Abstract
This article analyzes how a fundamentalist Christian movement, the Promise Keepers, uses sport in its literature as a means of promoting a specific style of masculinity and male leadership, which is referred to as “Christlike” masculinity. Two books foundational to the Promise Keepers' ideology, What Makes a Man and Seven Promises of a Promise Keeper, serve as the basis for this research. A critical feminist analysis is used to examine the ways in which sport is used to construct a masculinity that encourages a patriarchal ideology. Highlighted are three ways in which sport is employed to support a patriarchal ideology. These include using sport as a demonstration of masculine qualities that are linked with superior leadership, using sport as a means to rally men around male superiority, and using sport images and metaphors to conjure mental images of male superiority.
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