Gaines for Girls with Riley Gaines - Christian Athletes Are Done Staying Silent ｜ The Riley Gaines Show

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00:00:28.000 covid radicalized an entire generation particularly among athletes because athletes

00:00:35.480 realized what could be taken away from them and the answer is everything in an age where many

00:00:42.680 celebrities are silent on their faith and their values and their beliefs we are seeing athletes

00:00:49.040 that are boldly proclaiming the name of jesus on the biggest stages they are pointing millions

00:00:54.620 towards something eternal. Today, we're diving into this revival in athletics. Why specifically

00:01:00.400 it's exploding in college and pro sports, what it means for the culture, and how these athletes are

00:01:04.900 being some of the most effective voices for Christianity. We're joined by Steve Eubanks,

00:01:10.100 author of Godball, How Athletes Are Saving Christianity to Break It All Down.

00:01:18.700 Well, Steve, thank you for joining the Rally Gain Show. You know, honestly, this topic,

00:01:23.220 this intermingling of faith in sports, I think, kind of subsequently reaching into the political

00:01:30.140 cultural realm. Can you give us a little background on yourself and how you've arrived

00:01:35.540 at your perspective on this faith revival that's happening through sports?

00:01:41.340 Yeah, Riley, I have been in sports journalism most of my adult life, going all the way back

00:01:47.360 to the to the 90s. And as a result of that, I have I have seen all of the good and the bad

00:01:54.700 that goes with both professional and amateur athletics. But in recent years, I've seen

00:02:02.040 something different. And that is the the overwhelming people getting their their faith

00:02:07.940 testimonies at every turn. They're doing it in pregame press conferences. They're doing it in

00:02:13.980 post-game interviews. And look, we've always had a little of that. I mean, going all the way back

00:02:17.920 to Roger Stahl back at the Dallas Cowboys, he would take that moment to give what television

00:02:23.640 producers used to kind of cynically call the Jesus bite immediately after a game where he would

00:02:29.460 thank his Lord and Savior. But those were few and far between. And they were always very quick

00:02:35.920 in and outs. Now, because of social media and because everything is televised, athletes are

00:02:42.940 realizing that they have a much bigger platform to go out and speak about these things.

00:02:47.720 And really, in the last six years, it has been truly a revival that has been led by athletes.

00:02:55.220 And I was watching all this and thinking to myself, surely I'm not the only one seeing this.

00:03:02.020 And as I began to look into it and research and talk to other people, I realized, no, it is something that is not just big.

00:03:10.160 It's universal and people are noticing no matter how much the media attempts to to squash it.

00:03:17.660 It's it's out there. You know, you mentioned six years ago and I think back to six years ago, of course, that 2020 era, which, again, kind of looking at it from the cultural lens was peak wokeness, if you will, if that's a good way to dub it.

00:03:33.540 And actually, in your book, you kind of point to these COVID lockdowns as a radicalizing force for many athletes.

00:03:42.600 Can you expand on that a little bit and maybe how the pandemic shifted priorities toward faith and toward boldness?

00:03:50.880 I don't think it can be overstated.

00:03:53.440 COVID radicalized an entire generation, particularly among athletes, because athletes realized what could be taken away from them.

00:04:02.340 And the answer is everything.

00:04:04.100 Everything could be taken away from them.

00:04:06.600 Everything they had worked for their entire lives, their sports,

00:04:10.240 everything they had done could be taken away from them in an instant.

00:04:14.260 They could be in total lockdown.

00:04:16.640 And it didn't take long for them to realize a lot of this was not real. 0.58

00:04:22.320 And the one thing I think COVID did was it really brought out the fact that this generation,

00:04:29.420 I call them the COVID generation. They can smell a phony a mile away now because they've seen it,

00:04:36.400 they've lived it. And what they really want is something genuine, true, and real. And that's why

00:04:41.960 so many of them returned to faith and why so many of them felt compelled to go out and share their

00:04:47.960 faith journeys. It's such a good point. It wasn't even real. A lot of the outrage or the consequences

00:04:57.160 or the reprimands that we were told that we were going to face if we didn't get the vaccine,

00:05:02.820 if we didn't follow the six foot mandates, if we didn't wear the mask in the weight room or in our

00:05:08.020 case in the pool, which was just about the silliest thing ever. It sounds ridiculous, 0.91

00:05:12.280 but seriously, Steve, I want you to picture 40 swimmers in the water where they literally tried

