Rocklin High School has a wide variety of different clubs on campus spanning from language, culture, games or even painting rocks. But one club in particular provides something that potentially changes lives for students and athletes who walk in looking for something positive to hear, not by a teacher, coach, counselor or advisor but rather someone who is connected to Jesus. Introducing the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) club.
FCA is a non-profit Christian sports ministry with the purpose of growing relationships between athletes and coaches using the powerful platform of Jesus Christ and uniting them while continuing to spread the gospel on a global scale. The FCA provides for different levels of sports which include professional, college, high school and youth sports. The organization engages with local communities that brings this club to different campuses across the world, including the club here at RHS.
However, throughout Rocklin’s history the FCA wasn’t the first club of its kind to be established here. RHS teacher, Mark Hardy, who’s the club’s advisor has seen similar clubs related to Christian religion throughout his teaching career, “I’ve been teaching at Rocklin High School for 32 years and pretty much the entire time, we’ve had some form of Christian clubs that have met in my classroom and so forth”, says Hardy, “But I believe it was approximately seven or eight, six or seven years ago, that students approached me and said maybe it would be great if we could do a Fellowship of Christian Athletes [club]. We went ahead and kind of ran FCA concurrently with the Christian club that was going on at the time. But then ultimately, because the Fellowship of Christian Athletes offered so many resources, so much support, at the local and national level, we decided to kind of merge and basically make what was called the one club [now] the FCA club [into] one group.”
Since its beginning, Hardy has seen a tremendous amount of growth from students attending the club when they meet every Wednesday at lunch. There are some pulling factors that draw people into the club, the main factor being free pizza given out at every meeting where Hardy admits “it’s a little manipulative or whatever but it makes it more of a fun atmosphere. It makes it kind of more worthwhile in some ways. And hey, if that helps them to hear the gospel, to hear Bible truth. You know, we’re really all for it.” However, Hardy is also seeing students taking an interest in learning about religion, “…another thing I’m seeing is that a higher percentage of our students are really interested in growing in their faith. We have something once in a while called FCA core, where there’s no pizza, there’s no special guest speaker. You know, the things that might kind of attract students, but what there is [instead] is we just get together and we want to study the Bible, dig deeper into something about our faith and so forth.”
The FCA requires no formal membership, anyone can join in at any time and listen to what they have to offer. Senior Zachary Burdick, one of the club presidents, explains the average club session, “So everyone comes in [and] we welcome them. If FCA is with (us), we have a big banner that says FCA. We’re trying to reach everyone in the community, so we know this club is happening. They’ll get their food if we have it, and then we’ll pray for their food. And then a lot of the time we have a guest speaker, whether it be a professional athlete or a youth pastor from a local church. We’ll have them come in and share a message from the Bible or from their story of how they met Christ. Then at the end, a lot of the time, we have a prayer to receive Christ or we also (offer) an opportunity (whether students) want a Bible or if they want prayer. We always ask them if they want to talk to anyone we know, like our leaders or Mr. Hardy [who] always wants to talk to them. And then at the end of the club we pray out and then we’re basically done, and we just have community with them”, Burdick says.
As a president, Zach also ensures that “every person that walks in is going to hear the good news of Jesus Christ and what He did for us, and whether they make that decision that day to give up their life and follow him that day is one thing.”
Don’t let anyone look down on you because you’re young, but set an example in speech, life, love, faith and purity… – Zachary Burdick
For the athletes who walk into each session, it’s making an impact on them in regards to the way they view certain topics. Senior Hadley Jantz, a water polo player, has been showing up on a consistent basis throughout the year. When asked about how this club changed the way she viewed sports she had this to say, “I think for me, it’s a good reminder that I need to keep my identity in God and not in my sports, or what I’m doing in my life, day to day”, Jantz says, “I need to remind myself that my value is in place, and how good I’m playing in water polo, or how good I’m swimming one day, it all comes back to God, utmost before anything else.” As an athlete, Jantz mentions the struggle of “having practice so often, it takes up a lot of time and it makes me feel really busy and I don’t have time to sit down and maybe pray or read my Bible.”
However, she does not let that stop her from connecting with God, “even if it means leaving practice an hour early to go to youth group on a Tuesday, that’s what I’ve had to do. And that’s made me realize that it’s more important to be at church and be learning about God, then necessarily, be at every single practice, if I can.”
Rocklin’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes is more than just the average club, it’s one that’s allowing both athletes and students to build a deep relationship with God and view their sports in a different perspective. To Hardy, the club may provide free pizza “but fundamentally, at its core, we believe that we offer the greatest gift that anyone could ever receive, and that is eternal God Himself, Jesus Christ, dying for you, that you might live. And that’s what people could find at FCA.”
That reason is what he believes separates the FCA from the many different clubs currently on campus.
How FCA was Formed
The Fellowship of Christian Athletes was founded by Don McClanen, a former coach at Eastern Oklahoma A&M. McClanen sent out 19 letters to well-known sports figures, among those were Branch Rickey who owned the Brooklyn Dodgers and athletes such as Otto Graham, Carl Erskine and Donn Moomaw. In September of 1954, the first advisory meeting was held and the FCA was officially formed. After moving their headquarters to Kansas City, Missouri they held their first national camp at Estes Park, Colorado in 1956 which drew in 256 athletes and coaches. Overtime, the FCA continued to expand with new camp locations, established a national magazine and added in groups called “Hurdles” on school campuses. Since then, several professional athletes and coaches from major, minor league sports, and top-tier college programs have engaged in FCA through camps, ministry events, become guest speakers and in ministry leadership roles.
