Bruce Lamer has carved a career out of the sport he loves, and he says he owes much of it to the Knights of Columbus. 

Beyond the competition, football is about brotherhood for the St. Matthew’s Tigers. 

Sport is a pervasive phenomenon of 21st-century culture. Therefore, asked the Vatican, “how could the Church not be interested?”

TORONTO - Growing up in Venezuela, Fr Eduardo Soto fell in love with the Pan Am Games when his home country hosted the quadrennial event in Caracas in 1983.

MONTREAL - The St. Thomas à Becket parish parking lot was completely full on May 23, with more than 300 excited ball hockey players, coaches, fans and volunteers. Some teams had matching jerseys, while others had roaring cheers — but the one thing all teams had in common was their exuberant spirit and excitement for their upcoming games.

VATICAN CITY - Coaches need to show integrity, fairness, patience, joy and kindness, especially toward those who are struggling, Pope Francis said.

VATICAN CITY - Never let practice and competition get in the way of going to Mass, studying for school, being with friends and helping the poor, Pope Francis told an Italian sports association.

DALLAS - Even after becoming the toast of the sports world, golfer Jordan Spieth, a 21-year-old Dallas Jesuit graduate, remained humble and down-to-earth as he worked the crowds at Augusta, handled the media and bantered with morning and late night talk show hosts after his historic win.

In professional hockey, fans call for the coach’s head during a losing streak. When Ottawa Senators head coach Dave Cameron faced this dilemma in February, he received winning advice from his parish priest.

WASHINGTON - Sr. Lisa Maurer is a Benedictine nun who lives at the St. Scholastica Monastery on the campus of the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minnesota. She works at the Benedictine Health Centre next to the monastery, serving senior members of the community. She prays, studies and ministers at local parishes.

She also happens to coach a men's football team.

Grade 8 student Samantha Bestavros is no hockey fan but the NHL might yet win her over through a new program that uses hockey to make math interesting.

WASHINGTON - How far would you go to defend life? Life Runners would go about 26.2 miles a race.

Founded in South Dakota by running partners Pat Castle and Rich Reich, Life Runners has been promoting Catholicism and the pro-life movement through marathons in some of the nation's biggest cities since 2008.

Castle said Life Runners came out of a prayer group the two men co-founded in 2007 called Life Group Devotions. They decided to create an "action arm" of their ministry.

When I compare the number of hours I spend acquiring blisters and backaches travelling miles in a rowing shell to the time I spend at Mass or in prayer, I feel sheepish. To paraphrase St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 9:27, athletes chase after perishable wreaths. 

As a member of my university’s varsity rowing team, my days are structured around these wreaths: practice, second practice, regattas and recovery. 

LONDON - Visitors to the 2012 Olympic Games might be surprised to discover the extent to which London has been marked by the Catholic faith over the centuries.

Riding the trains of the London Underground they notice stations with names such as Temple, Blackfriars, Charing Cross and Covent Garden. Above ground, the traces of Catholicism are yet more noticeable: Whitefriars, Greyfriars, Ave Maria Lane and Paternoster Square all denote a rich Catholic heritage that precedes the Reformation.

Super Bowl Sunday marks the end of the football season and a look back at the year that was. On the field it was the year of the quarterback, with Drew Brees, Tom Brady, Matthew Stafford, Eli Manning and Aaron Rodgers all putting up eye-popping numbers. Off the field, the chatter was about one quarterback, Tim Tebow of the Denver Broncos.

His improbable story was captivating enough, coming off the bench in mid-season to lead his team to the playoffs with one last-minute victory after another. It was his Christian faith, though, that sparked an international discussion about whether faith had a place in sports, whether God was on Tebow’s side or whether Tebow thought God was on his side, or whether in fact God thought He ought to be on Tebow’s side.