Waterford is the fourth town in Connecticut to have an FCA program along with their standard team. If you happen to be religious, what you see in church is a stark contrast to what you see on the playing field. Though sports and religion are not traditionally connected, they are slowly intertwining as the Fellowship of Christian Athletes becomes more and more popular in CT. Schools in CT can have religious clubs.
Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA), is a program where people around the world can practice both Christianity and their chosen sport. There are 114 countries where teams are located and 83,421 athletes who are all dedicated to their teammates, religion, and sport.
With FCA, athletes play the sport they love, while practicing their faith and using it as inspiration to become a better athlete and person. When team huddles occur, prayers are spoken and verses from the Bible are recited. FCA uses coaches to help connect athletes and religion during games and practices. These groups look to use faith as motivation, enlightenment, and connection to teammates.
Coaches of FCA have goals to strengthen athleticism while also strengthening faith.
Fellowship of Christian Athletes was founded by Don McClanen in 1954, where at the time he was a basketball coach in Oklahoma. He had a vision that he brought to life as he influenced his team by praying before games. Even though he was coaching just one basketball team, he was able to make one of the largest sports ministries in the world.
Participants, whether it be professional, college, high school, junior high, and youth levels, all use FCA to connect to religion while doing something they love.
Through values of integrity, teamwork, and excellence FCA aims to build athletes one heart at a time so that each can have a special connection to Jesus and grow as a person, according to the Connecticut FCA website.
FCA continues to grow and gain more members. FCA is definitely not for everyone, as many would rather focus on their sport without religion involved, but it is welcome to anyone interested.
