Slaloming down the slopes in billowing cassocks in the tracks of their late compatriot Pope John Paul II, Polish priests again vied for the “papal cup” prize in the annual clergy ski championships.
Each year ski-mad priests flock to Poland’s southern Beskid Slaski mountain range bordering the Czech Republic to indulge their passion, as bemused fellow skiers watch them whiz by in their priestly garb.
“Each year, this is how we kick-off the competition for the John Paul II cup,” said Father Damian, one of the organizers of the recent event that first started 14 years ago.
Photo: AFP
“When we take our cassocks off, that’s when the real competition begins,” he said.
Priest and seminarians compete in six separate events according to age.
So far no nuns have taken up the challenge, but Father Damian says the slopes are open to them too.
“If at least three show up one day, we’ll create a special category,” he vowed.
In this race, prayers are a standard part of the warm-up routine.
“May the good Lord watch over us and protect us, may He give us the strength to compete in a fair play,” competitors say, heads bowed before reciting the Lord’s Prayer.
“We can praise the Lord in a natural setting, in beautiful countryside,” said Father Henryk Urbas, the papal cup champion for the fifth year running.
“People are really surprised to see us skiing in cassocks — it’s a way to demonstrate our devotion,” said the Salesian priest, who is also a school gym teacher.
Franciscan friars were the first to organize the special event and priests from the local Silesian region then took it over.
“We must be the only ones in the world to organise this kind of competition,” said Father Damian, adding it was none other than the late ski-mad Polish-born pope who inspired the creation of the event.
“It’s Pope John Paul II who was our example. He loved to ski, especially in these very Beskidy mountains when he was a young priest and then as a bishop and a cardinal,” the priest added.
“The pope was passionate about skiing. Once he was asked whether it was appropriate for a cardinal to ski. He replied that above all, it was inappropriate for a cardinal to be a bad skier,” Father Damien recalled.
Competitors range in age from 20 to nearly 70.
At 68, Father Wladyslaw Nowobilski from the nearby village of Cisce was the oldest to take part.
“I should always get a prize just because of my age,” he chuckled.
Backed by 30 of his parishioners from the southern Polish town of Bedzin armed with whistles, tambourines and castanets, Father Krzysztof Sontag makes no secret of his passion for the slopes.
“I train all year at the gym. Skiing and sports in general give me a lot of joy,” he said.
“Our priest is really fantastic,” parishioners said. “We come here each year to cheer him on. It really brings us closer. There aren’t many priests like him in our region.”
“Skiing in cassocks is also a way of demonstrating that the spirit and the body always go together, like the Latin expression Mens sana in corpore sano [A healthy mind in a healthy body],” Sontag said.
“We can do both, hold the rosary and ski poles, get down on our knees and on our skis,” he said.
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