Free The Green Revolution by Ralph McInerny

Catholic.”
    â€œYou’re not Catholic?”
    â€œNo! Methodist.”
    â€œI’ve heard of it.”
    â€œHeard of it! It’s one of the largest denominations. We’re all over the country. Do you know who started the most universities in this country? The Methodists, that’s who.”
    â€œI suppose your mother wanted you to go to one of those.”
    â€œOh, no. They’re not Methodist anymore.”
    â€œHow many Methodists on the team?”
    â€œOnly five.”
    â€œSo few among so many Catholics! No wonder your mother worries.”
    â€œHa.”
    Bartholomew waited, but that seemed to be it. “They don’t pester you?”
    â€œAbout religion? Football is our religion.”
    â€œI’ll tell your mother.”
    Wesley’s laughter was delayed but dependable.
    â€œHow many Catholics are on the team?”
    â€œHow should I know.”
    â€œSomeone told me the team goes to Mass together before games.”
    â€œCome on.”
    â€œIt’s not true?”
    â€œI never heard of it.”
    â€œHow about the coaches?” He put out a hand to stop Wesley from rising. “I mean religionwise.”
    â€œAsk them.”
    â€œTake a guess.”
    Wesley’s roommate, John Foster Natashi, from darkest Africa, was also on the team. He was majoring in computer science. He seemed to think that Bartholomew was one of the tutors provided athletes and had come to help John with his homework. When Bartholomew identified himself, Natashi admitted he had never heard of Advocata Nostra .
    â€œIt’s one of those giveaways,” Wesley explained.
    â€œDo you buy the Observer ?” Bartholomew had bristled at this description of his paper.
    â€œI see your point.”
    â€œActually, you do. It comes out of your fees.”
    Natashi had withdrawn to his side of the room and was now kneeling on a little rug. His head tipped over, touching the floor, and he remained motionless but not soundless for several minutes.
    â€œIt doesn’t take him long.”
    â€œNot a Methodist, I gather?”
    Natashi was indeed done with his prayers in a few minutes and rolled up the little rug. Bartholomew asked him where he had gone to high school.
    â€œPrep school. Choate.”
    â€œAnd you ended up at Notre Dame?”
    â€œWe have a devotion to Jesus’ mother.”
    â€œAt Choate?”
    â€œI am a wide receiver.”
    â€œHe’ll be drafted before his senior year,” Wesley said proudly.
    â€œMaybe the war will be over by then.”
    â€œHe’s kidding,” Wesley said.
    â€œMany Muslims on the team?”
    â€œOnly one. So far.”
    â€œAh.”
    â€œIslam is the religion of the future.”
    â€œTell it to the Methodists.”
    Bartholomew left the roommates arguing amicably. Were two players a sufficient basis to write another article? They would have to do.

12
    They met in Lipschutz’s hideaway office in Brownson. Wessel, Francoeur, and FitzJames, what Lipschutz thought of as his steering committee, were surprised and delighted to find that Lipschutz had secured the names of Otto Bird and Roger Knight for the petition that Notre Dame withdraw from college football, turn its back on the creeping professionalization of the game, and regain its soul. This was all bunk, of course. Lipschutz did hate football, but because he saw it as draining off huge sums of money that might have been more meaningfully spent elsewhere—for example, on the center he had proposed to the provost that, under the direction of Lipschutz, would put the university unquestionably among the leading research universities of the land. Ever since he had submitted the proposal the previous spring, complete with projected budgets for five years and suggestions as to where the building to house it could be erected, there had been foot-dragging from the main building.
    There were those who might have thought that the