"Hi, this is God. Thank you for calling the World-Cup-prayer-hot-line. If you want me to ensure Spain win, please press '1', for Portugal please press '2', for Brazil please press '3', for Argentina please press '4', for Japan please convert immediately and try again in four years."
I've always wondered why out of the 18 World Cup finals ever staged, all have been won by predominently Christian countries. Of those, 14 have been won by predominantly Catholic countries. What can we deduce from this? Well - clearly God exists, and what's more he strongly favours Catholisism but sometimes makes allowances for protestants so as to keep them from going completely off the rails and converting to Islam or Buddhism. Brazil have won it an astonishing 5 times. Is it any coincidence that they possess more practicing Catholics than any of the other countries involved? I think not. They even built a ridiculously enormous statue of Jesus overlooking Rio. Therefore the World Cup is a complete sham - imagine the time and effort put in by coaches, players, television executives, fans - all completely wasted. The fact is the World Cup is no different from American Idol / X-Factor, only that instead of phone votes, God just sits upstairs tallying up the prayer votes.
Growing up in a Catholic community and going to Catholic school I knew a number of priests who were very friendly, down-to-earth, thoroughly genuine, altruistic individuals who more importantly loved their football. From their pulpit they would always (in a light-hearted manner) urge the congregation to remember the England / Ireland team (depending on the priest) in their prayers. As a young God-fearing child obssessed by football I would always screw my eyes shut tightly at night with hands clasped, begging God for England World Cup glory - not realising I was hopelessly out-numbered by hordes of Brazilian kids doing exactly the same back in Sao Paulo.
My point is: isn't asking God for your team to be better than the other team sort of cheating in a way? It's one thing to use performance enhancing drugs but it's a whole different ball-game when you try to enlist the help of an omnipotant being. How can that be a level playing field? Until FIFA looks into this and finds some way to prevent true believers from gaining favour for their teams then Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and secular countries will never stand a chance, especially if it ever came down to penalties, after all - JESUS SAVES.
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