October 13 1905
AT THE Church Congress the Bishop of London [Dr Arthur Foley
Winnington-Ingram] described his experiences at a football match, where, as a
spectator, he shouted himself hoarse in his support of the side in which he was
interested. His lordship was not a solitary instance of the ecclesiastic who
sympathises with athletics. In England, indeed, the spectacle even of the
clerical athlete is a familiar one. But it comes upon us with a sense of
amazement that the Head of the Roman Church has just permitted the holding of
some athletic sports in the grounds of the Vatican, and was himself present at
the performance, making on the occasion an excellent little speech, in which he
extolled the benefits of a sane athleticism.
We can quite imagine the horror with which sticklers for Vatican dignity and
repose would regard His Holiness’s daring innovation; to ourselves it is not
shocking, but only surprising. The present Pope [Pius X], as a matter of fact,
has been an athlete himself, and a member of the Alpine Club. Doubtless the
memory of his vigorous feats in the past makes the rôle of the Prisoner of the
Vatican the more irksome to play, and it would be to him something of a relief
from his inactivity at least to see others doing that which his position denies
to himself.