Episodes

Andrew Whitaker

The Vice President of Operations as well as a founding board member of the National Catholic Coaches Association.  He was a student manager for Michigan State’s football team, coached football for two seasons at Alfred State College and one season at the University of St. Thomas.  Plus, he coached two seasons of varsity tennis at Lumen Christi, a private Roman Catholic high school in Jackson, Michigan, where he had played five sports when he was a student-athlete. He also volunteered as a soccer coach and English teacher for refugee children in Africa.

Notable guest quotes:

“Both of my parents were Catholic.  I am one of four children… We were definitely raised in a household that prayed before every meal, attended church every Sunday… My parents were always very open about their faith.”

“My junior and senior year I had the opportunity to go (to Jamaica) and do some ministry down there and it was a wonderful experience…  It’s something that to this day… I still draw from experiences that I had there.”

“That’s just an opportunity to travel and see a little bit more of the world, see a little bit more of God’s creation, but also at the same time give back while doing that, not just selfishly take from those experiences but to actually give something out of those experiences.  And often times you get more than you even give when you’re doing something like that.”

“I almost feel like it was one of those innate, blessed, God-given abilities.  And so I think when you have something like that, and I think everybody does, sometimes you have to search for it, you don’t know exactly what your special talent may be, but when you figure that out I think it’s very important that you share that with the world because God didn’t just give that to you for no reason.  He didn’t just make you who you are and say, ‘Okay, don’t utilize any of the special qualities or the talents that I gave you’.”

“I also think it’s important to give back.  So, I had thought a lot about joining the Peace Corps.  I thought that might be a good opportunity to travel and to give back to the world a little bit.”

“I will say that there are some times when you do have those struggles or when things really are stressing you out – maybe you’re in the middle of work for the season, you have got practices that you’re going to, you’ve got exams that are coming up – it’s a real time where you’re like, ‘Boy, man am I glad that I have faith, that I am a Catholic and that I can just go for an hour to church and reset and talk to God, refocus on what’s important here.”

“For me it was always just a blessing to have the opportunity to get to do something that I love.”

“I love coaching and if an opportunity – and the correct opportunity – presents itself and I think it’s really what God’s calling me to do, I’ll definitely jump at the chance.”

Related link:

National Catholic Coaches Association

Nikki Breske

She just graduated from Florida State University where she was a pole vaulter, ranking among the Seminoles Top Ten all-time both outdoors and indoors. Born and raised Catholic, in high school she competed for Winter Park High in central Florida and was undefeated during her senior season there. She is committed to and outspoken about abstinence and chastity. Listen for the phone call she received her first week away at college and how she responded.

Notable guest quotes:

“But with all of this (pandemic) going on I’ve definitely gone into overdrive in praying and just asking God to lead me wherever He wants me to go next and worry less, stress about it less, and just allow Him to guide my life where He wants me to be.”

“I was (a) cradle Catholic, so, born and raised.  I went to St. Margaret Mary Catholic School, K through eighth grade.  And then, we always went to Mass as a family every Sunday.”

“I didn’t want to leave the church ’cause that was where I felt at home even though I hadn’t been to that church before.  It was just the presence of God and knowing that each Catholic Mass was the same in terms of reading and whatnot.”

“I’ve seen people come out of college or go through college and I’ve seen the heartbreak of all of the sins, just, like, the drinking and the partying, and, just, I knew that wasn’t something that I wanted to do and I knew that ultimately wouldn’t help me in track.”

“I think it just helped me realize that God created us for so much more.  So it gave me pretty clear eyes to see that even though I was in an environment in which sin was dwelling, that that wasn’t the only option that I had.”

“I would say I have a definite passion especially for abstinence and promoting chastity among all young single people.”

“God has created each and every one of us for our mission for His plan.”