00:05:18.700 to make us wear a mask, a face mask. I'm like waterboarding myself at practice. I'm like,

00:05:23.820 this is the silliest thing ever. And I found myself pushing back on it then. And I was really 0.78

00:05:29.620 scared. I was scared of all the things they told me that were going to happen. I remember so

00:05:34.000 vividly being sat down, you know, I was gosh, when COVID hit in March of 2020, you know, when it

00:05:40.020 really paralyzed the U S at least, uh, that was sophomore year, kind of end of my sophomore year,

00:05:45.940 we were heading into our NCAA championships. We come back our junior year, you know, everything

00:05:50.100 shut down. We're sent home for summer. Eventually we come back. And I remember so vividly, you know,

00:05:55.080 our, our sports trainer lady sitting the team down and she says, you know, you all have to get the

00:06:00.020 vaccine. And it just didn't really sit right with me. You know, I already had COVID at this point.

00:06:05.800 And so, you know, studying biology and chemistry and all the sciences, I was led to believe,

00:06:10.840 at least I was taught that the most natural form of immunity was, you know, antibodies that,

00:06:16.160 we possess in our body by having already COVID. And so, you know, I'm not someone who's necessarily

00:06:21.900 anti-vax or anything like that, but I'm young, I'm healthy. Why do I have to get it? And she said,

00:06:25.900 Riley, you're the team captain. If you don't get it, you're not going to be able to travel

00:06:30.220 to University of Alabama. It's a big SEC meet, big rivalry. You don't get to go if you don't

00:06:34.420 get the vaccine. And I was so torn in this moment. What do I do? You know, I care about my team. I

00:06:39.340 care about contributing to, yes, of course, my personal goals, but my team goals more than

00:06:43.720 anything. And so I kind of called her bluff on this and I said, okay, I guess, I guess that's

00:06:49.160 going to have to be the case then. And guess what, Steve, I never got the vaccine. And of course I

00:06:53.720 got to go to university of Alabama and compete. I realized at that point, just how manufactured it

00:06:58.820 really was. And so I think that's a really good point that you make there and craving something

00:07:03.340 real and authentic and something that AI can't answer. You know, you can't put into chat GPT,

00:07:11.720 or at least I guess you can, but nothing of substance will come in if you put in the question,

00:07:16.740 you know, what is my purpose? Why am I here? These existential questions that I think naturally

00:07:22.340 20, 21, 22-year-old boys and girls, men and women for that matter, are really contemplating.

00:07:29.840 This generation that was radicalized by COVID, I think it's exacerbated among athletes.

00:07:35.740 Because if you think about it, when you reach the age of physical maturity,

00:07:40.260 How long is it from that time until the time when your athletic career is over?

00:07:44.600 Ten years, maybe four years for most.

00:07:48.640 And so as a result of that, when you have a year taken away from you, it's a large, large percentage.

00:07:54.680 And it completely radicalized these athletes.

00:07:58.280 And that's when they realized, no, they can't do this.

00:08:01.160 We have to stand up for what is true.

00:08:02.800 You also talking about your book here, you mentioned this kind of pivotal moment with golfer.

00:08:09.020 Her name is Amy Olson, who's just incredible, where a publication tried to censor her for her Christian and pro-life views.

00:08:18.600 How did that incident become really like a catalyst for noticing the broader trend of outspoken Christian athletes, especially pro-life athletes?

00:08:28.620 Yeah, Riley, that was really kind of a pivotal turning point for me personally.

00:08:33.400 And Amy and I, who are dear friends, will be inexorably linked from this point forward.

00:08:39.020 Because I was working at a publication where Amy was, at the time, seven months pregnant and had qualified to the U.S. Open.

00:08:48.220 And I thought, wow, that's a great story.

00:08:49.660 So I reach out.

00:08:50.780 I talked to her about it.

00:08:52.060 And when I wrote the story up, because she had said at that point, look, no one doubts now that I am carrying a human being.

00:09:02.220 But exactly a year prior, when the Dobbs decision was overturned, the entire media, sports media especially, were outraged.

00:09:10.760 And they all came to Amy because they knew she was one of the more outspoken Christians on tour and asked her about it.

00:09:17.520 And so she found it incredibly ironic that the same group of people who were outraged at the overturning of the Dobbs decision

00:09:25.200 were very much in favor of her qualifying and carrying a child during the U.S. Open.

