What the tattoos of World Cup players say about their love, life and religious beliefs

(The Conversation) — As millions watch the 2026 FIFA World Cup, players’ tattoos will be on display – offering a glimpse into the inner lives of soccer’s biggest stars.

The leg tattoos on midfielder Leandro Paredes of Argentina. (Marcelo Endelli/Getty Images)

Gustavo Morello
June 10, 2026

(The Conversation) — As the 2026 FIFA World Cup starts on June 11, 2026, traditional news and social media channels will be full of pictures of the players. Many of them will be showing their tattoos.

Body art has become increasingly part of international soccer, although its prevalence can vary across geographical regions. A study of athletes participating in the 2018 World Cup found that Latin American players were the most heavily tattooed, followed by those from Oceania and Europe. African and Asian players are the least tattooed.

I have been studying tattoos and their spiritual and religious roles since 2018. Tattoos are an investment of time and money; they tend to symbolize something important in the person’s life. For professional athletes, however, they take on another level of meaning.

These athletes operate in controlled environments in which what they do and say with their bodies is highly regulated. A player cannot freely ski, ride, work out or take vacations without considering contractual obligations to companies and other investors. Most of the professionals playing in the World Cup have also signed sponsorship agreements that regulate what they can display on their social media.

Against this backdrop, tattoos remain one of the few spaces of personal freedom. As my colleagues and I found in our research, those who get them are choosing to reveal what is important and sacred to them.

Breaking the code

Sociologists Sam Belkin and Dale Sheptak argue that tattoos are often a way for athletes to express their humanity in environments where they may be subjects of unreal expectations or treated as an asset. Belkin and Sheptak write that visible tattoos are a type of “nonverbal communication” that enables players to be honest about their personal feelings and what matters to them.

My colleagues and I analyzed the tattoos of the Argentine men’s national team that won the last World Cup in Qatar in 2022. We looked at about 200 pictures and found that 20 of the 26 players on the roster had a total of 226 tattoos.

Argentina’s Rodrigo De Paul, left, and Lionel Messi at Lusail Stadium in Lusail City, Qatar, on Dec. 9, 2022, with their tattoos visible.
Simon Bruty/Anychance/Getty Images

We analyzed the team’s demographics and the tattoo designs and placement on the players’ bodies. We also analyzed interviews where some of them had talked about their lives and, in some cases, the stories behind their tattoos. By placing these tattoos in the broader context of their professional paths and religious and popular culture, we were able to better understand what the body art meant to them.

A majority of players expressed their religious beliefs through their tattoos: 75% of them – 15 out of 20 – featured body art of religious figures connected to Catholicism, like the Virgin Mary, Jesus and saints; some also had tattoos of doves associated with the holy spirit, and churches.

We also saw religious diversity. There were tattoos of the Buddha, folk saints and spiritual objects. One player had a tattoo of a dream catcher – a handcrafted willow hoop with a woven net that resembles a spider’s web, typically hung above a bed to offer protection; another had the word “energía” – energy – inked on his body.

Seventy-five percent of the players had tattoos depicting what they achieved in their careers. Some of the symbols they used were trophies, jerseys and numbers. Usually the numbers they got corresponded to the jersey numbers they wear.

Eighty percent – 16 players – had tattoos that portrayed what they loved. These tattoos include designs of numbers – usually dates of their children’s births – names of beloved ones or their partner’s eyes or lips.

Some tattoos expressed their extended family, including parents, grandparents, people who helped raise them, and even pets.

Placement was also important. About 60% of the tattoos were on the arms and head, locations that were easily visible when they are performing on the field.

But the design of the tattoo also decided its placement: Religious symbols were usually placed on the entire shoulder or biceps, or on the upper or lower leg. Tattoos related to professional careers were usually located on the player’s dominant leg. Animal tattoos were usually placed on backs, and not visible during games.

Not all tattoos are the same

Many scholars who study soccer have examined its relationships with politics and explored how the sport has been a venue for politics. Diego Maradona, for example, got the Argentine Marxist revolutionary and guerrilla leader Che Guevara tattoo on his right arm and Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro on his calf, expressing his revolutionary political view. Our research team did not find political tattoos among current players.

Gender is also important when looking at tattoos. Female players are often subjected to greater scrutiny than their male counterparts. When Argentina’s national women’s team captain Yamila Rodriguez revealed tattoos of Cristiano Ronaldo, she faced intense criticism from fans and media for having the Portuguese superstar and not Argentinean Lionel Messi depicted in tattoo. Rodriguez’s experience highlights that women’s bodies are subjected to personal judgment in a way that men’s are not.

