No, they aren’t sinful whether or not they take part in them or take part in them as spectators.
Some might imagine that such Sunday participation is sinful due to the long-held Protestant sentiment relating to the Lord's Day in the USA. The Catholic Church agrees that we should always keep away from pointless procuring and that we should always not unnecessarily burden folks with Sunday work.
The Church has a distinct view on eating places and sporting occasions (see CCC 2187).
Some could object to the instance of the British Christian runner “Eric Liddell” whose story was depicted within the 1982 Academy Award profitable film “Chariots of Fireplace”. Paris Paris due to his view of the third commandment. Thus, he didn’t compete within the 100-meter or 4×400-meter relay, however he received the 400-meter sprint and positioned third within the 200.
As Catholics, we are able to commend Liddell for what we’ve performed to honor God, however we’d disagree with him on his interpretation of the sanctification of the Sabbath/Lord's Day. The Church has lengthy seen Sunday sporting occasions as a possibility to bear joyful witness to the Lord. Consequently, Catholic athletes have by no means been required to overlook Olympic occasions on Sundays, and I’m not conscious of any Protestant competitor within the 4 main skilled sports activities leagues in the USA—the NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL—who abstain from taking part in on Sundays, and in these leagues there are numerous religious Protestant Christians.
Equally, as younger males taking part in Catholic Youth Group (CYO) soccer within the Detroit Catholic League, we attended Sunday Mass after which attended our late morning soccer video games. We saved issues in perspective, with “religion, household, and soccer” in that order, so taking part in soccer was a positively formative expertise for us, our mother and father, and different classmates.
Subsequently, benefit from the sporting occasions of the Catholic Sunday Faculty, both as members or as spectators!
