5 powerful moments of faith at the 2026 FIFA World Cup
The 2026 FIFA World Cup, the first joint host by the US, Canada, and Mexico, has already featured multiple displays of Christian faith from players and teams. Croatian players Kristijan Jakić and Igor Matanović spoke at a press conference before their opening match against England, explaining how Catholicism shapes their lives and the team’s identity. After a match between Curaçao and Germany, players from both teams joined in prayer, illustrating inter‑team spiritual solidarity. The article highlights five key moments of faith at the tournament, underscoring the global reach of Catholicism within the sporting arena.
3 months ago
The 2026 FIFA World Cup has already seen several public expressions of Catholic faith by players and teams, highlighting how personal belief can intersect with the global sport.
Before facing England, Croatia’s Kristijan Jakić and Igor Matanović spoke to the press about how Catholicism guides their lives and the national squad, describing prayer as a source of strength and identity.
After Curaçao’s historic debut—setting a Guinness World Record as the smallest nation to qualify—its players gathered for a moment of gratitude on the field. German teammates Jonathan Tah and Felix Nmecha, both outspoken Christians, joined them, emphasizing brotherhood in Christ beyond competition.
Following his three‑goal performance that tied Miroslav Klose’s record of 16 World Cup goals, Argentina’s captain Lionel Messi publicly thanked God, calling his achievements a blessing.
Following a 4‑1 win over Paraguay, U.S. defender Mark McKenzie led a prayer on the pitch. The team’s faith is also reflected in Christian Pulisic’s “Bible Time” study groups and goalkeeper Matt Freese’s daily listening to Father Mike Schmitz’s “Bible in a Year” podcast.
After scoring Germany’s opening goal against Curaçao, Nmecha knelt, removed a crown, placed it on the ground and pointed upward, symbolizing that all glory belongs to Jesus. He later affirmed that his talent and success are gifts from God.
Catholicism’s influence on contemporary international sports culture
Catholicism’s influence on contemporary international sports culture is best understood not as formal control over leagues and federations, but as a persistent moral and pastoral “presence”: the Church enters dialogue with sport’s institutions, promotes a vision of sport centered on the human person, and encourages practices that foster virtue, peace, and encounter rather than doping, violence, or commercialization.
The Church’s influence is grounded in the conviction that sport shapes public life and therefore carries co-responsibility for how it develops. The Dicastery document Giving the Best of Yourself states that the Church “does not avoid the co-responsibility for development of sport and its fate,” and explicitly describes her desire “to enter into dialogue” with “sports organizations and governing bodies” in order to advocate for the humanization of contemporary sport.
This “humanization” is not merely sentimental; it has concrete ethical targets. The same text identifies moral problems that can erode the spirit of sport—doping, corruption, spectator violence, and rampant commercialization—and notes that the Church can offer “a moral vision” in precisely these contexts.
Catholic influence also shows up institutionally. The Dicastery text explains that the Holy See has “different bodies interested in the sporting phenomenon” that promote sport from institutional, pastoral, and cultural standpoints.
At the national level, it highlights that “national Episcopal Conferences” often work closely with sports associations; and in some countries, ecclesiastical sports clubs and associations have existed for more than a century, actively participating in sporting events. Priests may be involved in parish sports groups or serve as chaplains to professional clubs and even at the Olympic Games.
The Church’s approach functions like a counter-principle to what the John Paul II homily calls negative and “discutible” aspects that exist in sport. He frames the Christian task as acceptance, assumption, redemption—i.e., not fleeing sport, but redeeming its human values.
A key synthesis appears in the same homily: sport should be governed by the principle that human dignity is the end and measure of every sporting activity, not the other way around.
Catholic influence is particularly visible in how it interprets sport’s social role in a world marked by migration, nationalism, and identity conflicts. The Dicastery document says sport is “one of the few realities today that have transcended the boundaries of religion and culture.”
Because the Church seeks unity of the human family, this becomes especially significant “when seen in the context of sports.” The document even links Catholic identity with what it calls “what is best in the spirit of sports,” describing the Church’s role as building bridges and promoting common causes—like “leaven” permeating society.
