Today's Battle for Women's Sports

Faith, Sport, and the Human Person

I don’t know if you’ve seen this—anyone here from Nebraska? I love Nebraska. We love Nebraska.

Nebraska set a women’s sports record: 92,000 people. Caitlin Clark, right, has been selling out stadiums. The women’s Final Four had four million more viewers than the men’s Final Four.

So I expect we might have some full seats. We’ll see if people come in—that’s my measure.

Thank you so much for coming and discussing with me this very timely topic. You guys are probably off your phones this afternoon, but the world is blowing up right now in regards to women’s athletics. We’ll talk about that in a second.

But first, if you would just join me, let’s start in a quick prayer and then we’ll get going.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.

Come Holy Spirit, teach us how to pray. Jesus, we praise you and we thank you for the gift of this day, the gift and the opportunity to be together, to really witness your love for us, witness your love for our humanity, witness your love for the gifts that you’ve given us, witness your love for the athletic talents that you’ve given us.

Today we just offer this talk up for all the athletes who are beginning their Olympic journey over the next few weeks, as the opening ceremony was today. I feel really called to intercede for those athletes—that God will be glorified through their sport, through their play, that this time will be a source of conversion, and that the Lord would have mercy on us.

We just pray this in Jesus’ most holy and sacred name, amen.

Amen.

Caitlin Clark, the NCAA, and the Protection of Women’s Sports

Good, good. Okay—was anybody at the Eucharistic Congress last week? A few of you? Okay.

So, the Congress took place in Indianapolis. Indianapolis is the new, basically, capital of the world because Caitlin Clark is playing basketball there.

I stayed in the Marriott Hotel and, I don’t know if any of you saw this, but on the side of the Marriott Hotel was a massive poster of Caitlin Clark. Pretty cool. Very cool.

Now behind the JW Marriott, which some people don’t know this, is the Eucharistic Congress. And so we have this interesting dichotomy, right? Never have women’s sports been more celebrated, more viewed—but the NCAA has been completely silent in protecting women from having men compete against them.

I’ve had the privilege of getting to know Riley Gaines. And the head of the NCAA came to Riley and said to her: “I actually don’t agree with what’s going on, but I can’t do anything about it.”

I think the majority of people in the country agree with this man, but he’s powerless.

People ask me all the time, “Well, have you met Caitlin Clark? Do you have a connection to Caitlin Clark?” I actually don’t want a connection to Caitlin Clark. Everybody is trying to use this woman right now.

So one thing—I was walking, the convention center is literally right across. I took this picture, and I was really struck that behind me, this was happening: 54,000 people on their knees in front of Jesus.

And I prayed. I prayed for Caitlin, who has become this beacon—we’ll talk about why, kind of a hope in women’s athletics right now. But I also prayed for the individuals within the NCAA who remain spineless, who are afraid to protect women from men competing in women’s sports.

But I found a lot of hope in it.

Now, I don’t know about you, but it is the greatest time of every four years. Can I get some agreement with that? I’m so excited.

I actually cried this afternoon. I’m a tough athlete—I don’t cry. And I cried, but not for the reason you’d think.

The opening ceremonies went on today in Paris. And I love the Olympics. Right? It’s—man fully alive. But the whole opening ceremony was made of mockery. It was turned into a drag performance.

And it gets worse. That was just in adoration before this. Like—pray in reparation for these people.

Sport Reveals Human Nature

This is what we’re facing. Whether you’re an athlete or not, a fan of sport or not, as a Catholic, as a lover of Jesus, this is what we’re facing. And it’s happening right now within this realm of athletics.

And the reason it’s happening ties into the theme of this conference: because we don’t know what it means to be human.

Because we don’t know Jesus.

The first is that it reveals our nature—what it means to be a human being. Our nature.

We’re not like angels—we’re not all spirit. We are body and soul, and you can’t separate them.

Today, society says you can. That you can be this body and this, interiorly, something else. But when does that actually happen? Death. Hence the culture of death we’re living in.

But in sport, the body reveals the soul, and the soul reveals the body.

If you talk to any athlete, they’ll admit that there is this kind of interior sense of self when they’re playing their sport. You often hear that sport is 90% mental.

