The Boston Red Sox put themselves at the front of the homosexuality-is-normal movement (link), but they also have the largest number of evangelical Christians. Did they quietly stay away during the Red Sox homosexuality antics? If they objected, did Red Sox management decide to plow forward anyway at the risk of offending some of their biggest players? Strange days.
As the Sunday baseball crowd streamed into the park less than an hour before the defending world champions played their 128th game of the season, a dozen members of the Red Sox -- the largest group of evangelical Christians on any team in Major League Baseball -- joined an equal number of coaches and staffers in sharing a bond of faith that is fast becoming the stuff of national renown among religious figures in sports.
The service was conducted by the Rev. Walt Day of Baseball Chapel, a ministry that provides all 30 major league teams with a chaplain. Moments earlier, Day had turned a stuffy storage room in the visitors clubhouse into a chapel for five Detroit Tigers.
Similar contrasts in the size of the Sox congregations and others have seized the attention of baseball chaplains across the country.
''Without question, chapel attendance among the Red Sox has been far and away more than any of the major league teams over the last two years," said Vince Nauss, president of Baseball Chapel.
Trot Nixon, Mike Timlin, Tim Wakefield, Jason Varitek, Curt Schilling, Doug Mirabelli, Bill Mueller, Matt Clement, John Olerud, Mike Myers, Tony Graffanino, Chad Bradford: Each Sox player considers himself an evangelical Christian who believes in the sacred authority of the Bible and the promise of Jesus Christ as his savior.
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