Watching the World Cup 2014 Soccer Matches over the past couple of weeks I have noticed that a disproportionate number of the players and coaches who make the sign of the cross are doing it the opposite of the Latin Rite way. Many of them are signing themselves the way it is done in the Eastern Rite Rituals, even though they are surely not Eastern Rite Christians: e.g. I noticed it again today with Mexico's win against Croatia. Even the coach crossed himself the wrong way: right shoulder first!
Someone needs to teach our Latin Rite professional athletes how to bless themselves! Don't they have priest chaplains! Don't they have team Masses and other formal prayers? If not, they should, for that would be a grand omission! I must say that I find it a bit embarrassing every time it happens, unless it is of course a team of a country with a predominantly Eastern Rite population (of which there are very few in the world and even fewer who make it to the world cup: e.g. Greece, Russia). But all of the Latin American Countries are vastly Latin Rite Catholics! They should know the Latin way!
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