National football team | He takes the Bible literally

Evangelical propaganda in front of the fan curve: After his goal against SV Elversberg, Felix Nmecha takes off his imaginary crown. Photo: IMAGO/osnapix Football players who cross themselves after scoring a goal or point ecstatically towards the sky have always annoyed me. If he existed, I would really hope that he had better things to do than watch some idiots play football and intervene in regulation. But okay, to each their own folklore. After all, there are also goalkeepers who spit in their gloves before games without being put on the disgust list by the local health department.

Christoph Ruf is a freelance author and observes political and sporting events in his weekly nd column “Place Conditions”.

However, Felix Nmecha's case is different. The Borussia Dortmund player has come under fire for celebrating his Christian fundamentalist views for the umpteenth time. Twice on Saturday he knelt in front of his own fan curve and took off an imaginary crown. The campaign "The King's Return" (English for: Jesus will be behind you at the checkout at Aldi tomorrow) is close to the evangelical kickers of "Ballers in God", whose most famous propagandist in this country is Nmecha.

The campaign “The King’s Return” (English for: Jesus will be behind you at the checkout at Aldi tomorrow) is close to the evangelical kickers of “Ballers in God”.

BIG is not a harmless prayer group and Nmecha is not one that takes its Christian faith a little more seriously than others. Nmecha is neither Catholic nor Protestant, he is evangelical. He takes the Bible literally. This explains why the kickers consider abortion to be murder (“Satan’s plan”) and homosexuality to be a sin. And we have to let everyone know that from morning to night. God, says Nmecha, commissioned him to use football to share “the truth”: “No way that I get this platform and only use it for myself. I would dishonor God by doing so.”

Even when Nmecha moved from Wolfsburg to Dortmund, BVB fans pointed out BVB's stance on homosexuality after Nmecha shared a video by right-wing blogger Matt Walsh ("Accepting child murder (abortion) means giving up your soul"), who made fun of trans people. "If we don't see what's wrong with it." He later apologized - as he has done since then whenever his statements are once again understood as they were meant.

Even after his signing, BVB tried to smooth things over by citing Nmecha's statement, which actually doesn't mean the all-clear: "I don't think I'm homophobic or transphobic," he said at the time, and the first three words should actually bring tears of laughter to anyone's eyes. »I don't hate anyone, but I stand up for my faith.«

This is how it is with evangelicals, because their faith is more important to them than state laws. The DFB was not interested in how far the religious madness goes among its national players when it came to its radical Muslim homophobic national player Antonio Rüdiger. With Nmecha, too, it shouldn't be difficult to find out how he really thinks if you ask him the right questions on topics like women, homosexuality or atheism. It is unlikely that this will happen. Because that would require an awareness of the dangers of religious fanaticism. But as sports director Rudi Völler said so beautifully when he announced a conversation between the national coach and Nmecha: "We will talk to him about it because it has become a public issue."

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