A tattoo of Portuguese player Cristiano Ronaldo on the leg of Argentina women’s team captain Yamila Rodriguez ahead of a match against Uruguay in Montevideo, Uruguay, on Oct. 28, 2025.
Eitan Abramovich/ AFP via Getty Images

This World Cup, with its unprecedented global outreach, offers a unique opportunity to observe the values, beliefs and relationships that players choose to display on their bodies. In some ways, tattoos can be seen as a small window into the players’ souls.

(Gustavo Morello, Professor of Sociology, Boston College. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)


The Conversation religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The Conversation is solely responsible for this content.

Cincinnati, where Vance converted, gives a glimpse of Catholicism’s history in America’s heartland

(The Conversation) — For more than a century, anti-Catholicism was a powerful force in the region’s culture and politics. But religious pluralism ultimately triumphed in the ‘Queen City.’

John Caspar Wild painted 'View of Cincinnati From Covington' in 1835, as the city was booming. (Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal/Google Art Project via Wikimedia Commons)

Matthew Smith
June 10, 2026 

(The Conversation) — Ten years after “Hillbilly Elegy” catapulted its author into public view, JD Vance is publishing a new memoir, “Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith.” The vice president explains the book as a sort of self-help guide for the spiritually lost: “… by sharing my journey I might be helpful to others – Catholic, Protestant, or otherwise – who are seeking reconciliation with God.”

Scheduled for publication in June 2026, “Communion” promises “an intimate account” of its author’s religious journey. But the Catholicism to which Vance converted in Cincinnati in 2019 is quite unlike the evangelism he encountered in his childhood, famously described in “Hillbilly Elegy.”

As a historian of religion in Appalachia and the Midwest, I find America’s religious mosaic endlessly fascinating. Vance’s journey from Protestantism, to atheism, to Catholicism, not to mention his marriage to a Hindu woman, reflects the diversity of the United States.

My own experiences teaching in Vance’s hometown of Middletown, Ohio, suggest that America’s Midwestern communities, tarnished by “Rust Belt” stereotypes, are as dynamic and as changing as everywhere else – including in matters of faith.

Nearby Cincinnati, where Vance was confirmed at a Dominican priory, is a case in point and a window into Catholicism’s history in the American heartland. For more than a century, anti-Catholicism was a powerful force in culture and politics – yet, time and again, religious pluralism triumphed.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance and his wife, Usha Vance, attend services at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican on Good Friday, April 18, 2025.
Andreas Solaro/AFP via Getty Images

Scots-Irish settlers

“To understand me, you must understand that I am a Scots-Irish hillbilly at heart,” Vance declared in his first memoir.

The Scots-Irish played an outsized role in history. Initially, these Protestants were from Scotland, but they moved to Ireland in the 17th century. “Planted” by the British Crown as a form of colonization, these immigrants riled the Catholic majority whose lands they occupied.

Later, many crossed the Atlantic and settled the Colonial American backcountry. Their distinctive influence shaped the “hillbilly” culture of Appalachia.

The faith of these settlers kindled a fervent Protestant piety, found in the Great Revival of the Ohio Valley frontier. In this early 19th-century rebirth of backcountry religion, traveling ministers preached a fiery gospel of grace, stirring large crowds with their open-air sermons.
Queen City

Boundaries between urban and rural America were always porous. By 1830 a quarter of Ohio’s 1 million inhabitants clustered in the state’s southwestern corner. Cincinnati was the heart of this region: the “Queen City” of the United States’ expanding Western frontier.

It had become a hub of Catholic immigrants from Germany and Ireland – and a center for anti-Catholic preaching and anti-immigrant politics. In 1835, leading Protestant evangelist Lyman Beecher infamously denounced immigrants “rushing in like the waters of the flood” and argued the Vatican and Catholic schools posed dangers for America.

The first Catholic parish in Cincinnati originally met in a small building just outside city lines.
Cincinnati Public Library via Wikimedia Commons

Amid such prejudice, Protestant Irish Americans embraced the term Scots-Irish to distinguish their more established population from recent Catholic arrivals. Many of these Catholic newcomers, fleeing famine and persecution, were disparaged as poor, illiterate and superstitious.

Yet despite alarmism and periodic violence, including ethnic riots in 1855, Cincinnati’s sectarian relations were surprisingly pragmatic, shaped by a sense of shared civic endeavor. Protestants welcomed the city’s first Catholic church, for example, and often sent their children to the Catholic parochial schools. Many converted to Catholicism, including wealthy philanthropists.

