Former professional football coach Mike Ditka, a practicing Catholic who occasionally served as lector at the 7 a.m. team Mass on game-day Sundays during his decade leading the Chicago Bears, died Friday. He was 86.
“Iron Mike,” as Ditka was known, had a famously explosive temper, which often boiled over on the sidelines and in postgame press conferences. Ditka, who led the Bears to a Super Bowl XX victory in 1986, once broke his right hand after punching a hard object over frustration with the play of a rookie offensive lineman — then, before the next game, told his team to “win this one for Lefty.”
Less well known was Ditka’s commitment to his Catholic faith, for which he credited his convert mother and the nuns of his parochial school in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, where he was raised.
“Growing up, the most important thing was the sacraments with my family,” Ditka told an interviewer with the Catholic website “One Peter Five” in August 2018. “We loved everything about the faith. Going to Catholic school and learning the faith, I wouldn’t trade that for anything.”
“I don’t care how many times I got hit by a nun,” Ditka said, “it was good for me.”
Football success
Born Michael Dyczko in 1939, Ditka was the son of a non-churchgoing Ukrainian and Polish steelworker father and an Irish and German mother who converted to Catholicism.
He played tight end for the University of Pittsburgh and then in the NFL for the Chicago Bears, Philadelphia Eagles, and Dallas Cowboys. In 1988 Ditka was honored as the first tight end ever to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
After retiring from playing, Ditka served as an assistant coach before getting his unlikely chance as the head coach of the Bears in 1982.
His 1985 Bears went 15-1 during the regular season and stomped their way through the playoffs to a Super Bowl victory. So confident were the players of that dominant team that they recorded a rap song called “The Super Bowl Shuffle” during the regular season. (Ditka later said he didn’t know about it, but he didn’t criticize the players for doing it.)
Ditka’s success, toughness, temper, and sense of humor made him a cultural phenomenon, inspiring a recurring skit (and guest appearances) on “Saturday Night Live” and launching a career as a motivational speaker.
When the team’s fortunes plummeted, he was fired in 1992. He later coached the New Orleans Saints but was fired after three years.
Off-field philanthropy
Ditka made millions as a pitchman for dozens of products after he left football, and he used some of that wealth to help others.
“Ditka was very supportive of Misericordia and other charities that supported children with special needs and disabilities,” Mary FioRito, an attorney, lifelong Chicagoan, and Cardinal Francis George Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, told the National Catholic Register, the sister partner of EWTN News.
And not just with checks.
“He spoke at fundraisers, and surprised observers could catch him privately visiting with residents he knew by name,” reported the suburban Chicago Daily Herald.
Ditka was also a member of the Knights of Columbus and participated in the organization’s charitable activities.
‘Constant turmoil’
In his 1986 autobiography “Ditka,” published at the peak of his success, Ditka admitted to having had “no spiritual life at all” during the 1970s, before two other coaches got him involved in a Bible study that reintroduced him to God.
“I always had faith, but I never had understanding,” Ditka said. “I always knew what was going on in life. I was raised right. I did all the things you were supposed to do. But I never understood why I was supposed to do them, because I never had a total understanding of what was going on.”
He also acknowledged what he called “constant turmoil inside,” and he compared himself unfavorably to longtime Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry (1924–2000), whom he admired for always keeping his cool on the sidelines and for his involvement in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
“My priorities can get mixed up. I don’t think he ever gets his priorities mixed up,” Ditka said in the book.
Ditka said he discovered that following his faith was hard work.
“Sometimes you take for granted that your faith will always be there and everything will be fine. But without making the effort, that’s just not a fact. You have to make a real effort to live your faith daily,” Ditka said in the book.
“Nobody is going to do it every day. Nobody is going to do it perfectly,” he continued. “But unless you make the effort you’ve got no chance at all.”
Ditka married in 1961, got divorced in 1973, and then remarried in 1977. Both wives survive him, as do his four children, according to an obituary in the Daily Herald.
“I’m far from perfect now, and I’m never going to be perfect,” Ditka said in his autobiography. “When I die, I’m going to be still trying to get better than I am.”
This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, the sister partner of EWTN News, and has been adapted by EWTN News.