John Paul II’s 1984 homily places these ideas in a deeply international and moral frame. He explicitly calls sport a means of “pacific coesistence of all the peoples,” “beyond and above every discrimination of race, language and nations.”
This peace-oriented vision is also connected to a Christian interior life: he quotes and interprets Paul’s language about the athlete’s self-mastery and temperance, treating sport as a training ground for moral virtues—honesty, loyalty, perseverance, collaboration—so that competition does not degrade into hostility.
A major pathway of Catholic influence on international sport is education—especially the formation of youth athletes and sports leaders. Pope Benedict XVI, addressing a 2009 seminar on “Sports, education, faith,” emphasizes that sports initiatives should aim at “integral development of the person,” provided they are managed by competent personnel. He adds that such initiatives offer priests, religious, and lay people “true and proper educators and teachers of life” for the young.
Benedict XVI stresses that sport can stimulate “competitiveness, courage and tenacity in pursuing goals,” but insists on avoiding practices that “pervert the nature of sports,” explicitly naming doping.
In other words, Catholic influence does not aim to reduce the intensity of competition; it aims to redirect it toward virtue and a mature anthropology (a view of the human being as more than physical performance).
The same address grounds this educational logic in the Second Vatican Council’s teaching that sports belong to humanity’s common patrimony and facilitate moral development and human formation.
John Paul II’s homily gives a theological depth to the Church’s formation approach. He connects sport to bodily excellence while maintaining a sacramental-moral claim: by Baptism the human person—“in his totality and integral nature of soul and body”—is the “temple of the Holy Spirit,” so athletes are called to “glorify God in [their] body.”
He also contrasts two “crowns”: the corruptible reward sought in ancient athletic competition versus the “incorruptible” reality of life with God, thereby placing sporting ambition within a larger moral horizon.
Catholicism’s impact is not limited to athletes; it also targets the institutions that shape public perception—governance bodies and the sports press.
Pope John Paul II, speaking to FIFA executives, links sport’s global scale to moral responsibility: football’s worldwide reach and media coverage create “an immense power” that must be used “for the good of the human family.”
He explicitly hopes FIFA will keep tackling violence, noting that young people learn to compete without conflict—where the opponent is not an enemy.
He also warns that while football’s financial success can sustain charitable initiatives, it can also contribute to “a culture of selfishness and greed,” so the “finer values of sport” must be emphasized and transmitted.
Catholic influence extends to how sport is narrated. Pope John XXIII, addressing the International Sports Press Association, says sports journalism has “a grave responsibility” because it can “orient the opinion of the masses.”
He adds that journalists do not only inform but also “form opinion,” and therefore should educate the public toward the right place of sport in human activity—“ni trop mesquine… ni… trop grande.”
Concretely, he warns against dangerous myth-making and disproportionate enthusiasm—especially over purely physical values—and urges a Christian journalistic program summarized as “faire la vérité dans la charité” (“making the truth in charity”).
In the present pontificate, Catholic influence continues through direct communication to athletes and clubs—shaping what role models are expected to represent.
Pope Leo XIV, in a message to executives and players of Inter, praises success achieved through “hard work, teamwork, discipline and perseverance,” but insists that this moment of achievement must translate into a message useful for youth. He states that young people look at players as “heroes” and that this “entrusts you with a responsibility that goes beyond performance” and calls them to be “witnesses to values.”
He then reinforces a moral standard from Saint John Paul II: ensure that many recognize in conduct “authenticity and integrity that stand the test of time.”
This kind of signaling matters in international sports culture because elite athletes function as transnational moral references—often more influential than formal statements by institutions. The Church’s strategy here is not merely to correct wrongs, but to propose an explicit model of integrity for athletes under intense public scrutiny.
Catholicism influences contemporary international sports culture primarily by advocating that sport be treated as a genuine human good that must be ordered to dignity, virtue, and peace—while addressing structural moral risks like doping, corruption, violence, and commercialization.
It pursues this through: dialogue with governing bodies, educational formation of youth, promotion of sport as “encounter” across cultural boundaries, and guidance for media and public narratives toward truth in charity.