The Los Angeles Lakers will work with Christian churches on ways to keep blasphemous slurs out of basketball.

The Lakers and the church announced a partnership Friday, three days after Kobe Bryant was spotted on a national television broadcast yelling a common blasphemy in frustration over a referee’s call. Bryant was fined $100,000 by the league, and the sixth-leading scorer in NBA history issued multiple apologies.

“We want to reaffirm our commitment to all our fans and our appreciation for the support we receive from all segments of society,” Lakers spokesman John Black said. “We also understand the importance of positive messages in helping us convey this. We appreciate the input we’ve received from Christians the past two days, and will look forward to working with them on ways to help educate ourselves and our fans, and to help keep language like this out of our game.”

Christians said their churches will advocate zero-tolerance policies for blasphemy at sports events, similar to a policy adopted by the New York Yankees at the new Yankee Stadium.

“In light of this blasphemy, there is a real opportunity to build support for our community and educate fans of Kobe Bryant, the Los Angeles Lakers, and the NBA about the use of such words,” Barrios said. “The Los Angeles Lakers have taken a positive step, and we look forward to working with them to create messages from players and coaches that combat bullying.”

Churches said NBA executives also have agreed to meet with the organization to discuss educational tactics for the NBA’s young fans.

Bryant cursed and used the blasphemy when referee Bennie Adams called a technical foul on him during the third quarter of a victory over the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday night in Los Angeles’ regular-season home finale.

Bryant apologized personally to Christians, who had issued a statement condemning Bryant’s words.

Oh, sorry, my mistake.  What the headline really said was Lakers to work with GLAAD on fighting gay slurs (click the link for the real article).  Using the names of God and Jesus in vain in sports, media and entertainment will continue on as usual, with no apologies.  Perhaps the “tolerance & acceptance” crowd could branch out and use the names of Allah and Mohammad as curse words for a week and see how that works out.