Father David Jasso, before he became a priest, was the manager of a major Mexican soccer club that won two championships and ahead of this year’s World Cup in Qatar, he had an important message to give.

Jasso managed the Monterrey Soccer Club in Mexico, known as the “Rayados,” leading the team to local championships in 2009 and 2010.

A few weeks before the start of the FIFA (International Federation of Football Association) Soccer World Cup to be held in Qatar this year, Jasso appealed to players and fans to experience “soccer with joy and as an opportunity to grow our talents, remembering that sports and soccer are also a gift from God.”

In a Facebook post titled “It’s still time to experience the World Cup in peace,” Jasso pointed out that “soccer should be a safe family event.”

“No more violence in something as beautiful and exciting as soccer! I learned this during my time at the Monterrey Soccer Club -Rayados- as Sports Manager before becoming a priest,” he wrote.

Jasso also recalled the violence unleashed at the La Corregidora Stadium in Querétaro, Mexico, where a confrontation between the fans of the Querétaro Fútbol Club and the Atlas Fútbol Club “according to official figures, left 26 injured, with dozens of scenes of brutality and more than 30 arrested.”

“I remember as a child witnessing these kinds of ‘riots,’ ‘fights,’ or ‘brawls’ at the stadium I went to with my father, and even learning from the news of acts of violence in the vicinity or even in neighbourhoods or suburbs after a classic, the most important match in the city, even more, important than a match for the Mexican all-star team.”

Jasso then recalled the message that St. John Paul II addressed to the leaders of the Union of European Football Federations (UEFA) in May 2000, in which he encouraged soccer to serve for the “promotion of greatness and the dignity of man.”

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