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The Vatican turns to cricket 
2:46 pm, Tue October 22, 2013
The traditional English sport of cricket (popularized throughout parts of the Commonwealth) will get a surprising new platform for widening its appeal shortly when the Vatican establishes a league of its own.
Vatican officials announced on Tuesday that its cricket league will comprise teams of priests and seminarians from Catholic colleges and seminaries in Rome. And the Roman Catholics have a lofty goal: to defeat the Church of England - not in a theological re-match, nearly 500 years after they split - but on the cricket pitch.
The challenge was launched at the baptism of the St. Peter's Cricket Club.
The seminaries and religious colleges will play each other in a tournament based on the Twenty/20 format of the game.
After that, the best players will form a Vatican team, which will be called the "Vatican XI," and challenge the Church of England to form its own team of Anglican priests and seminarians to play in London at Lord's, the home of cricket.
"The Vatican team will be able to play anybody in the world. We hope to see a Vatican team playing at Lord's," said Alfonso Jayarajah, a Sri Lankan who was the first captain of the Italian national team and a board member of St. Peter's Cricket Club.
"We hope to have ecumenical dialogue through cricket and play a Church of England side by September," said Father Theodore Mascarenhas, an Indian official at the Vatican's Council for Culture, who once played as an off-spin bowler.
The idea for a Catholic cricket club was the brainchild of John McCarthy, Australia's ambassador to the Vatican. He wanted to see something similar to the Clericus Cup, a soccer tournament among the religious colleges and seminaries of Rome.
The Vatican team will wear the official colours of the tiny city-state - yellow and white - and their jackets will have the seal of the papacy, two crossed keys.
The initiative was announced on Tuesday in a library in the Pontifical Council for Culture, a Vatican department which concerns itself with sport and science as well as art and music.
2:46 pm, Tue October 22, 2013
The traditional English sport of cricket (popularized throughout parts of the Commonwealth) will get a surprising new platform for widening its appeal shortly when the Vatican establishes a league of its own.
Vatican officials announced on Tuesday that its cricket league will comprise teams of priests and seminarians from Catholic colleges and seminaries in Rome. And the Roman Catholics have a lofty goal: to defeat the Church of England - not in a theological re-match, nearly 500 years after they split - but on the cricket pitch.
The challenge was launched at the baptism of the St. Peter's Cricket Club.
The seminaries and religious colleges will play each other in a tournament based on the Twenty/20 format of the game.
After that, the best players will form a Vatican team, which will be called the "Vatican XI," and challenge the Church of England to form its own team of Anglican priests and seminarians to play in London at Lord's, the home of cricket.
"The Vatican team will be able to play anybody in the world. We hope to see a Vatican team playing at Lord's," said Alfonso Jayarajah, a Sri Lankan who was the first captain of the Italian national team and a board member of St. Peter's Cricket Club.
"We hope to have ecumenical dialogue through cricket and play a Church of England side by September," said Father Theodore Mascarenhas, an Indian official at the Vatican's Council for Culture, who once played as an off-spin bowler.
The idea for a Catholic cricket club was the brainchild of John McCarthy, Australia's ambassador to the Vatican. He wanted to see something similar to the Clericus Cup, a soccer tournament among the religious colleges and seminaries of Rome.
The Vatican team will wear the official colours of the tiny city-state - yellow and white - and their jackets will have the seal of the papacy, two crossed keys.
The initiative was announced on Tuesday in a library in the Pontifical Council for Culture, a Vatican department which concerns itself with sport and science as well as art and music.
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