Helping outsiders come inside and stay. Summer 1998 Marshall Shelley Current Trends & Columns

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Harry Caray wasn't Chicago's best songleader, but he was the best known. The 84-year-old sportscaster, the voice of the Cubs, died just before spring training this year, forever silencing his trademark lead-in to the seventh-inning-stretch anthem.

"Lemme hear ya," he'd bellow. "Uh one, uh two, uh three … " and we'd all sing, "Take me out to the ball game."

Harry wasn't slick, often mispronouncing names. An unabashed fan, he'd cheer each home run with "It might be … it could be … it is! Holy cow!"

He was Everyman. Even his theology came from the bleacher seats. In his book Holy Cow! he wrote, "I am not a religious man. I've made some mistakes in my life. Dutchie is my third wife … and I've paid a lot of alimony in my time. But I've always believed in Almighty God. I've always believed that if you live your life as a decent person, the umpire in the end will say you did it right."

While there may be more to Harry's beliefs than I've read, this statement reflects the four tenets of today's street-level Everyman Theology:

1. Belief in Almighty God.
   
2. Open admission of "mistakes."
   
3. A self-defined "decent" life.
   
4. Expectation that at Judgment Day, "the Umpire" will call you safe.
   

Every time I watch a Cubs game this year and see the patch on each player's uniform featuring Harry's likeness, I think about his "statement of faith": In the end, God's gonna do what God's gonna do, and I've lived a middle-of-the-pack moral life, and I figure that's good enough for the Umpire to spread wide his arms for me.

I wonder, Is that faith? Or fatalism?

Is that trusting God or mere self-satisfaction? Is that relying on God's grace, or denying any need for grace?

I freely admit I'm "not in position to make the call" on Harry's ...

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