“Nobody’s happy with the ‘hookup culture.’  Nobody’s happy being hungover the next day.  Nobody’s satisfied but nobody talks about it.  Everybody talks about the fun that they had, but when you get alone in a room are you happy with yourself?  And I’ve seen more often than not that people aren’t and that they’re searching for more.  And though it seems in a twisted way, I think all of this is us searching for God.  Whatever we are diving into or indulging, it’s really a search for happiness and a search for Jesus.”

“Sports are great, but at the end of the day there is an end to everything.  There’s a season for everything.  And prioritizing school, especially, I think is something so important.  Education and learning are SO important, especially going into the real world.  And you never have a plan of when your season is going to an end or an injury occurs.”

“I have… found that when I start my day at 7am in that Mass and receiving Jesus in Communion, that my day is significantly better.  I start my day with so much more peace and just a happiness.  I think I radiate something so much more than myself when I start my day off in daily Mass and ask God to be with me and to allow Him to work through me and just be a friend to everybody just like Jesus was.”

“There were a couple meets that we all, regardless of the team, we all circled up, and we prayed, and I think those were some of the best meets with the best people to compete against.”

Related link:

Nikki Breske on Instagram

(This episode contains a prayer by Fort Worth Christian Football League parent Linda Fleshman, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Fr Stephen Gadberry

The pastor of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Batesville, Arkansas, AND St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church in Newport, Arkansas.  He was on Season 10 of “American Ninja Warrior” on NBC in 2018 and also enjoys archery and is an avid hunter, plus he coaches CrossFit.  He served in the U.S. Air Force in Texas, Germany, and central Iraq.

Notable guest quotes:

“Whenever I’m working and I’m being productive, for me that’s a very sacred moment.”

“I remember starting tee ball when I was probably five years old?  And pretty much every year since then I’ve done some sort of sport.”

“Throughout my life, just, I’ve always trusted the people who were over me: my parents growing up, my superiors in the military, my formators in the seminary, and now, of course, the bishop and the dean – the priest in charge of that area that I’m in – I trust that Christ will speak to me and I can hear His voice.  One of the ways I can hear it most clearly is through them.”

“(the bishop) was also concerned about my soul.  He said, ‘I want you to do (American Ninja Warrior) as long as it doesn’t affect you negatively spiritually’.”

“Spring of 2018 I get the call from (American Ninja Warrior).  They say, ‘Come, we’ll do the filming.’  I did that in Dallas, of all times, it was Palm Sunday night.”

“One of the best ways to preach the gospel is, just be joyful.”

“Through American Ninja Warrior I was… hoping to share this human aspect of this priest, because we’re called to live out the incarnation of Christ.  We’re called to share His grace, to manifest His divinity in the world through ministry, but we’re also called to embrace our own unique identity with our strengths and weaknesses that we have.  And so, He’s given me that particular skill set of… physical exertion, you could say.  So I just embraced it and trusted that if the Lord gave it to me and I use it well, that He’ll do what He needs to do.”

“(Saint) Augustine and Joseph Ratzinger, two of the greatest minds and greatest hearts in the history of the church.”

“I’ve been able to meet countless you could call them ‘famous’ people.  But at the end of the day, they do one thing and they do it well.  Everything else?  They’re just like you and me.  Which does not discourage me, but actually it encourages me to do, that one gift that God has given me, it encourages me to do it well.”

“It’s in the basics, the still, silent moments of the basic times of life that you can most perfectly hear the voice of the Lord.”

Porter Moser

The head men’s basketball coach at Loyola University Chicago since 2011, has been an NCAA Division I men’s basketball coach for 30 years. His 2018 team went to the Final Four.  As a player he competed on the Creighton University Bluejays and in 2017 was named to the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame for his accomplishments as a player.  He has also been inducted into the Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame.  Plus he is the author of a new book called, “All In: Driven by Passion, Energy, and Purpose.”

Guest quotes:

“I was born and raised Catholic.  Both my parents were Catholic.  And it was very traditional Catholic upbringing and I was able to go to Saints Peter & Paul Catholic grade school all the way through.  Then I went to Bennett Academy Catholic High School.”