And interestingly, in the Catholic sphere, we spend a ton of time talking about the spiritual side of things—so important. But if we’re a united being, what we do to the body affects the soul, and what we do to the soul affects the body.

And we see that naturally in sport. We see that revelation of the interior of the person.

And how interesting—I was just praying into this—how interesting that they mocked the Last Supper, where Christ’s body becomes a gift for us.

Because no matter the sport, what is the one constant? The use of the body.

The use of the body.

And so, we don’t know what it is to be human. I think this is one of the reasons that sport is so good, but also why it’s becoming mocked. Because sport naturally reveals what it is to be human in a couple of ways.

The Beauty of Athletic Gifts

Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m obviously a huge sports fan.

And I think when you see somebody like Simone Biles throw a triple backflip, or Sydney McLaughlin setting world records—she has the top 20 times in the 400m hurdles—I think we’re so attracted to that.

And honestly, I will literally watch any sport. I’ll watch archery in the Olympics. Anything. I’m just so fascinated, because when you see somebody do something incredible with their body, for me, that points to God.

Like—wow, Lord, look at that gift that you gave that person. Look at the drive you gave them. Look at that almost inhuman thing they just did.

It reveals the beauty and the nature of God.

Now, I suspect we have some athletes in the room as well.

I don’t know about you, but there are moments when I’m working out, when I am utterly exhausted, and it’s in those moments that I actually feel closest to God.

It’s transcendental. Something happens.

This past weekend, I drove halfway across the country to Lake Placid, New York. Two of the women I mentor were competing in the Ironman. One is a professional—she came in fourth. She’s a total badass, but she loves the Lord.

She said to me—I just signed up for an Ironman, so pray for me—she said, “I want to save you from the pain of it.” Because you do a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike, and then a marathon. She said, “Part of me wants to save you from the pain of it. But another part of me wants you to experience it—because when you are utterly exhausted, when you have nothing left, the only person you have to rely on is the Lord.”

The Sexual Difference Revealed in Sport

The last thing I think sport reveals is the sexual difference. And this is something, right, in our society that everybody’s trying to nullify—that there’s a sexual difference.

Do we have any basketball fans in the room? Everybody’s now a basketball fan for the kid, right?

If you look at how men play basketball versus how women play basketball, it’s inherently different. And that reveals something about the human person.

Men, right—this is a little bit of Theology of the Body for you—men in the sexual act are external. And so, we see the height of masculinity is sacrifice.

This is why men—you grow up, not that I didn’t love superhero movies—but you grow up loving Braveheart and superhero movies, and you have this sense of wanting to sacrifice yourself for the other. The person that lived that out perfectly is Christ.

But if you watch where men play basketball, there’s more sacrifice involved. It’s a little bit more individualistic, more driving solo, driving to the hoop, dunking the ball.

But the women’s game, on the other hand—women, the height of our femininity revealed through our bodies—yes, the height of our femininity revealed through our bodies is our receptivity. And then it’s our ability to bear forth life.

They say the women’s game is more graceful. There’s more passing, it’s more team-oriented. There’s a different purity to it.

I think that’s why the hearts of many people in America are being drawn to women’s basketball. Men’s has become over-politicized; that’s not happening in the women’s game right now. But there’s a purity to the game, there’s a grace to it, and we’re drawn to that.

It’s beautiful.

And nobody can argue that the games are different. Is one better than the other? No. They’re different. The sexual difference designed by God—we are made in His image and likeness, male and female He created them—is revealed through sport.

The Tension in Women’s Sports

Now, there’s been this interesting kind of tension in women’s sports as it’s matured over the years. Coming out of the feminist movement and all these different things, the idea arose that the athletic woman is less feminine than other women.

That was a lie I always believed.

In today’s society, when I was playing tackle football with the neighborhood boys and considered a tomboy—it’s scary to think who somebody would have said that I should be. Maybe, “You should be a boy.”

But I grew up with this lie that I wasn’t feminine.

Our interests don’t define our femininity. It’s not based on external things.

We are body and soul. Body and soul.

Which means, since God created me as a woman—saying this to all the women in the room—God designed you as a woman for a reason. And because of that, you are feminine in your whole being.