00:09:31.460 In fact, the Golf Channel even said there are going to be 157 players in the field rather than 156 because she was playing with two.

00:09:38.720 And when I wrote that story up, I thought, wow, this is great.

00:09:41.640 We're going to make national news with this.

00:09:43.380 This is an athlete speaking out on a social issue.

00:09:46.280 It's going to be a big deal.

00:09:48.000 And the publication at that time reached out to me within 30 minutes and said the entire staff had been going nuts

00:09:55.300 that we could not run something that was anti-abortion and pro-Christian

00:10:00.940 within the pages of the publication.

00:10:02.880 And I was like, what are you talking about?

00:10:04.880 This is news.

00:10:06.140 We are a news outlet.

00:10:07.860 And the fact that you wouldn't promote something like that

00:10:11.920 shows an incredible anti-Christian bias.

00:10:15.380 Well, anyway, the publisher won.

00:10:17.380 They said, we will only run this if you take the abortion and Christian stuff out. 0.65

00:10:21.320 And I knew immediately that I had to resign, which I did on the spot. 0.94

00:10:26.880 But at the time, I thought, is it really this pervasive?

00:10:31.020 Is the media bias against Christians this bad?

00:10:35.160 Because, I mean, I had seen it, obviously, as I mentioned before, with the Jesus bite and kind of the whole snarkiness in television when someone attempted to profess their faith.

00:10:47.040 But I didn't realize it was this pervasive.

00:10:49.460 Well, then I began to look around and realized, yeah, not only is it this pervasive,

00:10:54.020 there are a lot of athletes just like Amy who are out there looking for an outlet and a venue to speak about faith.

00:11:01.380 And as a result of that, once you see it, you can't unsee it.

00:11:05.800 It's everywhere.

00:11:06.600 You know, on one hand, you have, whether it's sports leagues or media outlets, as you're saying,

00:11:11.960 especially left-leaning sports media outlets who say, you know,

00:11:15.280 we shouldn't mix sports and politics when it comes to things like what Jackson Dart just did

00:11:20.960 introducing the president or the story that you mentioned. But on the other hand, that they have

00:11:25.980 Black Lives Matter in the end zone or in racism or any of the, I think, very charged statements

00:11:33.680 that we're seeing, especially purported by the NFL and the NHL and the NBA. So it doesn't really

00:11:41.480 seem like they don't want to mix sports and deemed political issues. It just seems they have

00:11:48.480 an issue with it when it comes to being Christian or being conservative. Is that something you've

00:11:54.120 seen? Oh, absolutely. And I think you hit the nail on the head with the Black Lives Matter

00:12:00.220 protests and things of that nature. Because what is more anti-Christian than lumping someone in a 0.89

00:12:08.120 group based on the color of their skin. I mean, we're all children of God made in his image.

00:12:13.880 That's the message of Christianity. We are commanded to love one another as Christ loved us.

00:12:19.380 And that includes everybody. I think sports fans see that. They recognize it. Look, do you think

00:12:25.840 if you tuned in to the NBA playoffs or to an MLB game or to anything that's going on right now,

00:12:34.120 that you're going to start counting heads based on the racial makeup of a various team.

00:12:39.340 Of course not.

00:12:41.300 Fans couldn't care less.

00:12:43.720 And that's the one thing that I think that the media in particular cannot stand. 0.90

00:12:48.600 Not because it's the racial aspect of it, but the Christian aspect of it.

00:12:54.540 They know that somebody looking at someone based on merit, based solely on merit,

00:13:00.500 is a very Christian belief.

00:13:04.240 And where is that available now?

00:13:06.220 It's only available in sports.

00:13:07.660 It's the only place you can find it.

00:13:09.800 And that's why-

00:13:10.300 Spotify, it's Jay Shetty.

00:13:11.960 Are you one of those media strategy people

00:13:14.340 scrolling through spreadsheets,

00:13:16.180 searching for an audience

00:13:17.220 that pays twice as much attention to your ads

00:13:19.740 than they do on social?

00:13:21.380 Let me introduce you to fans.

00:13:23.860 And they're here with me on Spotify.

00:13:26.520 Trust me, I know fans.

