White’s search for answers was elusive at times

MILWAUKEE — Mark Burwell recalled Sunday afternoon that when Reggie White was out in public, fans often would come up to the star and tell him how great he was at the game of football.

White would often respond that what he really wanted to be was a great humanitarian.

“That’s what he felt was his true purpose in life, to be a humanitarian,” said Burwell, the executive director of the Urban Hope Entrepreneurship Center in Green Bay, one of the more successful public service ventures connected to White and his wife, Sara.

Even at the height of his athletic fame, White felt strongly about what he aimed to do beyond the playing field.

He told the 300 people who traveled with him to visit Christian holy sites in Israel in March 1998, “When I finish playing ball, there’s a much higher calling,” and he told a reporter near the end of the trip that he was “desperate” to make himself a better person and to pursue his ministry.

But as successful as White was in finding answers to how to be a great football player, his spiritual and humanitarian pursuits — and business ideas connected to those pursuits — proved to be a tougher matter.

While some of the community-oriented things he did were successful and millions heard his messages, many of the things he set out to do did not bear fruit and some harmed his reputation.

In the end, White was still searching for answers to many of the basic questions of life. He apparently had moved away from the conservative Christian advocacy that was one of his best known traits and he worried that he had been exploited by people he tried to help.

Urban Hope, which was largely started by the Whites, has grown and has helped many people launch or develop small businesses in the Green Bay area. Burwell says that it counts businesses with about 1,100 jobs among its successes, and he asks what other professional athlete can say they helped develop that many jobs in a community.

But Urban Hope has also drawn some criticism for not doing so much for needy people and shifting to more helping more middle class people.

White was the kind of person who often had great ideas, but who saw few of them become reality.He was quoted recently in a television report saying he had given $5 million toward charities over the years, but he suspected “a majority of that money isn’t going to the right places.”

White was nationally known for his strong Christian advocacy in his playing days. “Jesus is coming, I hope you’re ready,” he was known to yell at offensive linemen during a game.

But his religious remarks brought him controversy.

Following the trip to Israel in 1998, he was invited to speak before the Wisconsin State Assembly, and he gave a speech that cost him commercial endorsements and probably a chance to be a network television commentator. He criticized homosexuality as a sin and made remarks about different ethnic groups that used stereotypes, triggering a flood of news stories.

His reputation was never quite the same following that furor, although affection for his football playing remained strong.

In recent years, White’s religious life changed as he continued to search for answers.

In a program put together by NFL Films recently about players and religion, White was shown studying the Bible in Hebrew. He reportedly adopted some Jewish rituals in his life in recent years, although he said he was not becoming Jewish. He said in a 2002 television report that he didn’t want anything to do with institutional Christianity any longer but wanted to be involved with “the Jewish Messiah who died for my sins.”

Burwell said, “I think he was trying to find his true father,” and that led him to look into other religions. Burwell added, “He was looking at more humanitarian things. He was looking basically for answers.”