Sunday Football or Church? A Case Study in Substitutes and Complements

Abstract

Prior research has suggested that secular competition (e.g., holidays, vacations, travel, ending blue laws, etc.) on Sundays can reduce religious service attendance. The implication is that secular competition is a substitute for religion, not a complement. However, to date, no research has looked specifically at the effect of National Football League home games on Sunday religious service attendance. In this paper, we use attendance data from a United Methodist Church located less than five miles from a National Football League stadium in the Southeastern US from 2010 to 2017 to evaluate whether Sunday home games affect religious service attendance. Adjusting for seasonal variations in attendance, we find that early home football games significantly reduce service attendance. While just a single case study, these findings support the idea that secular events and activities are a substitute for religious attendance and not a complement.