You may or may not be into football, but the 28-year-old kicker for the Kansas City Chiefs, Harrison Butker, gave quite a commencement address this month to the graduates of Benedictine College, a Catholic university in Kansas. Whether you have or haven’t, it’s worth knowing what took place.
First, Butker is clear and plain about the current, perverted state of the world. He doesn’t go into details (mercifully), but he also doesn’t artificially hold back or self-censor. He notes that “Pride Month” is a celebration of deadly sin. He tells the young women that they have been relentlessly lied to by our culture, just as young men have been pressured to abandon healthy masculinity. (Not the evil, twisted version of masculinity, but the right kind.)
The second thing to note is that he doesn’t dwell on the negative. He, instead, seeks to focus on the positive—encouraging the young men and women listening to embrace their primary and most important vocations, beyond a title, jobs, or career. Butker speaks, for example, of how his success and his family’s success would not be possible if his wife had not fully embraced what he calls the most important title—that of “homemaker.” He received an 18-second round of applause after that statement—applause that even those who hated the speech noted was given by both men and women there. Honestly, seeing such values reflected in a young man in a position where many are corrupted by worldly priorities was encouraging. Hopefully, such values really do inform the rest of his life away from the cameras.
The third item worth noting by those who know the truth is that his speech was not simply a defense of “traditional” or even biblical values. It was a full-throated promotion of Catholic values and the Catholic faith. Of course, this should not be a surprise. He’s a serious Catholic. (Personally, I’d say he’s more Catholic than their pope these days.) And he is speaking at a Catholic college commencement to (presumably) young Catholic graduates. So, again, it should not be a surprise.
But it should mean something to those of us in the Church of God, who—by God’s grace—have been given insight into such things. His depiction of the Roman Catholic Church as the church founded by Jesus Christ when it was not should get our attention. His praise of how life should be centered around a “sacrificial mass” that is in contradiction to the laws of God should catch our mind’s eye. Does it mean he is evil? Not at all! Just deceived (Revelation 12:9).
This suggests a few different but related takeaways: (1) Those who represent the false faith often do not come across as “villains”—if anything, they often share some (even many) of our values. 2 Corinthians 11:14 points out that Satan seeks to come across as an angel of light, and he will ensure his counterfeit Christianity seems that way. (2) That said, he speaks of his own faith with a passionate devotion that should challenge us. Do we feel as passionately devoted to our own—a faith that literally does go all the way back to Jesus Christ and His disciples? If not, we should examine how we can grow into such a devotion. And (3) his speech could have prophetic weight (believe it or not). Is Harrison Butker the Beast of Revelation?!?! Er… no. However, there is a growing backlash among Catholics against certain progressive attitudes in the Roman Catholic church and, frankly, associated with their current pope. And should a wave of “Catholics taking Catholicism seriously” gain real traction among the younger generations, what prophecy says concerning the future actions of the apostate, counterfeit Christianity should begin to come to mind.
Tomorrow’s World should have a commentary coming out soon on the topic, and when it does, we’ll try to remember to come back here and add a link to it.