00:13:28.000 they don't skip they stay for hours they don't move on they manifest they're not a demographic

00:13:34.680 group they're fans spotify advertising you're among fans it's attracting so many people you

00:13:42.680 know uh we were talking prior to hitting record on this but i i was watching the women's college

00:13:48.460 world series and and it's one of those things like once you see it you really can't unsee it

00:13:53.420 And I saw so many young women who were willing to, in the pregame, postgame interviews, whether defeat or win, for that matter, which I think is an incredible thing that I want to ask you about, proclaim the name of the Lord and his goodness and his mercy and how that's where their confidence and their security as athletes and individuals really comes from.

00:14:17.040 I've got a clip here of Emma Clark from Tennessee.

00:14:20.740 This is after she hit a walk-off home run. 0.92

00:14:23.600 Let's watch it really quick.

00:14:25.060 Just so much joy.

00:14:26.240 I had so many thoughts, but I immediately just looked up

00:14:30.620 and just started to give God all the glory

00:14:32.320 because I'm just so grateful to be in this position

00:14:34.220 and just to be on this team with these people

00:14:36.840 and just to be able to have opportunities to be in moments like this

00:14:40.800 even when they don't work out.

00:14:41.800 It's literally such a blessing,

00:14:44.460 and I just couldn't do it without the girls to my left and right.

00:14:47.140 This feels very like 1 Peter 3.15 coded of, you know,

00:14:52.400 in your heart, revere Christ as Lord,

00:14:54.620 always be prepared to give an answer to everyone

00:14:57.300 who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have,

00:15:00.480 but do this with gentleness and respect.

00:15:02.360 That is what I see from these girls.

00:15:05.520 And something, I think, especially in the sport of softball that we've seen.

00:15:08.880 Someone like Jordi Ball, who actually just announced

00:15:11.020 that she's having a little baby.

00:15:13.320 She's been like a hero and a role model to me.

00:15:16.080 What's with softball kind of leading this public faith declaration that we've seen in 2026 especially?

00:15:24.740 I think this started about three years ago with the University of Oklahoma.

00:15:29.520 When they were in the softball World Series.

00:15:30.880 I love that team and I love that coach.

00:15:33.580 Absolutely.

00:15:33.980 When they were in the World Series and you went to the post-game press conference after they clinched the title,

00:15:41.300 there were probably, I don't know, six reporters there.

00:15:45.320 And it became a revival, full-blown.

00:15:49.720 Every player that was on the day house was up there speaking,

00:15:53.200 not just about their faith, but speaking about the depth of the connection

00:15:57.080 that that team had because of their love of Christ.

00:16:00.620 And the clips from that press conference gained millions of views,

00:16:05.500 far more than it would have had it just been your standard post-game press conference

00:16:10.100 from a softball world series.

00:16:12.140 And as a result of that,

00:16:13.200 I think everybody felt as though

00:16:14.760 they'd been given permission.

00:16:16.500 Hey, I feel that way too.

00:16:18.220 Now it's time to come out and speak out.

00:16:20.640 And so there's been this snowball effect.

00:16:23.160 All it takes is one.

00:16:24.620 It takes one person to go out and say that.

00:16:26.980 It takes one team to stand up

00:16:29.320 and speak boldly about their faith.

00:16:32.020 And suddenly those that are around you

00:16:34.980 feel emboldened to speak up as well.

00:16:37.860 is there concern that it's just anecdotal i don't know if that's a good way to put it but

00:16:44.100 uh you know again they mentioned their prayer routines and they they carry their their bible

00:16:49.560 verses there was one softball player i was watching i think from maybe texas tech who was

00:16:53.520 saying like she carries a little bible verse that her mom wrote in her back pocket with her

00:16:57.620 everywhere um is there concern that this is anecdotal how do we know this is more than just

00:17:03.500 what they're saying in those press conferences? Well, I think the data support it. I mean,

00:17:08.220 I think when you look at the total number of clips that are out there, sports clips,

00:17:15.380 people that are on social media putting things out, and the elevation of the faith message that's

00:17:21.540 come out as a percentage of the total amount of content available, you're definitely seeing a

00:17:27.600 huge growth on that front. Now, is some of it performative? Probably. But so what? I mean,

00:17:34.220 if the gospel message is being preached, there is a core there somewhere. And if you do have a few

00:17:40.480 stragglers that are coming in, so much the better. They're going to hear the same message as everyone

00:17:46.180 else, and they're going to be led to the word as a result. And like we saw there, we're seeing this

00:17:52.340 sort of praise and victory and defeat, like full-on testimonies after really tough losses,

00:17:59.520 I sometimes think, actually oftentimes, I think in a place of defeat is sometimes a better

00:18:06.760 opportunity to declare the name and the goodness of the Lord.

