White Sox fans get the points

It’s great having a pope who loves baseball and hates war. Ever since the election of Pope Leo XIV, I’ve been admiring his never-again-war pleas—and hoping he’ll find a reason to visit the United States, despite its president, who clearly loves war. Right now, there’s a tiny ray of hope: Pope Leo’s team, the Chicago White Sox, who lost 102 games in 2025 and a record-breaking 121 in 2024, are miraculously leading the American League Central Division.

Is it too much to hope that the White Sox will somehow maintain that lead in the division and end up winning the World Series this year? Probably. But if they somehow did, how could the Sox-loving pope resist showing up for the victory parade, even if that meant temporarily being on the same continent as Trump? Of course, if the White Sox are somehow doing well enough to attract the attention of Trump, and he insists on attending one of their crucial playoff games, that would end their chances right there. He has a well-established record in his appearances at sporting events: The Felon-in-Chief is also the Jinx-in-Chief. (Disclosure: I’m a Mets fan, but I always root for the Red Sox when they are not playing the Mets. Now I’m rooting for the ChiSox, too, because of the Leo link.)

Though Trump has criticized Pope Leo, he did invite the pontiff to come to the United States and share in the celebration of the 250^th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The pope declined. Instead, he spent July 4 on the Italian island of Lampedusa, a major entry point for people immigrating from Africa to Europe: not a very subtle dig at immigrant-bashing Trump. But the lure of a White Sox World Series would be difficult for the Chicago pope to resist.

Soon after last year’s papal conclave, a video surfaced that showed Rev. Robert Francis Prevost attending game one of the 2005 World Series between the White Sox and the Houston Astros, at what was then known as U.S. Cellular Field. In that video, the future pope looked intense and wore what looked like a White Sox jersey under his jacket. Chicago went on to sweep that series and win a world championship. Once Leo was elected, the White Sox wasted no time in embracing their most famous fan. The headline on a recent New York Times story nails it pretty well:

A Pope from Chicago Was Elected.

The White Sox Were Resurrected.

The team put a plaque on the seat at what is now known as Rate Field where the pre-papal Prevost sat for that 2005 World Series game. Not far from that seat, a large mural now shows the pope. At the top of that same wall is an image of Prevost at the 2005 game. Now, at tonight’s game between the White Sox and the Reds, the team will give fans a papal miter, with a White Sox insignia. That unusual promotion leaves me with mixed feelings, to put it mildly.

Those pointy hats have always turned me off. They seem sharply out of keeping with the way Jesus described his vision for the leaders of his movement. The Gospel of Matthew tells the story: The mother of James and John, two of his key apostles, knelt before Jesus and asked a favor: that her sons would sit at his right and left in his kingdom. When the other ten apostles learned of this cheeky request, they were indignant, which led to this description in Matthew 20:25-28:

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Somehow, that prescription of servant leadership doesn’t seem to fit with the frequent image of large numbers of church leaders gathering at the Vatican, wearing ostentatious pointy hats. One prelate who prefers particularly towering, massive miters is the annoyingly right-wing Cardinal Raymond Burke, shown in this photo:

If you’ve ever attended a Mass with a bishop as the presider, you’ve probably noticed, at various points in the liturgy, the bishop putting on and taking off the miter, complete with two lappets, the fabric streamers that dangle from the back of the pointy headgear. In my case, I vividly remember attending a funeral with a bishop presiding, complete with miter. Off to the side stood a young man in cassock and surplice, probably a seminarian, looking intently focused on his role in the liturgy: Whenever it came time for the miter to come off or go back on the bishop’s head, this young man appeared at the bishop’s side, to make sure that the taking off and putting on of the miter happened at the liturgically correct moments.

Somehow, I can’t get it into my head that this bit of show-off haberdashery was what Jesus had in mind when he prescribed servant leadership. But tonight at Rate Field, weather permitting, thousands of White Sox fans will be showing their loyalty to the team’s most famous fan by wearing pointy hats, complete with Sox insignia in front and lappets streaming down in back. Despite their decision to bestow this dubious distinction on their fans, as a pointed ploy to fill the seats, I hope the Sox go far this season, enticing their most famous fan to show up, preferably wearing a Sox cap and civilian clothes—not a miter.