Finding religion within the Stanley Cup final

The biggest prize in ice hockey is the Stanley Cup, and for the primary time in nearly twenty years Edmonton Oilers are vying for it. The Oilers are hoping for a comeback against the Florida Panthers and are only two wins away from becoming champions of the National Hockey League.

The finals will once more focus attention on Edmonton, the previous team of the legendary Wayne Gretzky. But they may also focus attention on a few of Canada's biggest exports: hockey and oil.

Novelist Leslie McFarlane once observed: For Canadians, “hockey is more than a game; it is almost a religion.” Now that the Oilers have a likelihood to bring the Stanley Cup back to Canada for the primary time in nearly 30 years, Prayers and superstition aboundout of wearing special clothing to fans who look away during penalty shootouts.

The Oilers also recall one other aspect of Canadian society with almost religious significance: the extraction of natural resources. In American and Canadian culture Oil has long been intertwined with religion. In the eyes of some people it’s a national blessing from God, and a way to the “good life”“ for individuals who persistently seek it.

We are religious scholars who study sports and the way oil shapes society, or Petroculture. The Edmonton Oilers represent a worldview that values ​​triumph, luck and labor – beliefs that could be found on the ice or within the oil fields. The Stanley Cup Final offers a glimpse into how the oil industry helped shape the religious fervor surrounding Canada's favorite sport.

Boomtown

Edmonton is the capital of Alberta, a province known for its vast oil, gas and oil sands reserves. With five refineries producing a mean 3.8 million barrels per day, oil and gas is Alberta's largest industry – and an attitude to life.

This is very true for Edmonton, the “oil capital of Canada”. Here, oil not only structures the local economy, but additionally shapes identities, architecture and on a regular basis experiences.

For example, visit the West Edmonton Mall and you may see a statue of three oil staff drilling, reminding buyers that Oil is the muse of their trade. Visit the Canadian Energy Museum to learn the way oil and gas have transformed the region because the late Forties, and to view items resembling engraved hard hats and the “Oil Patch Kid”, a variation of the legendary “Cabbage Patch Kids” toys. Take a tour of the Greater Edmonton area and see how Pump jacks line the horizon. Oil is all over the place and shapes the longer term, wealth and opportunities.

Given this background, the Oilers' name is just not surprising. After all, it is just not unusual to call teams after local industries. Pittsburgh Steelers pay homage to the steel mills that after employed a big portion of the team’s fan base. The Tennessee Oilers were originally the Houston Oilerswhich prompted other Texas teams just like the XFL to Roughnecks further north is the name of the basketball club Detroit Pistons References to automotive engineering.

Teams with industry-inspired names play a dual role, honoring each a spot and a career. Some fans not only cheer for the house team, but cheer yourself on – and reaffirm that their industry and their work are necessary.

In a recent TikTok videoa person, ecstatic over the Oilers' victory over the Dallas Stars, claps his hands and jumps around his lounge. The caption reads: “My Filipino father, a first-generation immigrant who works on an oil rig and has never played hockey in his life, is cheering for the Oilers as they make the playoffs. Better bring him the trophy, you oil boys.” He appears to be cheering for the Oilers not because they're a hockey team, but because they're an oil team.

And indeed, the Oilers are an oily team. The Oilers Oilfield networkdescribes itself, for instance, as “exclusively promoting[ing] companies in the oil and gas industry” so executives can network “through the power of Oilers hockey.”

The Oilers' connection to the industry is further underlined by their logos. The current logo incorporates a easy drop of oil, but earlier designs featured machine gears and an oil employee Pulling a lever in the form of a hockey stick.

Liquid gold

There is an extended tradition of mixing ice hockey and oil – and with Canada itself.

After the British North America Act When Canada was founded in 1867, the brand new nation sought a particular identity through sports and other cultural forms.

This is where hockey is available in. The winter game developed in Canada from the Gaelic game “Shintyand the First Nations game of lacrosse soon became the glue that held the nation together.

Since then, the media, politicians, sports clubs and major industries have helped to fuel fan enthusiasm and portray hockey as an integral a part of Canada's rugged pioneering character.

In 1936 Imperial Oilone among Canada's largest oil firms, began sponsoring Hockey Night in Canada, a national radio show that reached hundreds of thousands of individuals each week. A number of years later, Imperial Oil played a significant role in bring the show to televisionwhere the Imperial Oil Choir sang the theme song. Imperial Oil and its petrol stations Esso also sponsored Youth hockey programs across the country. In 2019, Imperial signed a contract to supply the “official retail fuel” in Canada.

On the solution to great wealth

The links between hockey and industry in Alberta’s oil region will not be nearly sponsorship. In each cultures, the concept of ​​luck plays a central role – historically one among the various prerequisites needed to extract fossil fuels. “Getting rich” within the oil fields is entangled with the concept of ​​divine windfallespecially amongst the various Christian staff.

philosopher Terra Schwerin Rowe has written concerning the “petrotheology” of North America and explained what number of Perceive oil as a present from God is to be taken from Earth – for those who can find it.

Oil represents luck and who wouldn't need to borrow a little bit of it for his or her team? Sport is exciting because sometimes talent, team chemistry and residential advantage still lose out to luck. Oil culture combines the concept of ​​divine favor with the demand to persevere and persevere, just like hockey.

Currently, fans from everywhere in the world join the people of Edmonton in supporting the Oilers. They will throw their hands within the air in despair when captain Connor McDavid is shipped to the penalty box, or they’ll dance to the Oilers' motto: “La Bamba.” They too will cheer for the oil.