[ed. See also: The Most Poisonous Rivaly in Sports. Postscript: It was Mayhem. Man,what a game.]
The Saturday evening Mass at St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church here will be a cappella because the organist has football tickets. Weddings and funerals will be rarities. Car dealerships are expected to go dark. The J & M Bookstore will close at kickoff — and reopen after the game only if the home team wins.The normal course of civil society in this state is transformed every year when Auburn University and the University of Alabama meet for what some believe is just a football game and what others see as a test of moral virtue. But the 78th matchup in what is now known as the Iron Bowl will be the first time the winner will grab the usual statewide bragging rights while simultaneously keeping its national title hopes alive and earning a spot in the Southeastern Conference championship game.
As a result, almost everything outside Jordan-Hare Stadium figures to sputter to a halt for a four-hour stretch on Saturday as top-ranked Alabama seeks an undefeated regular season, No. 4 Auburn enjoys its abrupt resurgence as a football power, and the state proves there are few limits to its infatuation with all things pigskin-related.
And the observances won’t end on Saturday. The Sunday sermon at the Auburn Church of Christ will be about humility because, as its sign along South College Street put it, “We’ll either have it or need it.”
“It’s gigantic. It’s for all the marbles,” said Eric Stamp, who owns a print shop in Auburn. “People change their Thanksgiving weekend plans to accommodate the Iron Bowl.” (For decades, the game was played in Birmingham, known for iron and steel production.)
The Alabama faithful concur. “Everyone knows going in that if your team loses, it will hurt you for decades. Just the mention of it in 25 years will cause certain people to retch in despair,” said Warren St. John, a former reporter for The New York Times whose book “Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer,” documenting the zeal of Crimson Tide supporters, was once the textbook for a University of Alabama course about the culture surrounding Southern football.
by Alan Blinder, NY Times | Read more:
Image: Dustin Chambers 