In 1837, Cincinnati’s Catholic Bishop, John Baptist Purcell debated Protestant preacher Alexander Campbell on the merits of Catholic religion for several days before a crowded audience. Both debaters claimed victory, and proceeds from the published debates were evenly split between Catholic and Protestant charities in Cincinnati.
Changing country

By the mid-19th century, the city’s Catholics, while still a minority, were larger than any single Protestant denomination and central to the cultural landscape.

People observe the National Eucharistic Congress, a gathering for Catholics, in Cincinnati in 1911.
Wikimedia Commons

At the time, Catholics represented only 5% of the U.S. population. That percentage would triple by the turn of the century, due to immigration from southern and eastern Europe.

Anti-Catholic backlash continued into the 20th century, along with other forms of religious prejudice. For example, the U.S. Immigration Act of 1924 restricted immigration from parts of Europe heavily populated by Jews and Catholics. Animosity once focused on immigrants from Germany and Ireland shifted to those from Italy and Russia.

Bias against Catholics remained a robust force in Appalachian politics, too. Leading up to the 1960 Democratic primary, John F. Kennedy campaigned tirelessly in West Virginia, considered a tough arena for a Harvard-educated Catholic but critical to his electoral strategy. His success in the Mountain State defied the myth that a Catholic candidate could never win the White House.



John F. Kennedy campaigns in West Virginia on May 10, 1960.
Corbis/Corbis Historial via Getty Images



Turn toward ‘Communion’

Southern Ohio, where Vance grew up and converted to Catholicism, is deeply Midwestern. But its heritage has been influenced by the wave of workers who left Appalachia in the mid-20th century looking for jobs, including Vance’s family.

As Vance wrote in a 2020 essay for Lamp magazine, which addresses Catholic issues, his early ideas of Catholicism were negative ones – assuming, for example, that the church “rejected the legitimacy of Scripture.”

As a young man, he drifted away from faith altogether. During his days at Yale Law School, however, Vance discovered a curiosity that drew him toward Catholicism, inspired by thinkers from Silicon Valley mogul Peter Thiel and French philosopher René Girard to the fourth-century theologian St. Augustine.

Vance wrote in his essay, “I often wonder what my grandmother” – a woman with Christian beliefs, but skepticism of institutional religion – “would have thought about her grandson becoming a Catholic.”

Today, 1 in 5 U.S. adults is Catholic, and another 9% consider themselves “cultural Catholics.” America’s prejudice toward their tradition has eroded. Six out of nine Supreme Court justices are Catholic, along with 28% of Congress.

In fact, Vance’s new faith highlights a growing alliance between culturally conservative elements of American Catholicism and America’s religious right, dominated by conservative Protestants since its emergence in the 1970s.

Lately, this alignment has come under strain, in part reflecting American-born Pope Leo XIV’s wariness toward U.S. policies, such as the war in Iran. Nowhere have such spats been more ironic than in Vance’s rebuke of the pope. After Leo remarked that Jesus’ followers are “never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs,” the vice president warned, “If you’re going to opine on matters of theology, you’ve got to be careful.”

It will be interesting to see how such tensions play out in years to come.

(Matthew Smith, Visiting Assistant Professor of History, Miami University. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)


The Conversation religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The Conversation is solely responsible for this content.

THE LION VS THE ANTI CHRIST

Pope Leo says Christians ‘cannot promote war,’ blesses Sagrada Família’s Jesus tower

BARCELONA, Spain (RNS) — Surrounded by the nature-inspired architecture of Antoni Gaudí, often referred to as ‘God’s architect,’ the pope gave a homily that made a forceful appeal in defense of human life and against war.

Pope Leo XIV, bottom, walks in procession to celebrate a Mass in the Basilica of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, June 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

Claire Giangravè
June 10, 2026

RNS

BARCELONA, Spain (RNS) — Visiting one of the most recognizable landmarks in the world, the Basilica of the Sagrada Família, Pope Leo XIV celebrated Mass and blessed its recently constructed central tower of Jesus Christ, which made it the tallest church in the world.

During his Wednesday (June 10) homily before over 4,000 people, including 200 cardinals and bishops, and surrounded by the nature-inspired architecture of Antoni Gaudí, often referred to as “God’s architect,” the pope made a forceful appeal against war and in defense of human life.

“We cannot believe in Jesus and promote war. We cannot believe in Jesus and kill the innocent. We cannot believe in Jesus and abandon those who suffer, those who weep, those who flee from misery,” he said.

The liturgy was accompanied by a 600-voice choir and witnessed by church and state authorities in Spain, including the Catholic monarchs King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia.

The pope praised the Barcelona church, which has been under construction for over 140 years, as “a work in progress today, reminding us that the Christian life is always a journey because it is a project that God is carrying out.”

