The Gospel According To Ray

In 1997 Lewis and McCall went to court to establish child-support arrangements. By then she was expecting her second child by Lewis; the court mandated payments of $3,800 a month. The following year he was ordered to pay $2,700 a month, plus back payments of $29,700, to a Baltimore-area woman with whom he had daughter. The process left him drained, and he told his mother that maybe he'd just wait to know his kids when they were older. Smith would have none of it. According to McCall, Lewis has since made great efforts to spend time with his children (three live in Baltimore, three with McCall in Florida). He calls them daily, has movie dates with his two daughters on Fridays, sometimes brings all six kids to stay at his house on the weekends of home games. "That's the beauty: I give them what I never had," Lewis says. But he's only half right. Like his dad, he doesn't live with their mothers, doesn't see his children every night.

His world has always been one of extremes--quotes, emotions, troubles, triumphs--and people's reactions follow suit. Lewis's history and his raw views, about "devious women" or how a black man in America is "still a n----- in a lot of peoples' eyes," will only reinforce the perception of those who call him a thug. But plenty of people also sit on the other end of the spectrum, ready, like Singletary, to put their names on the line and speak about "the pureness of his heart."

When Singletary took over as Ravens linebackers coach in 2003, Lewis was playing at a level few had ever seen, with a young man's fire, a veteran's knowledge and a once-in-a-generation hunger. But the first time they spoke, Lewis begged for instruction--and not only in football. They set up regular meetings, and the two went heart-to-heart for the next two years, discussing faith, family, "disciplines and desires and what a man is supposed to be," Lewis says. Whatever Singletary said, Lewis soaked up; once he suggested Lewis play more on the balls of his feet, and in the next practice Lewis collapsed because his calves were cramping. He'd been trying to play on tiptoes.

After the 2004 season Singletary left for San Francisco, and Lewis got that feeling again: what he needed, walking out the door. But Lewis was also pushing 30, and maybe some lessons had sunk in. Bryant, his pastor, sensed Lewis learning something new and necessary: "If I'm a king, I am responsible to the kingdom I've created around me," Bryant says. "He has found that he had to father himself."

Last spring, after a long silence, Lewis says he heard from Ray Jackson again. His father called from Tampa to say he'd been put out by a girlfriend and hospitalized. Against his better judgment Lewis rushed from his home in Boca Raton, intent on moving his father in at last. He sent a car to pick up Jackson; they were to meet at Lewis's grandmother's house in Lakeland. But when Lewis arrived, Jackson wasn't there. He stewed for a few hours, then got a call: His father wasn't coming.

On the long ride home, Lewis tried to grab hold of himself and say, Toughen up! But it was no use. He cried the whole way, shaking, empty again, with familiar words rolling through his head: That's the last straw. I'm done.

Lord knows, it hasn't been an easy path. But who said it should be? Lewis studies the story of David, who slew Goliath and became a king and had woman trouble too. He studies Job and all the trials God put him through. What was 2000, after all, but the work of the same master hand? From jail to a Super Bowl stage, with millions watching so he could become more famous, wield a greater voice than ever? Ray Lewis knows people will respond to him; he'll show you, with just a flick of his hands, how he can get 70,000 strangers to scream for him.

So now, Lewis can feel it happening all over again. People had written him off after last year, marked him down as fading. Lewis was furious at the criticism. Billick and Newsome characterize Lewis's off-season sniping as a continuation of contract haggles from a year earlier; before the 2005 season he had sought to renegotiate his seven-year, $50 million contract, signed in 2002. People were calling for Lewis to be traded after he demanded the team beef up its defensive line, called him a malcontent for questioning the team's commitment. "Persecutions" is the word Lewis uses to describe the affair, at once paranoid and proselytyzing: They're out to get him, and it's part of God's plan.

Yet the next thing you know Baltimore spent its first-round draft pick on defensive tackle Haloti Ngata. Then Lewis became the central factor in bringing McNair to the Ravens. Give me the pieces, Lewis told team owner Steve Bisciotti last February. Give me a real chance at another Super Bowl, or let me go.

"What do y'all want me to do, seriously?" Lewis says of his critics. "The thing you've praised me for--being a courageous leader--is the same thing y'all trying to crucify me for now. I'm doing what you want, to say, 'Dammit, I'm not going to put up with this!' and suddenly [the team] said, 'Ray wanted to talk about money.' I never played this game for money, but now I do?"