Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know all about Caitlyn (Bruce) Jenner. You probably know Wednesday night she received ESPN’s Arthur Ashe Courage Award.
Caitlyn spent some of her considerable fame and fortune to make an admittedly substantial change in her life. But she did not swim against the tide of public opinion by any stretch of the imagination. The LGBTQ agenda has the power of the White House and the Supreme Court firmly behind it. Caitlyn walked into an America waiting for her with open arms. It was a change she wanted, sought after, not something thrust upon her she had to overcome.
Hard. Sure. But courageous? Not really.
There were far better candidates. Noah Galloway for one. Noah lost an arm and a leg in the Iraq War, yet continues to compete in adventure races and other events, including a 58-hour Death Race.
But my vote goes to Lauren Hill. ESPN threw Lauren a bone and awarded her their “Best Moment” Award. Her parents accepted it for her. In case you are not familiar with her, let me tell you a little about her.
Lauren was a freshman at Cincinnati’s Mount St Joseph, a small Division III school. Her senior year in high school she learned she had inoperable brain cancer and was given at best two years to live. But in September, just after she started at “The Mount,” she was told she had only months.
All her life Lauren wanted to play college basketball. Due to the nausea and headaches caused by her illness and the medication she took, it looked like that dream would never come true.
Her determination, and that of her teammates, made sure it did.
In fact, I think Lauren, her team, and the opposing team all deserve the award.
Hiram College, the opposing team, gave up their home court advantage and made the 300-mile trip Lauren was too sick to endure, all to help a girl they had never even met fulfill a lifelong dream. When Lauren scored her goal, her crying teammates mobbed her at center court. What no one paid attention to was the Terriers, waiting at the end of the court, crying as well. As they say, character is what you do when no one is looking.
The Mount petitioned the NCAA to allow them to play their first game two weeks early, on November 2, in the hope that she would be well enough to play. The publicity caused a game that normally draws 100 fans to be played at Xavier University before 10,000 people. The team designed special gray uniforms (gray is the color for brain cancer) for the game that they turned into a fundraiser, and over $50,000 was raised during the game. They had practiced a play repeatedly to help her score in her weakened condition; she scored 17 seconds into the game. After her goal, her father helped Lauren to the bench and she sat out most of the game wearing pink sunglasses and headphones. With the team ahead by 9 points, she scored one more goal in the final 30 seconds.
Lauren played in three more games and scored three more times before being admitted to hospice care on December 1. In her last months she worked to promote awareness of brain cancer, especially the rare pediatric kind she faced, and to raise money for research. She eventually raised over over $1,000,000.
When she died April 10, LeBron James tweeted “You are the true definition of strength, courage, power, leadership…”
She was nineteen years old.
So tell me, who showed true courage?