The imposing structure was built as a response to the industrial revolution of the 19th century through the support of the Association of the Devotees of St. Joseph, who sought to counter the secularization that accompanied the industrial era.

People wait for Pope Leo XIV’s arrival to celebrate Mass at the Basilica of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, June 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

Leo took his name from his predecessor Leo XIII, best known for his encyclical “Rerum Novarum” (“On New Things”), which offered answers to the challenges posed by the industrial revolution. In Leo XIV’s recent encyclical, the first of his papacy, he said we are witnessing a new industrial revolution and stressed the importance of putting human beings at the center of society, culture and education.

Gaudí saw the basilica as a project in which “an entire people” would come together and contribute, said the architect and scholar Chiara Curti, who has written three books on the Catalan architect, including her latest, “The Sagrada Família: The Cathedral of Light.”

Curti said the faces of the people in the façade of the nativity of the basilica were meant to look like the people working and living around its construction.

“ … The cathedral has this characteristic where each person places their own stone,” she said. “… It is as if (Gaudí) were saying that the history of salvation is made up of the people of today.”

The design of the basilica, covered in artwork and symbolism telling the story of Christ, was described by the pope as “an eloquent catechesis made of stones, colors and light.” He added that in modern society, “it becomes even more evident how art and beauty are privileged channels of evangelization.”

A view of the Basilica of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona, Spain, May 30, 2026, ahead of Pope Leo XIV’s visit to the city in June. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Gaudí, who started working on the basilica in 1883, died before he could see it to completion, in 1926, after being hit by a tram car. Leo’s visit coincided with the centenary of his death, as some speculated on the possibility that the pope might soon approve his canonization. Before the Mass, Leo visited Gaudí’s tomb, located beneath the church.

“As an architect inspired by faith, the venerable Antoni Gaudí designed this place with the desire to narrate the mysteries of the Lord’s life,” he said in his homily. “In this way, he has proposed to us a spiritual pilgrimage, leading to an encounter with Christ, who for our sake was born, died and rose again.”

Pope Francis declared Gaudí venerable, a first step toward sainthood, in 2025, but the cause cannot move forward until a miracle is recognized, according to church rules. But a pope could potentially waive this prerequisite.

“The church always arrives a little late to saints,” Curti said, adding that Gaudí’s reputation for holiness was already recognized during his lifetime. “He already accompanies people toward the possibility of turning their lives into a work of art.”

Leo also blessed the monumental tower of Jesus Christ, which stands about 566 feet tall. In 2012, Pope Benedict XVI consecrated the church, praising it as “a visible sign of the invisible God, for whose glory its towers rise,” Leo recalled.

The pope said the cross was the “radiant sign” of Christ’s love. “When Christ is lifted up, the grandeur of his humanity shines forth, and our works glorify God. These are the works of faith, and art stands out among them,” he added.

The blessing was followed by music, fireworks and a light show before the 9,000 people including those outside the basilica. According to local estimates, 120,000 people followed the event on the screens placed in the nearby streets. 

ciberconflitos.wordpresshttps://ciberconflitos.wordpress.com  › wp-content  › uploads  › 2014  › 12  › hardt_negri_multitude_-war-and-democracy-in-the-age-of-empire.pdf

MULTITUDE WAR AND DEMOCRACY IN THE AGE OF EMPIRE MICHAEL HARDT...

Michael Hardt and Anronio Negri.

Signs of the Times

Pope Leo reveals his political theology in Spain

(RNS) — ‘The world is undergoing a profound spiritual and cultural crisis, which manifests in multiple forms of violence, polarization and mutual distrust,’ Leo said in Spain.

Pope Leo XIV is flanked by Francina Armengol, president of the Congress of Deputies of Spain, left, and Pedro Rollan Ojeda, president of the Senate of Spain, as he meets with members of the Spanish Parliament at the Congress of Deputies, in Madrid, Monday, June 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

Thomas Reese
June 9, 2026 
RNS

(RNS) — During his addresses to political and diplomatic leaders in Spain, Pope Leo XIV laid out the political theology he believes should guide not only the church but also politicians and diplomats.

He presented his vision in two speeches: one on Saturday (June 6), in the presence of King Felipe VI, to civic and diplomatic leaders; the other on Monday, to the Spanish Parliament.

The church wishes to be in service to humans, Leo explained. It “walks alongside humanity, shares its hopes and its wounds, listens to the questions of every age and allows herself to be challenged by everything concerning the lives of contemporary men and women.”

---

RELATED: With his first encyclical, Pope Leo hits it out of the ballpark

---

To those who fear church interference in politics, the pope affirmed, “It is a service not marked by imposition.”

