I returned to the sport of tennis two years ago, right around the time I started writing Midweek Musings. As I broke in my new tennis sneakers, relearned my backhand and built my stamina for multiple sets, this article remained poised in my subconscious, whispering to me like a well-hit passing shot just over the net. As I step back onto the court — 25 years after putting down my racket at age 16 — I have returned to the sport with a bit more maturity (ha!) and a more spiritual perspective. So here are a few insights I’ve come to on the court.

Tennis, and other sports, are a wonderful way to build community. In a time of increased social isolation and division, participating in sports can provide connection. New to town, tennis has been a way for me to meet new people and form friendships. Along the way I became part of a team, and so I feel like part of something bigger than myself, and get to cheer my teammates on; it’s a feeling not unlike being part of a church. (Shout out to MAC White Weekday Women A-1, Level 2 — Northshore League Champions 2026!)

Lots of great research and writing explores how the discipline required in sports training mirrors spiritual discipline. This is a lesson I’m still working on. When I get out there on the tennis court I just want to smash the ball as hard as I can — which is not a great strategy. Tennis requires attention— an ability to read and respond to the type of ball you’re presented with; finesse — a careful calibration of how hard and how to hit the ball; and strategy — the ability to slow down enough to place your return well. To do those things takes discipline, and practice.

Tennis is also a game of mental toughness and requires the ability to stay present in the moment. It’s all too easy to get frustrated with a missed shot, or get caught up in a dispute about a line call. As a kid I nearly lost my love of the sport because I would get so down on myself after a double-fault or lost game. But then I learned a bit about meditation and developed my own color-calming meditation. Breathe in the color green, breathe out the color red. Breathe in peace, breathe out frustration. It’s amazing how helpful this has been to my game, both as a young person and now. Adding this meditation as part of my tennis game not only helps me keep my cool and stay grounded, it adds to my overall spiritual practice. Being able to call up this meditation on the court means I can also rely on it in the overcrowded grocery store parking lot, or when the kids have (once again) left Legos strewn all around the living room.

And because prayer is now a big part of my life — and because I realize that there are certain skills for tennis that are beyond my own abilities to supply — I have begun to say a quick prayer at the beginning of each tennis match as well. I don’t pray for a particular outcome. Something feels weird in praying, “Dear God, empower us to crush our opponents.” But I do pray for focus, confidence, and to remember that it is a gift to play this game and have fun. I also firmly believe in “line-call karma.” Better to call it in and build up good karma than to call it out and build up bad karma!

Many athletes describe sports as a place where they encounter transcendence. Pro Tennis Coach José Antonio Fernandez writes: “When I step onto the tennis court, I do not see just lines and a net dividing two sides. I see a temple. A place where body, breath, and spirit converge. For me, tennis, when approached with presence … becomes meditation in motion, tai chi with a racket, a dance with the forces of focus, grace, and surrender …. Consider the breath: in tennis, just as in yoga or qigong, the breath is rhythm, anchor, bridge. The inhale before a serve awakens readiness. The exhale through a stroke releases tension. The pause between points is the same sacred stillness as the pause between breaths. Nothing is wasted. Everything is practice. Consider movement: each step, each swing, is an expression of flow. Like the tai chi master, the tennis player finds grace not through rigidity but through fluidity. Power comes not from force, but from harmony — the seamless coordination of body and mind with the ball, the opponent, and the moment itself. I’ve often felt that when my body stops fighting for control, my strokes become effortless — and that’s when the game feels most alive.”

This is why tennis, or any sport, can be a spiritual path. It offers the invitation to meet yourself in the mirror of movement, to discover stillness in action, to let awareness turn the ordinary into the sacred. With awareness, every serve is a prayer, every rally a meditation, every match a journey of the soul.

The Rev. Katherine Schofield is pastor of First Parish Church in Manchester-by-the-Sea.

Midweek Musings rotates among Cape Ann clergy.