sport watch
Should we play for #ao1?
Jonny Reid
Is there a problem with playing for an audience of one?
Scroll through any Christian sports players’ social media and you’ll likely see #ao1 in their posts. It stands for ‘Audience of One’ and is a phrase that has been around for a few decades. It started in America with the organisation Athletes in Action saying:
18-year-old Christian cyclist dies
Luke Randall
An 18-year-old Christian cyclist from Switzerland has died while competing in the World Championships in Zurich.
Muriel Furrer was competing in a junior race when a bad crash in a wooded area left her with an eventually fatal brain injury. No one had witnessed the accident and she had been lying in the area before she was found during the next race. Furrer had regularly spoken of her faith on social media, with her Instagram profile declaring ‘all things through Christ’. She regularly posted about how God had helped her during competitions.
Call for action on betting surge
Luke Randall
Evangelical organisation Christian Action Research and Education (CARE) is calling for the government to ‘step in and hold the betting industry to account,’ following the revelation that the number of gambling adverts featured during the Premier League season's opening weekend has tripled since last year.
A study by the University of Bristol, funded by Gamble Aware, found that the opening round of fixtures across the weekend of 17 August saw 29,000 advertisements promoting gambling across the ten matches, marking a 165% increase on the previous year. West Ham’s evening clash with Aston Villa featured 6,500 ads, which works out to about 30 every minute.
Rory McIlroy and the Masters: is ambition a good thing?
“Never, ever give up on your dreams.” That was Rory McIlroy’s message after his career-defining triumph at the Masters, completing the Grand Slam and achieving every professional golfer’s dream.
From a young age, he had imagined a version of this moment. And for the last 11 years — since his last major win — he had dreamed of slipping on that iconic Green Jacket and becoming a champion at Augusta.