John Paul says you almost can’t even deny it. You just are. And your particular expression of it is going to be your gifts, your talents, the way you love, the way you play sports.

Men, the same thing is true for you. Because God designed you as men, you are masculine in your whole being.

Healing Through Sport

But we have to be so careful with our language these days.

I think this is why, actually, coming back to the pure intent of sport can really help heal our society.

Now, we’ll look at where things are, and we’ll get to how we got there. But it comes back to—and we’ve been talking about this—this cracked foundation in our anthropological understanding of the human person.

How could people think that it’s okay for a man to show up—and I think it was just in Washington State, three cyclists took the top three positions in a cycling race, three men.

How can they think that that’s okay?

Well, again, it comes back to: What is our understanding?

The Fundamental Question: Who Am I?

I work with a ton of young people. It’s kind of my bread and butter—the high school, college, some middle school.

And the fundamental question young people—and I think all of us—are asking today is: Who am I?

They’re desperate for a label. They’re desperate to slap something on: “Well, I’m an athlete. Well, I’m trans. Well, I’m this. Well, I’m that.”

But the Catholic Christian view that we come to know is that we’ve been created by God.

Did anybody in here ask to be created?

Our life is pure gift. Pure gift.

Our worth comes from the Lord. I just am loved. I am gift.

And revealed through the sexual difference, my body means I am meant to be a gift to others. It’s external, it’s outward, it’s focused on the other.

We see this trickle down into our view of our bodies, our view of marriage, our view of sex, our view of family.

Modern Queer Theory and Its Divide

Now, when we look at modern queer theory that developed—it’s the opposite.

“My creation is random. It’s just a result of some evolutionary process. Therefore, I’m random. Therefore, I am my own god. I have to create myself.”

This is why a lot of young people are trying to find their group, trying to find a label, trying to find an identity.

“My dignity requires external validation—hello, social media.”

And that’s a result of this division of body and soul. Marriage is just some contract. Sex is just about fulfilling my desires. And ultimately, we just saw this mockery—“I don’t need a Savior. Why don’t we mock Him instead?”

The Cultural Battle in Women’s Basketball

Now what’s interesting—I think, and granted neither of these women are perfect—and I want to put race aside for a second, I want to put sexual inclination aside for a second, I want to put faith or political beliefs aside for a second.

I want to talk about this.

There’s this kind of interesting cultural battle going on right now surrounding these two women.

For those who don’t know, two years ago Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark met in the national final. Caitlin Clark has been labeled one of the greatest basketball players of all time.

And right as they were winning, Angel Reese came into her face and started mocking. The country kind of blew up—very divided.

Caitlin’s response was one of humility: “Oh, she’s just being competitive.” Angel’s was very much defending herself.

This year, I watched Angel play three times. I ended up turning off the TV, because every time I turned it on, she was mocking—the coach, the players.

For me, that is the antithesis of sport.

When Caitlin was asked, after losing the national final to South Carolina this year, “What’s your legacy going to be?” she said something about the points, but then: “I hope it’s that the young athletes are inspired.”

Recently, she set a record for most assists in a WNBA game. And what did she do in the first interview? It was all, “My teammates.” They said, “No, it was you.”

There’s something in the purity of that. This is how we should all act. This is how sport should be: team-oriented, focused on the other, the greater good.

On the other side, there’s grasping for attention, grasping for influence—“I want to be remembered. It’s about me, what I did for women’s sports.”

I think both of these women are maturing. But I think it points to this kind of divide we have in sport.

Sport as a Gymnasium of Virtue

Who in here grew up playing sports?

Yes.

Who in here can say they are the person they are today because of the lessons they learned in sport?

There’s such a positive side.

One of my favorite quotes from John Paul II: he says that sport is a gymnasium for human virtue.

The virtues of teamwork, perseverance, kindness. Learning how to lose, learning how to win graciously. Learning how to respect your enemy. Learning how to deal with heated moments.

I was always the best of that, but the other thing is I love working with athletes because they’re hard, but when they finally open up their hearts to the Lord, they take off. It’s like this all-in mentality. But for many of them, they’ve spent their life working on their interior life—visualizing, thinking about their game, working on their mental toughness.

And so when Christ comes in, it’s like, “Oh yeah, sure, I can pray a holy hour, sure.” They can be intense.