00:18:12.500 Oh, absolutely it is. I mean, when are you lower than at a point where you have been

00:18:17.680 right on the cusp of winning only to have it taken from you but for for whatever reason either

00:18:23.320 someone was better or you didn't perform to your best whatever you fail to achieve your lifelong

00:18:29.260 dream at some point and at that point i mean look some athletes can go to a very dark place when

00:18:36.240 that happens uh but you're seeing more and more of them speak up and say no my life isn't defined

00:18:42.240 by how many home runs I hit, or how many points I score, or how fast I swam in the last meet.

00:18:49.180 You're finding these people saying, no, my life is defined by my relationship with Christ,

00:18:54.440 and I know good or bad, that's going to remain unchanged.

00:18:58.060 Why do you think athletes in particular have become some of the most powerful voices

00:19:04.160 when it comes to evangelizing culture, as opposed to influencers or entertainers or celebrities

00:19:11.960 or people in Hollywood, what, I guess, gives athletes that sort of credibility

00:19:17.640 or at least the willingness to put themselves in that position

00:19:20.800 as opposed to, again, those in Hollywood who kind of seem to shy away

00:19:24.820 generally from this topic?

00:19:27.340 Again, I think it boils down to merit.

00:19:30.340 People are longing for merit.

00:19:32.140 It's built into our DNA.

00:19:34.300 I mean, when you go out and you work really hard

00:19:37.120 and you perform at a high level, you want to be rewarded for that,

00:19:40.880 Not just in sports, but in your job and in every aspect of life.

00:19:46.240 You study the hardest in school.

00:19:48.060 You do all of the work.

00:19:49.260 You want to make the A.

00:19:50.880 People understand that innately.

00:19:53.740 Where do you find that now?

00:19:55.560 You no longer find it in the workplace.

00:19:57.800 You no longer find it really in any aspect of life other than sports.

00:20:04.240 As I said, you hit 30 home runs a year, you're going to play.

00:20:08.400 You score a touchdown a game, you're going to be on the field.

00:20:13.140 Sports is the last existing meritocracy.

00:20:17.020 People just deep in their bones recognize that and are drawn to it.

00:20:21.180 As a result, those are the people that are driving culture.

00:20:25.300 Look, ask anybody under the age of 30, probably under the age of 40,

00:20:30.820 to name five prominent religious figures.

00:20:34.320 You know how many are going to be able to do it?

00:20:35.900 Zero.

00:20:36.380 zero are going to be able to do it. They might be able to name one, but you ask them to name

00:20:41.560 five athletes, they can do it in a second. Some people might be able to name 50. It's a really

00:20:46.600 easy call to know who is driving the culture right now. And as a result of that, people are

00:20:52.940 looking at athletes and saying, hey, something's going on here. When you think about the things

00:20:59.460 that you want out of a person, self-respect, self-discipline, delayed gratification, your

00:21:06.960 willingness to focus on tasks, your willingness to get up when you're not down. These are all

00:21:12.240 things you try to instill in your kids. Well, where do you find that now? People are not learning

00:21:18.300 that in Sunday school because, quite frankly, young people aren't going. But where they're

00:21:22.320 seeing it is on the athletic fields. And now they're searching for the source of that. And

00:21:27.900 when they look at the source of that, they're turning to faith as a result. Every single day,

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00:22:52.740 visit preborn.com slash Riley, preborn.com slash Riley. You, um, in your book, you highlight

00:22:59.820 sports gambling as a major potential threat to this revival. Uh, can you expand on this? And I

00:23:07.380 think what explicitly, uh, you know, what risks are being imposed here? Yeah, look, I think if

00:23:14.940 there's anything that can derail this and really derail sports in general uh it is the proliferation

00:23:20.960 of gambling and we're already seeing it i mean if you look at the current indictments that have

00:23:25.140 been handed down i think it's three mlb pitchers and a couple of nba players uh that are currently

00:23:31.580 under federal indictment um not for throwing games because you don't have to throw games anymore

00:23:37.220 all you have to do is throw a particular pitch at a particular time because the prop bets are so

00:23:44.200 pervasive that you can get away with doing anything like that. You can go down in a UFC

00:23:52.300 fight at a particular round. Now, you can hop right back up and win the fight. But because of

00:23:56.700 the prop bets, you have an opportunity to do something like that and corrupt the integrity