“I remember finding the sanctuary of St. John’s Church right there on the campus of Creighton (University).  It was just, like, 50 yards outside the door of my dorm room… and I’d walk over there and be by myself, and just think and pray and just get my thoughts together and just ask for strength.  And I just remember having that private silent sanctuary to go to at St. John’s Church… And it was a defining moment in my life.”

“What I’ve learned in 30 years of Division I coaching… when I was a young coach I was so much about — and a lot of people are whether they’re in coaching or in business — you’re so much about the trajectory.  You’re, ‘What’s my next step,’ … and you’re so much about the trajectory instead of the journey and the relationships, whether it’s relationships with friends, family, spouse, kids, your relationship with God.”

“I just kept on praying for strength and I remember I just kept on saying over and over and over, ‘God has a plan’.”

“My faith grew and grew and grew and I was strengthened.  And, the adversity, I felt God’s power, I felt it more that God had a plan.”

“You achieve what you emphasize.  If you emphasize that relationship, that that’s a priority, same thing with your faith, you achieve what you emphasize.  If you’re not going to emphasize it, it’s going to keep going down in the pecking order.”

“God’s a lantern inside you.  And, are you going to let His lantern shine through you and have other people see His brightness through you, or are you putting a shade over that lantern to where He’s not reflecting through you? … I want my players to see that light.  I want the opportunities that are given me that come my way, I want it to reflect Jesus.  I want it to reflect my faith.”

“I also love what the Jesuits’ mantra is – men and women for others… I’ve just seen it in place when you put others first on how God finds it to come back to you.”

Related link:

Porter’s book, All In: Driven by Passion, Energy, and Purpose

(This episode contains a prayer from the South Bend Indiana Inner-City Catholic League, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Sherri Retif

She has been the head coach of the varsity girls basketball team at Germantown Academy for more than 20 years.  Her teams have captured the Inter-Academic Athletic League Championship 19 times, including a streak of 14 consecutive titles and 109 straight Inter-Ac victories. She had previously coached in New Orleans, where her teams captured back-to-back City Championships. She played basketball for the Tulane Green Wave and was inducted into the Tulane University Hall of Fame. In later years she was inducted into the Montgomery County Coaches Hall of Fame. In “Perspective on Youth Sport and Spirituality,” published by Notre Dame Press in 2015, she contributed a chapter on best practices. And, she co-authored a handbook called, “More Than a Game, Stories, Prayers and Reflections for the Student Athlete.”

Guest quotes:

“I grew up as a Catholic.  I went to Catholic schools all the way through twelfth grade and then I coached in a Catholic school for eight years… in New Orleans.  My husband took a job and we moved to Philadelphia and I just kind of thought I was done coaching and lo and behold Christ had another path for me and I was back coaching by the Fall.”

“I walked away from the game not thinking that was my calling.  I thought my calling was being a mom and a parent.”

“I realized my Christian values that I grew up with of honesty and accountability and community, and they just merged with the same values that I brought to the (basketball) court.”

“I learned that God was with us in adversity and God was with us in joy and bliss.”

“Being on a team is an opportunity for our students to have a small faith community, to have a safe place to grow and develop and make mistakes and learn.”

“If you’re focused on only winning or achieving a scholarship or outcome, you’re missing the journey, you’re missing the process.  And I think the invitation is to be aware of… is the experience moving them closer to God or is it moving them away from God?  Is my conversation with my athlete helping them grow closer to God or further away?”

“I think that’s where we all need to be as coaches – meeting our students where their needs are in our athletes.”

“The more we see Christ in others, Christ will grow in ourselves.”

“It doesn’t have to be all about winning on the scoreboard, it’s about winning in life.”

Related links:

Books mentioned:

Youth Sport and Spirituality: Catholic Perspectives

More Than a Game: Stories, Prayers, and Reflections for the Student Athlete

Chris Godfrey

He played guard in the NFL for the New York Jets, New York Giants, and Seattle Seahawks, including winning a world championship with the Giants in Super Bowl XXI.  He also played on three University of Michigan Rose Bowl teams.  He is the President and Founder of Life Athletes and nowadays is an attorney in Indiana.  He even talks here about a conversion experience as well as having met (Saint) Mother Teresa!