I have this anecdote. I have this pro women’s Bible study right now, and a lot of them are professional Ironwomen. So, like, they train three to four hours a day at least—they’re really intense.

So we had the Bible study. I asked, “Alright, what do you guys want to do for the next thing? Here’s a couple options.” Of course, they pick the one that takes two and a half hours of CP a week. That means I have to prep for like four hours. Guys, thanks.

But there’s just this intensity, this desire to go after it wholeheartedly.

Identity Crisis in Sports

I think sport today is one of the purest things we have left for our young people. Of course it has its issues, but you can’t be on your phone when you’re playing soccer. It forces kids to have social interaction, to get outside.

Of course, it has its issues too—especially youth sports and parents, and we’re not going to talk about that, not anybody in this room, okay.

The other side of it—and we’re going to kind of dive into this a little bit deeper—is this identity crisis. The hidden struggles that go on in sport, the ego that comes out, and then how women are now under attack. Kind of the dark side of sports.

Every issue—I would argue, and we’ll talk about them in a second—every issue that I deal with as I work with high school, college, and professional athletes primarily comes back to women not knowing who they are.

And I go through this with them, and we all struggle with this, right? But we base our identity off three things:

1. What we do

2. What we look like

3. Others’ opinions of us

And each of them sets us up for failure.

“Well, I’m only loved if I earn a starting spot.” What happens if that doesn’t happen?
“My dad will only love me if I make verses.”
“I’ll only get the attraction of men if I lose 10 pounds.”

All of these things—these lies—we define ourselves by. These aspirations, whatever they are in our lives. For athletes, it’s the athlete, the performance, the weight, the time, the opinion of their coach, the opinion of their teammates. All of them set us up for failure.

The result—and it’s pretty hidden, though you guys in the sports world may not see it as hidden—are some pretty intense things.

The average college athlete drinks more than the normal student. They keep it together pretty well, but there’s a ton of pressure. When you don’t know who you are, you go looking for it in other ways.

Mental health is rampant. Just the other night, I got a call from a woman—I’ll call her Julia, to keep her kind of anonymous. She’s kind of a high-profile athlete.

Julia’s Story

I got a call from Julia, and I was shocked. She’s calling me slightly late at night, and I go to bed early now to get up and train this Ironman. And she calls me, and I’m like, “Hey, how are you?”

She said, “Today is my three-year anniversary when I was hospitalized three years ago.”

Julia—one of the top recruits in the country for women’s volleyball—goes off to school. Not only is she a top recruit, but now athletes are able to be sponsored, so there’s this whole new realm where athletes are making money. She’s also TikTok famous, so there’s that whole realm of things going on.

Apparently, they did a drug test—I don’t know, at this school—so she’s smoking some stuff. It was just this culmination of all these factors, and she snapped.

I got a call from her parents. They called me and said, “Hey, this happened. Do you mind starting to be with her?”

So for the next three years, Julia and I talked pretty regularly. We started meeting, talking about the Lord, talking about, “Yeah, it’s amazing that you’re this incredible volleyball player, but that’s not why you’re loved, baby. There’s no pressure to perform.”

One day, she called me and said, “Sam, what did I do before?”
I was like, “What do you mean?”
She said, “Having a daily prayer life changes everything.”

She went on to transfer. She’s thriving, playing C and volleyball. But there are so many unseen pressures on our athletes, and I think they’re just increasing.

Eating Disorders and Wounds

A lot of eating disorders: 82% of college female athletes have some level of disordered eating. 31% is kind of diagnosable level. That is rampant.

Interestingly, in the last six months—I have a master’s in psychology and DMU, and some other trainings—so I’m able to walk with these women, get them the help they need. I’ve worked with a number of women struggling still post-collegiately, in their 20s and 30s.

A lot of it’s the result of abuse, mother wounds, wanting to strive for a time. It’s this false sense of, “I’m only loved if I’m skinny, or if I perform.” Stripping that away has a lot of healing power, helping them realize who they are.

Sexual Confusion in Sports

Promiscuity—the Olympic Village is handing out 300,000 condoms.

