Reuters reports professional boxer and current WBO welterweight champ Manny Pacquiao has cleaned up his partying ways and gone biblical – or at least, started reading the Bible with regularity – with the result that he’s a better, more focused fighter.
“I just want to focus on my career, focus on praying and follow the commandments of God,” the 33-year-old told Reuters while he taped up his hands in a tiny dressing room at the Wild Card Boxing Club.
“No more gambling, no more drinking. Reading the bible is to know the bible, and I believe that the bible is the manual for life.”
For [trainer Freddie] Roach, there has been only one boxing setback since Pacquiao opted to spend more time studying his bible.
“Manny said to me ‘God doesn’t want me to hurt people’, but I told him that God understands that this is a sport, it’s the oldest sport in the world and I think he (God) boxed, too. I might be lying a little bit there, but who knows,” smiled Roach.
A boxer on the verge of becoming a pacifist? I wonder what Pacquiao will do when he gets to the sixth chapter of Luke:
If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also
Here’s some footage of Pacquiao quietly taking in a Bible study a year ago.
[Manny, if you’re reading this, you have a friend in the clergy.]