Abstract
The world of competitive sport can present a challenging environment for Christian athletes and coaches. The culture of competitive sport, and particularly the attitude to winning, can cause athletes and coaches to question how their Christian faith should shape participation and/or whether they should participate at all. Few empirical studies have explored how Christian coaches frame their practice to align with their faith and reconcile the potential contradictions and challenges of coaching within competitive sporting environments. That said, there has been a recent increase in the number of studies exploring the potential relationship between sports coaching and the concept of servant leadership – a framework which is commensurate with a Christian world view. The aim of this paper is to contribute to these debates by presenting empirical evidence to explore the philosophies, intended practices and sociocultural factors influencing how Christian coaches sought to lead in competitive sporting environments. One hundred and ten coaches (female = 24, male = 86) completed an online qualitative questionnaire which explored their beliefs about leadership and coaching practice. This paper considers the ways in which Christian coaches’ might seek to frame their leadership behaviours within the context of competitive sport and how their approaches might align, or otherwise, with the theoretical tenets of servant leadership.
Highlights
Academic scholarship investigating the relationship between Christianity and competitive sport has revealed a considerable number of tensions
Our study was to explore the philosophies, intended practices and sociocultural factors influencing how Christian coaches sought to lead in competitive sporting environments
Meaningful coherence will be achieved if the reader considers that this research meets its principal aim, i.e., that it explores the philosophies, intended practices and sociocultural factors influencing how Christian coaches sought to lead in competitive sporting environments
Summary
Academic scholarship investigating the relationship between Christianity and competitive sport has revealed a considerable number of tensions. Stevenson[1] reported that Christian athletes wrestled with a series of personal factors including: the importance of winning, the importance of social status, the expectations of others, and relational dynamics with opponents and with their coach. Whilst some researchers have continued to discuss and problematize these issues from an athlete perspective (e.g.2,3), the specific body of literature surrounding the relationship between sports coaching and Christianity raises a number of fundamental questions about whether competitive sport is a legitimate vocational field for Christians. In one of the few published studies on this topic, Bennett, Sagas[4] reported how coaches might view themselves as a ‘living contradiction’ unable to reconcile the desire to win alongside their Christian faith. We focus on the overarching concept of ‘leadership’ with a view to offering Christian sports coaches an operational framework in relation to their practices and responsibilities regarding athletes and teams in competitive sport. The central aim of Reviewers: Trevor Egli (Johnson University, USA) Michael Sagas (University of Florida, USA) Jon Welty Peachey (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA)
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