Guest quotes:

“My faith at that time, I was loyally Catholic, but, not necessarily, oh, I went to Mass and stuff like that, but I didn’t really have, maybe mumbled a few prayers at night, but wasn’t the first thing on my mind.”

“My new freedoms and the horizons and all these new things I was learning and seeing really distracted me from thinking much about my faith.”

“I remember hanging up the phone and falling to me knees and saying, ‘Lord, I give up.  Whatever you want me to do, wherever you want me to go, You’re the boss now.’  And I’d never really prayed like that before and I meant it.”

“I just knew that I knew that God had a hand in the whole thing and that He was close to me.  And because He was close to me I wanted to get close to Him.”

“I was a Seattle Seahawk at that time and our fourth child was due right at the time I would  have to leave to go to Seattle for camp, so a lot of things were making me realize that, well, it’s been a good run, but I’m going to retire.  But I didn’t know what I wanted to do yet.  And so I went on retreat and the prayer in my heart was, ‘Lord, what do you want me to do next’?”

“All of a sudden the parable of the rich young ruler came to mind.  That’s, ‘Lord what do you want me to do,’ well, ‘Give away everything that you have and come follow me.’  And I can remember just kicking the ground and going, ‘Ah, jeez, I’ve been tithing, going to Mass… doing all these difficult things and now you want me to give it all away’?”

“It’s not so much our money that God wants, He wants our hearts.”

“One of the things that I’ve been doing out here for several years — and it’s really a nice fit with some of my other charitable interests — is that we brought the Lourdes experience back here to our friends and family members in northern Indiana.”

“We invite the young people to join us – over 300 professional and Olympic athletes – to live lives of virtue, abstinence, and respect for life.  And we invite them to make the same commitment that we’ve made.  We call it the Life Athletes commitment.”

“Our Super Bowl rings are as much a symbol of perseverance as they are success, and, if perseverance is important in something like football or sports, it’s way more important in our personal lives.”

(This episode contains a prayer seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Rich Garcia

A former Major League Baseball umpire, having worked in the American League for 25 years and been involved in four World Series.  He went on to be a MLB Supervisor for eight years. He was raised Catholic and is also a veteran, having spent four years in the U.S. Marine Corps.  In high school he played baseball and did some boxing, getting two baseball scholarship offers for college.  He also coached high school baseball.  Wait for his big revelation near the end of the interview!

Notable guest quotes:

“From first grade all the way to the ninth grade I went to a Catholic school.”

“My grandmother lived with us and she did most of the raising, thank God.  She was a saint.  Her nickname was Joan of Arc.  That was a great, great help for me, growing up.”

“Everybody else went fishing and swimming and stuff.  I just played ball.  I played baseball.”

“I knew I had God in my life.  I knew He was there.”

“When you go to Catholic school for that many years, you have that instilled — it’s in you.”

“The way things are today as far as the umpiring profession, the ministry has really, really grown.”

“They have phone calls every Friday.  They have a conference prayer call every Friday.  All the umpires that want to get on can get on.  The minor league umpires are also included in that.”

“As an umpire if you want to survive you better pray.  You need a lot of prayers.  There were a lot of times where I’d talk to God.  ‘Get me out of this jam.’  ‘Get me out of this city.’  ‘Get me out of this place.’  And, like most of us, very selfishly it was done when we needed Him.  Fortunately, I’ve grown to not only talk to God when I need Him… but, to do it every day.  And to keep Him close to me.  And I thank Him every morning for the blessings that He’s given us.”

“He showed me a lot of different ways to pray.  Showed me a lot of different ways to get close to God.”

“I’m really God-based right now.  I’m as high as I can be on our Lord.”

(This episode contains a prayer attributed to legendary Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)