00:24:02.680 of the game. Same is true with the NBA. You no longer have to throw a game. You just have to

00:24:07.120 have the first half spread be slightly inside whatever the number was. And that's one of the

00:24:12.720 problems. In the old days, when I was a young man, for example, if you wanted to place a bet on a

00:24:19.200 game, you had to go to a bookie, which means you had to know who the bookie was. And he was some

00:24:24.520 unsavory character in your town. You had to have his number. You had to go find him. And then you

00:24:29.980 had the transaction had to be in cash. He had to have your number and he had to know where to find

00:24:34.360 you. And there was this lag time between the time you placed the bet and the time the outcome of the

00:24:39.280 game was decided. So there was friction involved in being able to gamble on sports. Now you can

00:24:46.740 place a couple of bets every five seconds. It's a device and a television screen. And I think the

00:24:54.180 effect of having what I consider to be the slot machine effect, being able to play so many bets

00:25:01.700 so quickly, really has driven this to the point where it's unhealthy at every front.

00:25:08.240 Now, what can we do to solve it? I think that you're going to see the adding of friction back into this.

00:25:15.920 You're not going to be able to place quite so many prop bets quite so frequently.

00:25:20.700 I think you're going to see states recognizing that, you know, this is a dangerous trend that we're setting. 0.86

00:25:26.480 But more than anything, I think you're going to see middle class moms who are saying, oh, my gosh, my son is addicted to gambling. 0.58

00:25:34.980 And now all of a sudden, there's going to be a huge push to pull back on this.

00:25:41.000 It's time for me to interrupt you and tell you about something that I know a lot of you

00:25:44.460 quietly deal with, and that is private student loan debt. If you've listened to the show,

00:25:48.660 you've heard me talk about my friends at YReFi before. What they're doing is necessary. It's

00:25:54.100 incredible. If you are stuck with private student loans that feel impossible, like your monthly

00:25:58.940 payment is way higher than what you can realistically afford, maybe you've fallen

00:26:02.460 behind. Maybe you're in default. I have good news for you. You're not alone. And most importantly,

00:26:07.600 you're not out of options. Why refi? They work specifically with people in that exact same

00:26:13.400 situation. So they refinance private student loans that most places will not even touch.

00:26:18.380 They will sit down with you and actually build a payment plan based on what you can realistically

00:26:23.340 and actually afford. That means lower monthly payments. It means a low fixed interest rate,

00:26:29.100 oftentimes as low as 1%. It means a real path forward instead of just feeling stuck. Best thing

00:26:36.140 is they don't care about your credit score. So if this is something that's been weighing on you,

00:26:40.080 it doesn't have to be forever. Go to yrefy.com. That is Y-R-E-F-Y.com. And be sure to tell them

00:26:46.080 that Riley from the Riley Gaines Show sent you. I wanted to ask you in thinking about this,

00:26:52.140 you mentioned most people can name five athletes. Who are, I guess in your opinion,

00:26:59.100 the best athletes right now who exemplify the the god ball phenomenon that you're describing

00:27:06.380 well look i mean i think you couldn't name five there are probably as i say close to 50

00:27:13.060 cj stroud i mean let's just go down the list right off the bat in the nfl you've got

00:27:17.000 kirk cousins cj stroud brock purdy um saquon barkley trevion henderson these are all people

00:27:24.660 who, if you put a microphone in front of them, I can promise you, you're going to get a faith

00:27:29.140 message. And it's happening every week. And it's happening every time they have an opportunity.

00:27:34.320 Same is true in Aaron Judge in Major League Baseball, Jonathan Isaac in the NBA. You're

00:27:40.940 just seeing it up and down the chain. I mean, there's so many golfers, you can't even count

00:27:44.620 them, but take the number one player in the world, Scotty Scheffler. Again, at every press

00:27:49.960 conference, he's going to speak openly and honestly about his faith and what it means to him.

00:27:54.140 So the numbers are staggering in terms of what you're seeing.

00:27:59.860 Look, two years ago, the Super Bowl was held in Las Vegas.

00:28:04.260 And I've been to enough Super Bowls to know that things can go off the rails at the Super Bowl pretty quickly.

00:28:10.100 I mean, there's debauchery on every street corner if you want to find it.

00:28:14.080 Throw in the fact that it was in Las Vegas.

00:28:16.260 And quite frankly, I thought, you know, God just might open up the desert and swallow the whole city and cover it up.

