Regular readers of my journal know that I’m not much of a sports fan. The sports I enjoy the most are ones in which I know the players. Over the years, I’ve been to youth baseball, high school basketball, youth soccer and youth hockey games that I have enjoyed immensely. The University of North Carolina Tarheels won a national basketball championship when our son was a student at UNC and I paid attention to college basketball, at least the final four, for several years. I’ve been a Chicago Cubs fan since we lived in Chicago and I was watching on television when they won the World Series in 2016. Our daughter and her husband are fans of the New York Giants football team and we watch games with them when we are visiting, though this hasn’t been the Giants’ year. When I was an active pastor I paid enough attention to sports to carry on somewhat intelligent conversation with church members who were sports fans, but they probably sensed that I was less than a dedicated fan when I didn’t know the names and statistics of individual players.

Even someone who doesn’t pay attention to sports, however, can’t live where we do and completely ignore the big sports news from just across the border. Last night, in Vancouver, Christine Sinclair played her last game for Canada as the Canadian Women’s Soccer team won over Australia 1-0. The stadium attendance set a record for a women’s soccer match in Canadian history with 48,112 fans filling the stadium not far from Burnaby, Sinclair’s home town. Sinclair is retiring at the age of 40 after nearly 24 years as part of the Canadian national team. She made her first appearance on the national team at the age of 16 in 2000.

One of the emotional moments of the evening occurred before the game, when 190 youth soccer players walked in long lines onto the field, one for each of Sinclair’s 190 international goals. Sinclair scored the first of those goals on March 4, 2000 at the age of 16. She has two gold and one bronze olympic medals, earned as part of the national team. It is no wonder that she has become the hero of so many youth soccer players in Canada. The youth all wore red jerseys like their hero. Some of the jerseys stretched down to the knees of the young players. Vancouver’s BC Place was ceremonially re-named Christine Sinclair Place for the night in her honor.

It is a big deal across the border.

Listening to CBC radio, which I often do because we get a really strong signal living where we do, I learned that Sinclair has used her recognition to work tirelessly for equality for women, especially in sports. The commentators couldn’t resist reporting a statistic about the lack of that equality, however. Not only a member of the national team, Sinclair supports herself as a professional soccer player. She will play out the rest of this season for the Portland Thorns of the National Women’s Soccer League. Her contract for her final year with the league will net her $380,000. Compare that with Christiano Ronaldo, the highest paid men’s soccer player, whose contract will net him $260,000,000. The three top men’s soccer players earn a combined salary of half a billion dollars. Professional soccer has a ways to go before achieving equal pay for equal work.

I confess that I don’t understand the enormous amounts of money in professional sports. Of course the salaries of the highest paid players are well in excess of average salaries. On average, soccer isn’t the most lucrative sport. Average salaries are higher in professional basketball, baseball, and formula 1/Grand Prix racing. Average salaries exceed a million dollars in other professional sports: ice hokey, football, cricket, and golf. Those salaries are beyond my comprehension. I was never famous and I never approached the top of my field, but my best year as a pastor didn’t approach the pay earned by a professional cyclist, let alone a boxer, track star, or tennis player. I’m not complaining. I was treated well by the congregations that hired me and I didn’t go into my vocation for the pay. I would not have been successful with a career in any professional sports field.

Nonetheless, over the span of my career it is clear that I earned more than female pastors with similar experience doing similar work. Great strides have been made toward pay equity in our church, but those changes came later in my career. In general, the increase in the number of female clergy over the span of my career has resulted in women moving into positions of leadership in the church and higher salaries. That progress, however, has been slow. The United Church of Christ just elected its first female General Minister and President last summer. The head of our national church is not the highest paid pastor in our denomination, however. Large local congregations offer salaries that are higher than judicatory positions pay.

Like I said, we pastors don’t enter our profession in search of high salaries.

I join with my Canadian neighbors in celebrating the remarkable career of Christine Sinclair. I am especially moved by the ways in which she has inspired and motivated so many children and youth and especially young girls to pursue their soccer dreams. The vast majority of those young players will not make a career of sport, but many of them will translate their passion for sport into more active and healthier lifestyles regardless of how they earn their living. And perhaps - just perhaps - the national news stories about the lack of pay equity in professional sports will shed light on inequities in salaries that are based on gender in all fields. Society benefits when the lack of fairness is addressed and corrected.

I join my Canadian neighbors in wishing Christine Sinclair the best in whatever comes next in her life. May she continue to inspire youth and continue to speak up for equity and fairness for all.