On December 3rd 1990 — after a game between the 49ers and Giants — team chaplains Pat Richie and Dave Bratton got together and arranged the first joint post-game prayer.

The stage was set. Monday Night Football would go on to draw an estimated 41.6 million viewers — a record which still stands. Bratton wanted the players to take this moment and share their faith on the biggest stage. The idea came to him after he saw two Philadelphia Eagles players praying before a game.

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Prayer circles are historically a sign of evangelical Christianity, but the message a prayer circle sent on this stage was largely unclear. Were the players trying to convert spectators? Were they trying to fix their religious image? Were they making a statement? These questions went largely unanswered, but the practice itself stuck.

Team unity is often cited as one of the primary reasons why athletes pray together as a team. On average, there are more players that join team prayers in order to continue to build a team bond than do for religious reasons. They pray to be a teammate, to support others with religious beliefs, or to just feel at one with the group. The irony with that, however, is that team prayers are largely tailored towards Christianity, which can alienate people who are members of different religious traditions.

People of minority faiths, or no faith at all, can be subject to apparent mistreatment when religion takes a prominent place in an athletic program. Although praying may provide a safe environment for some, going against the values of the majority of the team may lead to those individuals feeling excluded. More often, athletes who feel distanced from a team because they have different religious beliefs simply leave the team or take a step back. They feel as if they are no longer welcome.

At the high school level, there’s an ongoing debate on whether or not prayers led by public school officials should be banned. Some states have completely banned this practice and in others, school districts have followed suit. Opponents argue that a coach leading a team in prayer breaches the constitutional separation of church and a state in a public school. It’s worth noting that public-school students have the right, by law, to pray on school property — but students must organize the prayer.

But those laws don’t apply to professional sports. In that world, coaches and chaplains usually lead the team prayers. While not team-mandated, players of different (or no) faith often face the uncomfortable decision of whether they’d rather join in on a team exercise that they don’t believe in, or face exclusion and alienation. Yes, these are grown men who are free to make their own decisions. However, they’re still employees of the team, forced to choose between either going with the crowd or being perceived as non-team players. In a professional space where labels and narratives are difficult to shake, which is an unenviable position to be put in.