Super Bowl ad to transcend sports

There are some things we can all agree on. The men's black hockey jerseys are absolutely fantastic.

The breadsticks alone at the Olive Garden are worth the price of the entrée.

A 6 year-old could come up with a superior parking system than the one currently in place at this fine university.

And when it comes to sports, all we want is for these millionaire athletes to actually have an opinion on things, to allow themselves to speak openly about things that actually matter in the world that we live in.

This Sunday, in front of one the largest television audiences in human history, the most identifiable college football player of our generation, Tim Tebow, will take part in an ad supporting the elimination of legalized abortion.

He will appear in the commercial with his mother Pam, who was told by doctors to have an abortion when she was pregnant with Tim due to her becoming seriously ill while on a mission in the Philippines.

The backlash has been quite measurable. Several interest groups have ripped Tebow for taking such a stance on America's de facto national holiday. Many have pointed out that CBS has rejected advocacy ads in the past, therefore committing the crime of journalistic hypocrisy.

But let us take the political and religious motives out of this for a second. As you probably have heard by now, Tebow's status as a future NFL quarterback is anything but certain.

Scouts have been weary of his slow delivery and ball security, and his performance in the Senior Bowl last week only further damaged his draft status.

Knowing that his future may not be in the NFL, one would think he could use his celebrity to lock up as many endorsement deals as possible, raking in the Benjamins before people realize that he may be the second coming of Jason White or Eric Crouch (fantastic Heisman-winning QBs who have no niche in today's NFL system). But he has taken the narrow road, the road of substance over egotism, the highway of real change on an incredibly important issue over falling into the groupthink mentality of the modern athlete.

If you are pro-choice or pro-life, Republican or Democrat, devoutly Christian or staunchly atheist - it does not matter in regards to the respect Tebow should receive for actually living with conviction without regard for the media's misguided criticism. We will not always agree with each other on these social and economic issues, but we should always value the opinions and free speech of others.

Just because you are a professional athlete does not mean that your opinion is any less educated or well-thought out. We need more Tebows ­- athletes who value morality and stewardship over egotism and arrogance. Tebow spends parts of his summers helping out impoverished children in the Philippines.

He does not shy away from the fact that he is saving himself for marriage, even in the face of a society that has adopted promiscuity as so much the norm that if a star player is not hooking up every night, the media sublimely feels faintly ashamed for him.

This all boils down to choices. CBS owns its broadcasts and can decide for itself what to air, and Tebow has the God-given right to express his beliefs in an appropriate public manner.

You can decide to accept or reject what he is saying. If the pro-choice stance is so unstable that a story about someone who chose to carry out a risky pregnancy to its full term undermines it, then CBS is not the party with the problem.

I am not trying to tell you how to think about whether his convictions are right or wrong.

I am saying that we really should admire Tebow for having a backbone.

In this day and age of athletes like Tiger Woods and A-Rod refusing to take a stand on any issue for fear of upsetting potential business partners, I respect Tebow for having the intestinal fortitude to live and speak for what he believes. Let us hope that the other athletes take notice.