Ohio megachurch pastor kicks Bible off stage during Super Bowl Sunday service
Pastor: 'We believe that church can and should be fun'
An Evangelical megachurch in Ohio kicked off Super Bowl weekend — literally — with a sermon that had all of social media buzzing.
Pastors with Crossroads Church in Cincinnati, a multi-site interdenominational church that boasts a weekly congregation of roughly 34,000, “punted” a copy of the Bible as part of its “Super Bowl of Preaching” series.
The sermon was delivered on Feb. 11, just hours before the Kansas City Chiefs topped the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII.
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With play-by-play announcers, color commentary, a referee, and a stage covered in AstroTurf, the Crossroads pulpit resembled Allegiant Stadium more than any church on Sunday morning as Senior Pastor Brian Tome and Pastor Alli Patterson sported football jerseys as they took the stage for the “pregame” coin flip.
After Tome wins the flip, the referee asks, “Would you like to kick or receive the Bible?”
“I will receive,” Tome replied.
Patterson is then seen taking a few steps back as another pastor squares up the Bible — which had a football-style book cover on it — before kicking the Bible off the stage and into the crowd.
Patterson then high-fives her colleague in celebration.
“Patterson back with the kick ... Oh my goodness!” the announcer is heard saying over the PA. “For the first time in 18 years, there’s a touchback for the kickoff.”
In another sequence, the Bible is kicked yet again — this time a shorter distance — as the rest of the “players” on stage jump on top of the book as they tackle one another.
“We’re gonna get some emails; here we go,” the announcer remarks.
In an introduction to the video, Andy Reider, community pastor for Crossroads Anywhere, the church’s mobile app, offers a greeting — and a disclaimer — warning viewers the church service has “little to nothing to do with actual football or the Super Bowl.”
“Today, you are tuning in for a church service that is unlike any other,” said Reider. “Disclaimer: it has little to nothing to do with actual football or the Super Bowl, but no matter what you believe, you're going to laugh.
“No matter what you believe, you might be a little confused at some point, but I believe you will and can experience God and church in a fresh new way.”
Reid also acknowledged the question many viewers of the service likely had.
“You might be wondering why on Earth would we do something like this,” he said.
One of the reasons, said Reider, was because “we believe that church can and should be fun.”
“You're going to experience hilarious commercials filled with middle school humor, really great music and some good old-fashioned smack talk,” he added. “But secondly, we believe that there are spiritual truths and realities that can be drawn out from sports and that's what each of our teachers are going to be doing today.”
CP reached out to Crossroads Church for comment on Tuesday. This story will be updated if a response is received.
Headquartered in Oakley, Ohio, Crossroads, which was founded more than two decades ago by former employees of American multinational Proctor & Gamble, faced backlash in 2021 after a guest speaker compared trans-identifying people to individuals with anorexia who are suicidal because they think they are overweight.
David Mahan, the director of policy with Center for Christian Virtue, Ohio's largest Christian public policy organization, reportedly asked the congregation what they would do if an anorexic teen came before them, saying she was suicidal because she was fat.
"What is your response? Affirmation, or do you try to get her distorted mentality of herself to line up with her biological reality? What do we do? And if we do the latter, why wouldn't we do it with the same dysphoric condition of transgenderism?" Mahan said.
Ian M. Giatti is a reporter for The Christian Post and the author of BACKWARDS DAD: a children's book for grownups. He can be reached at: [email protected].
