Four Major League Baseball teams — the Detroit Tigers, Colorado Rockies, Kansas City Royals and Milwaukee Brewers — have scheduled games April 10 during the midday time window that’s considered by many the most solemn period of the Christian calendar.
Religious leaders say they don’t expect Americans to return to an age of shuttered shops and businesses on Good Friday, but they question whether baseball teams could have been more respectful of religious sensitivities.
Monsignor Thomas Fryar, pastor of the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Denver, says he is particularly concerned about the ballplayers, security guards and other stadium workers who have little choice but to work that afternoon.
In Detroit, where about one-third of the region’s population is Catholic, the Tigers’ decision to schedule a baseball game at 1:05 p.m. on Good Friday is “insult upon injury,” says the Rev. Ed Vilkauskas, pastor of Old St. Mary Church in the city.