Sexual confusion. Right? I don’t think people know that women in sport struggle with same-sex attraction. I don’t think they necessarily have an idea of the percentage. There’s no statistic, no study—they want to hide it. It’s probably about 30%.

In today’s age, it’s praised. I work with a WNBA player right now, and I would say that the WNBA is 80–90% women who identify as same-sex or are in relationships. Last year she said she was the only woman dating a man on her team.

The factors are many. Every woman’s story is different. But there’s a lot of abuse, parent wounds, “I don’t feel feminine.” Women are emotional—we connect, we intensely undergo things with people, and then our sexuality is ignited.

In today’s age, it’s praised. “If you’re attracted, that must mean you’re sexually attracted. That must mean you should just go for it.” But we don’t sexually mature until about 25. When they have an experience, suddenly they slap the label on: “I must be this way.”

I was talking to a friend of mine who played pro soccer, very secular. She said, “I think every female athlete at some point questions their sexuality—because of the culture, because of the preying that goes on. I’m not sure it’s a freshman thing, but I had people preying on me, ‘You sure? You don’t want to try it?’”

From my foundation, she said, “I think every female athlete questions their sexuality. It’s everywhere. And you’re persecuted if you stand up against it.”

All these athletes now have to wear Pride jerseys. The one woman soccer player that stood up was kicked off the national team. So many of them I talk to just say, “I get it off me as quick as I can.”

But why? Why does sport have to be where we’re portraying Pride flags?

Men in Women’s Sports

And then we have—what’s so on everybody’s heart and mind right now—men being in women’s sports.

Why is this unfair? It should be pretty logical. It’s good to have facts.

Men are—you know—they have bigger hearts, bigger lungs, actually even bigger throats, so they can take in more air. They have higher aerobic capacity. They’re stronger.

But what’s interesting, right, what’s interesting is there are all these regulations. Even in the Olympics right now, the regulations are a little bit tighter. It’s like, okay, well if you transitioned before 12, then you can compete.

There’s actually a study done that shows there’s actually a genetic advantage of pre-puberty people—young boys—over young girls. Now, I was winning the mile in gym class, so I don’t know. But predominantly, young boys actually outperform young girls athletically.

So even these regulations of like, “Well, let’s…” it’s not enough. And the result is men are running 25% faster, jumping 25% higher, lifting 30% more.

The Impact on Women’s Sports

Obviously, we had the transgender men in the last Olympics. There are some new regulations where they won’t be competing this Olympics, which is good. But what this does—it strips the opportunities.

I was with a young basketball player there, and we were discussing this. She brought it up, and she said to me, “Sam, this makes me feel like I don’t matter.”

It’s the exact opposite intent for women’s sports. They take spots, they take trophies. You know, we don’t hear this side of it.

One of the women that’s in my Bible study, she’s the number one triathlete in her age group in the world. They rank all the distances. She does mostly Ironman. She’s number one in the world.

The number two in the world is a woman who’s transitioning to be a man. They specialize in the half-Ironman distance, which, if you’re good, takes about—well, my friend does it in four and a half, she’s crazy—about six hours. Okay, for a woman.

She started being allowed to take testosterone for her mental health. Her time dropped an hour. We don’t hear that side of it. Women are being allowed to dope—that’s what we call doping—for your mental benefit, and as a result, they’re getting athletic advantages. And the right people don’t stand up.

Leaders Who Stay Silent

This just makes me so mad. Billie Jean King—champion of women’s athletics—okay with transgender men coming in.

Megan Rapinoe—now she’s retired, so she can say these things. When Megan was on the national team in 2017, they played 15-year-old boys and got beat 5 to 2. But she’s okay with men competing against women.

And this one—this one just, oh, it broke my heart. Here’s this coach, this champion of women’s sports—head coach Dawn Staley of University of South Carolina. They’ve won the last two national championships. Asked point-blank: did she support men in women’s athletics? And she said yes.

These people are smiling. And I ask, like, how? How? But I think when you get so far down a way of thinking, when lie comes after lie comes after lie, before you know it you’re preaching lies—ones that maybe originally, if you’d asked Billie Jean King, I’m sure at the start of 1979 she wouldn’t have agreed with. They’re afraid to stand up for truth.

