Hope as a Theological Virtue in the Athletic and Spiritual Lives of Filipino Student-Athletes in the Philippines: An Exploratory Interpretative Phenomenological Study.

Résumé

In the Philippines, where Christianity and athletic passion coexist, little is known about how young student-athletes live out the theological virtue of hope in ways that affect their mental and spiritual health. This exploratory interpretative phenomenological study addresses that gap by reimagining the virtue of hope in Pope Benedict XVI's Spe Salvi within the lived experiences of high-performing student-athletes at the University of Santo Tomas (UST), Manila, Philippines. Adopting interpretative phenomenological analysis, the researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with a total of ten participants (n = 10), varsity athletes from basketball, volleyball, and chess programs, and were complemented by field observations and document analysis. The transcripts (translated from Tagalog and Taglish) underwent a seven-step analytic process that produced three group experiential themes (GETs): (1) resilience and perseverance through hope, where student-athletes described hope as an inner force that keeps them training through injury, defeat, and academic pressure; (2) faith and community as foundations of hope, where family, teammates, coaches, and communal faith practices such as Mass and team prayers nurtured a collective hope that enhanced well-being; and (3) spiritual growth and transformation through hope, where experiences of hope during trials deepened prayer life, fostered moral reflection, and translated athletic discipline into spiritual resilience. These insights enrich theological understandings of hope in a university sports context and illuminate how student-athletes integrate spirituality into training and competition. However, the study remains exploratory: Participants were self-selecting Catholic athletes from one institution, and the cross-sport sample size is small, limiting transferability. The insights provide a foundation for future research that could recruit larger, sport-specific samples, include athletes from different religious or secular contexts, and integrate longitudinal or mixed-methods approaches to examine how hope evolves over an athlete's career and relates to performance and psychological well-being.