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Wednesday December 20, 2006


     

Kansas City Royals Captain Mike Sweeney inspires New York Professionals With Faith Message

Emphasized importance of chastity, to both the men and their teenage sons at meeting

Mike SweeneyNEW YORK, N.Y., December 20, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - What happens when a major league baseball star and more than 100 of New York City’s top professional men gather to share their life’s passion? The answer may surprise you.

Kansas City Royals captain Mike Sweeney, advisory chairman of Catholic Athletes for Christ (http://www.catholicathletesforchrist.com), shared his heart and soul at a breakfast meeting of the New York Men’s Leadership Forum in Manhattan on December 6, and the results were profound. Said Douglas Dewey, advisory board member of the Forum, “Nothing could have prepared us for the message Mike shared.”

Sweeney spoke of a life infused with grace from the day of his birth. Born prematurely and needing a complete blood transfusion, his parents were told he might not live through the night. Mike’s father, a devout Catholic, wept and turned to the Lord in prayer. Soon afterwards doctors reported that Mike had completely recovered, calling it a miracle with no medical explanation. This episode began a life-long pattern of Sweeney following the strong spiritual leadership of his father. Now married with two young children of his own, Sweeney emphasized spiritual leadership as the primary responsibility of all fathers.

Sweeney spoke of a crossroads in his professional life where he learned to surrender all to God. Faced with the prospect of going back to the minor leagues or even leaving baseball, he received a sticker picturing a tandem bicycle, which he placed on his Bible. Sweeney said that with tandem bikes the person in the front seat controls the steering, braking, and everything else. The person in the back seat simply pedals as hard as they can. This image helped Mike learn the role of a Christian disciple: to let Christ take the front seat while we take the back.  The baseball star gave tandem bicycle stickers—the same kind that helped him reach his epiphany—to everyone in the audience.

Sweeney strongly emphasized the importance of chastity, to both the men and their teenage sons, many of whom were in attendance. The greatest gift they can give their future wives, said Sweeney, is their chastity and purity. This seemed to leave a deep impression on the boys, who don’t often hear this message at all, no less from a major sports celebrity.

Douglas Dewey said Sweeney wore no facade which his stature as a sports star can afford him, but readily bared his heart and soul in genuine Christian fraternity. This deeply moved the men in attendance, most of whom are bankers, lawyers, accountants, financial managers, and related professionals, who quite often have to wear such a facade in their workplace. According to Dewey, Sweeney was warm, personable, and accessible to everyone, staying for an hour after the meeting to speak with attendees and sign autographs.

Sweeney clearly places God first and foremost over everything in his life, and is eager to share the message of the gospel everywhere he can. He and his wife Shara began the Mike and Shara Sweeney Family Foundation to share Christ with young people and to bridge the points of separation among Catholics and Protestants. Their web site can be accessed at http://www.mikesweeney.org.

A recording of Mike Sweeney’s talk to the New York Men’s Leadership Forum will soon be available in mp3 format on their website at http://www.nymlf.org.

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