He repeated what he said in his recent encyclical, “Magnifica Humanitas“: “When the church addresses anything concerning public life, she does so while respecting the proper mission of institutions and the legitimate responsibility of those who have received the mandate to legislate.”

The church, he said, recognizes “the autonomy of earthly realities” and “the distinction between the ecclesial community and the political community.”

For the United States, this means he affirms the separation of church and state and rejects Christian nationalism.

Rather, what the church offers is “a reflection born of the desire to serve the common good and to recall what makes human coexistence truly human.”

To Spain’s Congress of Deputies, Leo affirmed the role of legislatures, where “differences are heard, sorted out and, when possible, transformed into shared decisions.” In words that could have been addressed to the U.S. Congress, he said, “Every legislative task ultimately confronts a decisive question: What conception of the human person inspires laws, and what kind of society do those laws build?”

Human beings are “more than just a cog in the social, economic or political order,” he added. They are “open to truth, endowed with freedom, and driven by a thirst for eternity that no temporal reality can quench.”

Leo recalled that Spanish philosophers and theologians “introduced into historical discernment the question of the irreducible value of every human being and the moral limits of power.” But he admitted that “society and the church herself did not always live up to these insights found in their own Christian tradition.”

Pope Leo XIV is welcomed by Spain’s King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia upon his arrival at Adolfo Suarez Madrid-Barajas International Airport in Madrid, Saturday, June 6, 2026, marking the start of his seven-day apostolic journey to mainland Spain and the Canary Islands. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

In this tradition, “authority always entails responsibility” and “every human being must be recognized as a subject of rights and duties.” That aspiration, he said, “continues to resonate today: that dignity, justice and the common good should be the measure of social relations, both at the national and international levels.”

“Our discernment,” he asserted, “must focus on the place of the human person in our decision-making and on how the dignity of work, solidarity, social policy and the common good are today being addressed in new ways.”

Laws, Leo believes, should be “a safeguard for all and a guarantee against the imposition of particular interests and agendas.”

“Can a community that casts into the shadows the unborn child, the elderly, the sick, those who suffer in silence or those who depend entirely on the care of others be called fully just?” he asked, reflecting his use of a consistent ethic of life in dealing with a wide range of issues.

The defense of human life is neither a partisan issue nor a confessional interest, but a goal of civilization, he added. 

Leo also spoke of “the tragic drama of migration,” which has divided Spain and the United States. He is clearly concerned for migrants, who “are forced, by often dramatic circumstances, to leave their communities.” He said they should be offered “safe and legal pathways, a respectful welcome and real opportunities for integration.”

At the same time, to address the causes of migration, he said we need “to promote the right to remain in one’s own land, working to ensure that no one has to leave their home due to a lack of peace, security or decent living conditions, including economic inequalities and the effects of the climate crisis.”

The pope believes that “the world is undergoing a profound spiritual and cultural crisis, which manifests in multiple forms of violence, polarization and mutual distrust.” And sadly, he complained, “the temptation to gain popularity by fanning the flames of polarization seems to have grown rather than diminished.”

What is needed, he said, is “public discourse that respects those who think differently, institutions dedicated to fostering dialogue, a historical memory that seeks truth and reconciliation, and a social life capable of sustaining civic friendship and mutual respect amid disagreement.”

He also expressed concern about the rearmament of Europe and other parts of the world. “True security,” he asserted, “stems from justice, patient dialogue, respect for international law and a policy capable of placing the lives of peoples above the interests that profit from war.”

He called on the international community “to rediscover the indispensable value of dialogue as a patient path toward just and lasting agreements, founded on respect for treaties, on the transparency of diplomatic action and on the sincere will to prioritize peace over the use of force.”

---

RELATED: Trump attacks Pope Leo for preaching peace

---

Leo acknowledged that the message of peace within nations and among nations “unfortunately strikes some as naïve and others as confrontational,” but he believes, it is “welcomed by those who do not shut themselves off in preconceived ideologies, but are rather open to the truth.”

The Spanish government has been at odds with the Trump administration’s foreign policy, including its war in Iran. It is therefore significant that the pope thanked Spain for “its faithful adherence to international law and multilateralism.”

The pope’s message is that the Christian tradition has much to offer the world of national and international politics. He affirmed “that law must serve the good, that justice sets limits on force, that power requires legitimacy, that the poor belong fully to the community, that the foreigner must be welcomed in accordance with his dignity and that human life can never be treated as a commodity.”

In Spain, Pope Leo showed how he plans to call world leaders to focus on justice and peace as an essential part of their vocations. We need to support that call with prayer and action.