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In an unprecedented meeting, a delegation of five NBA players and several officials from the National Association of Basketball Players are in the Vatican Monday morning for a private audience with Pope Francis to discuss their work on the social justice issues.
An aide to Pope Francis contacted the players’ association last week, saying the Pope wanted to learn more about how players had recently drawn attention to pressing social justice issues and economic inequality – and about what they were planning for the future, union officials told ESPN. . The union agreed and quickly scheduled an overnight Sunday flight to hold their private meeting with the Pope, which began at 11:45 a.m. local time Monday morning at the Vatican. With training camp set to open on December 1, players and union officials have had to make the trip now.
The delegation includes Kyle Korver and Sterling Brown; Jonathan Isaac of the Orlando Magic; Anthony Tolliver, union secretary-treasurer; Marco Belinelli; and Michele Roberts, general manager of the players’ union.
The meeting is expected to last an hour at the Papal Library in the Apostolic Palace, after which players and union officials will visit St. Peter’s Square.
The players and the union, in cooperation with the NBA League office, took to their stage during the restart of the 2020 NBA season in Orlando to highlight police brutality, racial injustice and other issues. . Most players selected various social justice-related messages – including “Say their names,” “Tie” and “Enough” – to place above their numbers on the back of their shirts. The league and union have agreed to paint “Black Lives Matter” along a sideline. Almost all of the players and coaches knelt while the national anthem was played before games.
Brown and Korver both played at the time for the Milwaukee Bucks, who opted out of a postseason game against the Orlando Magic following the police shootout of Jacob Blake, a black man from 29 years old, in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The Bucks’ impromptu strike inspired a wave of such actions across several sports.
Brown, who agreed to terms with the Houston Rockets this weekend, and George Hill, now a member of the Oklahoma City Thunder, were the first Bucks members to decide they would not play the game. Brown is the victim of a high-profile case of police brutality. In early 2018, eight Milwaukee police officers surrounded Brown outside a Walgreens to investigate a possible parking violation. One of them forced Brown to the ground. Another used a Taser on him. Earlier this month, Brown settled a civil rights lawsuit he brought against the city of Milwaukee and its police department after the defendants agreed to a payment of $ 750,000.
Isaac, an ordained minister, was one of the only players and coaches to represent the national anthem when the NBA resumed in Orlando.
The meeting was very quiet. The players plan to discuss this with the media afterwards. They will return to the United States on Tuesday morning.
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