00:28:21.000 But instead, we had the NFL Honors Banquet, and it turned into a complete revival.

00:28:30.620 I mean, you had Mika Fitzpatrick from the safety from the Pittsburgh Steelers who got up,

00:28:35.120 and not only did he basically preach the gospel, he made an altar call at the NFL Honors Banquet in Las Vegas.

00:28:43.600 And he was not the only one.

00:28:45.500 There were just one after another up there thanking the Lord for what they had given them.

00:28:52.160 So I think there's the overwhelming nature of the message and it coming from all corners.

00:28:59.180 That's what's driving this.

00:29:01.980 Yeah, it's, man, that's saving souls and pointing people in the direction of eternal life in heaven with Jesus,

00:29:10.380 which there is nothing more, I guess, reassuring that you're doing the right thing.

00:29:17.220 I think when you can shift your perspective and think about it that way,

00:29:20.000 think about eternity, it makes the time that we spend here on this earth

00:29:23.860 feel like, because it is, really just the blink of an eye in terms of time span.

00:29:30.120 You think it's sustainable, the whole movement?

00:29:32.900 You think it will continue on?

00:29:34.220 What's your prediction for the future?

00:29:36.380 I hope so.

00:29:37.380 Look, I mean, I think that there are certain things that will come up where people will attempt to derail it.

00:29:44.240 I mean, the devil never sleeps.

00:29:45.640 I mean, there's always going to be the one person that you point to to say, aha, this person was out speaking about Jesus.

00:29:54.320 And, you know, now he's run off, you know, to some debaucherous party somewhere.

00:29:59.460 That's going to happen.

00:30:00.900 And you are still talking in most cases about young people and young people make mistakes.

00:30:06.420 So I don't have any doubt that a lot of this is going to be highlighted.

00:30:12.260 But by the same token, I think if people will continue to pay attention to this overwhelming message, that the revival is going to continue.

00:30:21.400 What are the alternatives?

00:30:22.800 I mean, you're seeing for the first time really in two generations, we no longer have a decline in people who say they are Christian.

00:30:31.860 Now, that has been a steady downward trend since World War II.

00:30:36.440 Finally, it's leveled off.

00:30:38.600 Why is it leveled off? 1.00

00:30:40.200 Young men. 0.85

00:30:41.840 Gen Z and Gen Alpha young men are returning to church.

00:30:46.200 They're the ones that are handling the increase in Bible sales.

00:30:49.840 For the first time in history, young men are outpacing young women in terms of church attendance.

00:30:55.100 Why is that?

00:30:56.160 Is there some pastor out there leading them?

00:30:58.220 No.

00:30:59.160 It's that they are the people watching sports.

00:31:01.880 And they're the ones seeing it.

00:31:03.380 And they're the ones searching.

00:31:06.000 We'll be right back.

00:31:36.000 I think that's a really, really good and accurate, quite frankly, case to be made.

00:31:41.760 Steve, thank you for everything that you do.

00:31:44.120 Where can people get your new book, God Ball?

00:31:46.940 Well, you can buy it anywhere that sells books.

00:31:50.320 It's published by Center Street, and if you just want to go to centerstreet.com,

00:31:53.300 they'll take you to all the right spots.

00:31:54.860 Well, I so appreciate you.

00:31:56.520 Thank you for everything and for coming on the show.

00:32:00.160 Thank you so much for having me.

00:32:03.120 Thank you guys for watching The Riley Gaines Show.

00:32:04.940 you can subscribe right here.

00:32:06.860 We have new episodes every single Tuesday and Friday

00:32:09.160 at 10 a.m. Eastern time.

00:32:10.740 And we are covering everything from pop culture

00:32:12.920 to politics, to deep dives, to motherhood,

00:32:15.360 sports, all of that and more.

00:32:16.960 We want to hear from you though.

00:32:18.120 What is it that you want to hear?

00:32:19.140 Comment down below.

00:32:19.900 We can't wait to see you next time.

00:32:21.060 We'll be right back.

00:32:51.060 Woo-hoo!

00:32:51.600 Feel the fun.

00:32:52.700 Play Ojo.

00:32:53.920 Honey, forget about the lasagna.

00:32:55.400 Let's celebrate.

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00:32:57.120 Please play responsibly.

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Gaines for Girls with Riley Gaines - June 19, 2026

Christian Athletes Are Done Staying Silent ｜ The Riley Gaines Show

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