Faith, football are intertwined for Cardinal Gibbons state champions during Holy Week

Cardinal Gibbons senior football players Tim Charnot, Ethan Grace, Joey Olivieri and Jonathan Ward made a return walk with teammates to N.C. State’s Carter-Finley Stadium last Friday. There, they received visible, golden signs — rings — for having helped lead the Crusaders to their first N.C. 4A football state championship last fall.

The senior quartet’s leadership afforded them another walk of significance during this Holy Week, when Christians observe Jesus Christ’s passion, death and resurrection.

“These young men heard that we were going to the Chrism Mass,” Cardinal Gibbons Theology educator Kathleen Kozak said. “They chose to come to it.”

Tuesday, Charnot, Grace, Olivieri and Ward — clad in “Sunday best” attire — made good on their requests to attend the Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh’s annual liturgy at Holy Name Of Jesus Cathedral. There, sacred oils were consecrated and blessed by Bishop Luis Rafael Zarama. These oils will be used for sacraments and other liturgical rites throughout the Diocese’s 54 counties among eastern North Carolina.

While championship rings were not among the young men’s Tuesday wardrobes, they bore other visible, golden signs transcending sport, affirming faith and defining service. Charnot and Olivieri walked the Cathedral’s center aisle bearing large glass jars including golden-colored olive oil. Grace and Ward followed in the procession. Multiple 20-pound jars of olive oil were presented to Bishop Zarama for consecration and blessing.

“We knew it was going to be heavy, but it was great,” Olivieri said. “We made it through, and it was beautiful.”

Charnot added: “It’s crazy how something that seems like it’s so small can have, really, such a big impact on everyone around you.”

The quartet’s service afforded them opportunities to experience some of the binding ties of faith and sport. Grace was moved by the presence of the vast majority of the Diocese’s priests, which Ward saw as representing “brotherhood.”

The authenticity of brotherhood, Grace continued, binds faith and sport.

“We have a team that has a love for Christ, a love for each other, a love for everyone around us,” Grace said. “We’re a family. We’re here for each other.

“We’re all linked together because we’re serving one another.”

This commitment to service extends from the Bishop — a diocese’s leader — to its priests, deacons, consecrated religious, and laity of all ages and backgrounds. The players were honored by Bishop Zarama’s homily acknowledgment of the Cardinal Gibbons students’ presence.

“We know he’s there for us,” Olivieri said of the Bishop. “It was great to be there for him.”

Consistently being there for others, Kozak said, made Charnot, Grace, Olivieri and Ward ideal choices to share in Tuesday’s Chrism Mass. The quartet has attended Cardinal Gibbons’ Thursday morning mass (before school) for much of this school year. Kozak noted how Olivieri — from his seat in the middle of her classroom — has invited many of his peers to join him and his teammates at morning mass.

“They really look beyond who they are,” Kozak said. “They’re reflective of the things you share. They really think about it in regards to their lives.”

The students’ reflective tendencies include contemplating the significant relationship between their Chrism Mass ministries and Crusaders football. The Cathedral is located off Western Boulevard, on Cardinal Gibbons’ previous campus. A peripheral area included a gravel-laden practice space — anything but a field — for the Crusaders’ earliest teams when the program was reestablished in 1992.

“There are people who had a vision,” Ward said. “There are people that wanted to see this program succeed.”

Ward is referring to myriad gridiron pioneers, including those athletes who earned the program’s first win, in 1994. Cardinal Gibbons’ state championship rings include one stone for each win since that landmark 1994 triumph. Two yellow stones mark the Crusaders’ state runner-up finishes in two immediately preceding seasons before the 15-1 championship campaign.

Olivieri also explained how a future Cathedral visit by him, Charnot, Grace, Ward and others will complete a “full circle” connection with the past before the quartet goes its separate ways into the future.

“Next time we’ll be in the Cathedral is for Baccalaureate Mass,” Olivieri said of the school’s liturgy scheduled for Friday before Memorial Day.

“The same spot they were in 1992,” he continued, “it will be one of the last times we’re together as an entire class, and as a team.”

Then, again, these Crusaders’ impactful ministries in Church and community will last beyond any single time and space. Gary Meyerl — Cardinal Gibbons’ Director of Outreach and a 1982 graduate of the school — considers the quartet’s work to be for eternity.

“To be witness to the call to share with others through their example, who it is that we’re called to be, and how it is that we’re called to live out our faith through our service to others in our worship, to me, as an educator, it’s just the highest level of praise to God,” Meyerl said.

This story was originally published April 14, 2022 at 12:11 PM.