Consequences and Resistance

Obviously, this is having a grand effect on women’s sports. This was a good one: the track girls in West Virginia who boycotted and then got banned. They ended up being let back in with the sports, but the girls were banned from competing because they stood up.

And obviously things are happening tonight right now. There’s a lot going on.

So how did we get here? I have five minutes left to tell you more—four hours.

So, a couple things. We have preyed on our children, right? 9.2% of current high school students identify as trans. 20% LGBTQ. They spend six hours on their phones. And so, I mean, social media is just field day: marketing, schools, medicine, counseling.

There’s been this interesting kind of hijacking of language. Language dictates culture. Things like “non-binary,” “trans,” “people as gender”—they’re made up. Don’t use them. They’re using these institutions as change agents.

You see 400 to 500 companies. This is a non-qualifier for the US for the Olympics. And then we just see money kind of driving this whole thing.

What Can We Do?

What can we do? We’re there, John, there’s a fight. I think something that’s been so hopeful about this conference for me is because we—we have the analogy, like, we have it.

You know, I’m so struck by what Riley’s doing and Paul is doing and all these advocates in women’s sports. And they’ve got the facts, they’ve got the science. But what we have is an understanding of what it means to be human. We have the anthropology, and we’re called to speak the truth with love.

One of my pet peeves is that people just say, “Well, let’s just create a separate category.” To quote Mary Hasson: I want team reality. Right? Man, we are on team reality. There is no such thing as a trans person. And so by creating a separate category, we are acknowledging that that is a separate person—that’s a separate type of person. That’s not truth-filled.

And this is crazy for me to say, as a female athlete who works with female athletics, who sees the beauty of it and the ugliness of it. I’m actually kind of—“happy” is the wrong word—hopeful that this battle has come to women’s athletics. I saw the wave coming. I didn’t think it would get this far. But female athletes—we’re tough.

“So Sam, how can you say open category is a separate category? Is that what you’re saying?”

“They would create a separate category for those. So an open category, a separate category—that’s the distinction you’re making?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, because open typically doesn’t matter anybody else. It can be anybody. It doesn’t get into the nuance, right? Or the anthropology. Just say open.”

“Yes.”

“True.”

So what—so like—it’s a few months, they’re tough. I think we’re going to win this battle. We have a lot of perseverance, and I think we’re willing to fight. So it’s sad that it’s come to this, but I think it’s causing people to wake up.

Make sure you’re talking to your schools, your teams, your admins. Don’t use the language “trans person,” you know, “sex change”—all these things that just further the lie. Talk to your political representatives. Be bold in the boycott.

I think that this is the bread and butter right here. Start. We have a world full of people done over there. And when you can look them in the eye—even these Olympians—you look them in the eye and say, “You’re not loved because you’re an Olympian. You’re just loved because you’re a daughter of God or son of God.” The freedom that that brings, the inner healing that that brings, the change and the shift in perspective that that brings—that’s what’s going to start changing the culture.

Can I just add that? Don’t use the term ‘gender.’ Agree? Say sex. Male, female. Because that word has been hijacked, so there’s so much confusion around it. Sex, sexual, sexual difference. Those are the words you want to use.

A Call to Prayer

And finally—just pray. The devil’s real. He hates us—especially women, because we’re life-giving. He hates the sexual difference because it reflects God, reflects our union that we’re called to with God.

So pray. You know, if Leah Thomas—who is the swimmer, I’ll end with this—Leah Thomas, who is the swimmer that swam against Riley Gaines, the male at Penn—you guys know Thomas—if he walked in this room right now, you would see me vaulting chairs. That would have been my reaction.

One day I was in prayer, and I was just—just angry. I was enraged. I felt like, I mean, I worked. I worked so many years, and I’ve come back from so many surgeries to get to the pinnacle of my athletic career, and I felt like he just waltzed in.

And the Lord—He kind of poked my heart. And He said, “You’re filled with rage and filled with hate. You need to pray for him. Because Will, at the end of the day, doesn’t know who he is.”

We’ve got to be praying for these people who don’t know who they are. Yes, for the injustice they’re causing—we need to stand in truth, but in love.

So I would love to say a prayer. Let’s just pray for these individuals who perform at the Olympic opening ceremony. Let’s pray in reparation for what they did today.