[WhatWuzThatBlue]

Steve - I can appreciate your honesty but take a step back and look what you are saying. You are injecting your Christian based morality into a game. Invoking or thanking the Lord is okay, using his name in vain isn't? Come on, we have Jews, Muslims, Atheists, Agnostics, Buddhists and the like all playing our favorite game. I've umpired plenty of games with non-native English speakers and didn't know what they were saying - offensive or not. Would you warn or eject a kid for saying, "holymoses", "allah" or "mohammed"?

Around here, if a player curses at himself we usually ignore it - unless he screams it, of course! If a varsity second baseman, while tying his shoelace, breaks it and mutters "goddam it", are you reallly going to warn him about his language?

I've heard some of the most foul on-field language from so called Christian school athletes. I've never melted or had to go wash my ears out after those words. They are, after all, just words. When they are directed at me or an opponent, they take on new meaning and I've bounced kids for gestures too. But they've always crossed the line when using them and they knew it.

Some of us are fortunate to live in more tolerant environs. Mixed ethnicities and religions don't afford us the luxury of Sunday school marmism. We make the calls and ensure that the game is being played fairly. My job is not to ensure that they get into heaven or not. If Junior wants to invoke Allah's name, I don't care. Well, as long as he's not wearing a backpack when he yells it.