Thought for the Month

	It isn't fair! The man arrives and lays out on the table more money in crisp notes than you have ever seen before in your life. “It’s all yours,” he says. “All you have to do is make a couple of ‘mistakes’ when I tell you to and no one will be any the wiser. It won’t make any difference to the result and you are not changing anything — just a couple of times you overstep the mark and that’s all. Easy!” You are not to know of the hidden camera or that the man is a reporter who will soon tell the world what you have done. He has led you into temptation and you have yielded. We pray, “Lead us not into temptation” because we can all just as easily fall, as those cricketers did. How terrible that, simply to sell a few more newspapers, the careers of those young men have been ruined and their country’s team brought into disrepute. How wicked leading others into temptation really can be. But if nothing can justify that entrapment, neither can we ignore the damage done when cheating like that does take place. It undermines the very nature of the game - the trust of other players and spectators that what is taking place is according to the rules. There is a great deal of “gamesmanship” in all sport and much stretching of the parameters. But, like using illegal drugs, deliberately altering the game for financial reward strikes at the heart of the matter. A famous football manager once said, “Football is not a matter of life and death, it is more important than that.” The games we play help us to learn about rules and fairness and winning and losing. If we cheat at games we are more than likely cheating at life. Peter Wolfenden Chaplain