The World Cup of Modern Systematic Theologians - a Look Back

I've been thinking about writing something about my experience of hosting the World Cup of Modern Systematic Theologians back in June and July. This is not so much an attempt to regain the traffic that found it's way here back then, but maybe to reflect a bit on the question of if it was all worth it.

Because, believe me it was a lot of work. Just to run the games took me an hour or two every day. This was not something I thought about before I started it, the idea just struck me as something that had to be done. Once it got going I realized that it would not do just to pitch the theologians against each other, I would have to give some small presentations of the theologians involved and so on. So it snowballed.

But of course it was great fun as well. And I can't pretend not to have enjoyed the media coverage that happened at the end immensely. My 15 minutes of fame. I am especially proud that Ecumenical News Service decided to quote me on saying that the feminist theology movement will be one of the most important things that happened to theology in the 20th century. That is something I very much stand by.

Of course the daily traffic the tournament brought was not something that could be sustained once the tournament had ended. But there were some interesting long term effects. A lot of people decided to link me - thank you for that - and this still brings in people. And of course a lot of those people that find my blog because of the tournament decided to read other stuff too. Also, my blog has become very popular with Google, and that continues to bring in people daily. Finally, for some to me unknown reason, there is a link to my blog in the Japanese Wikipedia article on Karl Barth. I receive several visitors from that link every day.

If you want to recollect the tournament, here are the brackets once more.

Again in four year's time? Well, we'll see.