Hungering and Thirsting After Righteousness

This is a special post in my continuing series on a Christian ethic of eating. In light of the beginning of Lent tomorrow on Ash Wednesday, I wanted to take the opportunity to explore the theme “What Do We Hunger and Thirst For?” that Christine Sine of Mustard Seed Associates is contemplating this year.

When Christ tells us to “hunger and thirst after righteousness” or to pray that God “give us our daily bread” our full, first world bellies automatically think in spiritual terms. Most of us know nothing of hunger accept when we choose hunger for spiritual reasons, like fasting during Lent.

For better or worse, we are intertwined in an agriculture system that has distorted our relationship with food. We live divorced from food. Our food comes to us in saran wrap and cans, comfortably packaged so that we have as little mess, fuss or contact with the dirty world of food and food preparation.

We do not know where the tuna in a can or the burger on a bed of foam comes from, and we are happy with that. It is what our mothers and grandmothers worked so hard to obtain after the Great Depression. Time spent doing such laborious and revolting chores like baking and cooking have been minimized or gotten rid of altogether, and we can live in a wonderful world of pre-packaged, ready-to-eat meals, fast food and take out. We have conquered the evil specter of reliance on the seasons and freshness. We have taught ourselves to believe that we have conquered rotting and death.

We have, in a way, but that has come at a great cost of justice. When we are hungry or thirsty, we now live in a world where our hunger and thirst are actual ethical choices. When we hunger and thirst after righteousness it is more than spiritual, it is literal. It is the choice between fair trade coffee or coffee grown at great cost to the land and to workers. It is a choice between organic vegetables or the heavy use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers that pollute and destroy the earth and our own bodies. It is a choice between buying food from a local farmer and supporting a local economy or by buying from large, multi-national businesses that seek to destroy local farmers through lawsuits and business practices that are unfair and unethical. It is a choice to eat meat that is from ethically treated animals or to buy meat that comes from animals that have been treated in horrendous, inhumane ways that are not right for any person to participate in, directly or not.

We cannot accept the lie from marketers, advertisers and politicians that food can be compartmentalized and treated like a sterile science. Food is the fruit of an intricate web of cycles in creation that affect every aspect of our daily lives and touches every aspect of creation. We are all in this together. Our food choices are ethical choices. We can no longer afford to interpret hunger and thirst for righteousness as a spiritual choice. That is to buy into our society’s lie that we can divorce body and soul. Our spirituality is embodied. We live in the light of Christ’s physical resurrection, and our remembrance of his death and resurrection during Lent is a constant reminder that food is a means of grace and righteousness in our world. Christ’s presence is there whenever we break bread.

So, when we hunger and thirst for the bread and the cup, let us in the same way hunger and thirst for a great breakfast of coffee, toast, eggs and bacon that are products of integrity, righteousness and justice, and not the empty food of a world focused on greed, ill-treatment and consumption.

Prayer for the Final Week of Epiphany

God Almighty,

We praise you who journeys with us through sin and death,
who walked with Adam and Eve in the garden,
who led Abraham into the land of Canaan,
who sojourned with Israel in the wilderness,
who camped with David in the desert places,
who rescued your prophets when they were driven from the land,
who watched over your people when they were scattered to far away places,
who visited Mary and Joseph to bless them with your Son,
who empowered Christ to preach the good news of your kingdom.

You are always present with us, just as you were present on the holy mountain,
blessing the apostles with the sight of your son glorified.

May we continue to bring you praise.

All glory and honor belongs to you.

Amen

The Illumined Heart

Picking up on the conversation about being in charge of your own spirituality, one of the books that keeps coming to mind for me is Frederica Mathewes-Green’s The Illumined Heart: Capture the Vibrant Faith of the Ancient Christians. In this short, pocket sized  book Frederica uses realistic accounts of ancient Christian’s lives to illustrate the power and focus of ancient Christianity, and how it is sometimes so different than ours. Mathewes-Green makes it clear that she is not putting forth any new five step plan for spirituality or her own spin on an ancient concept. She is just a vessel for repeating the wisdom handed down by our Christian forefathers and foremothers, as she writes, “I hope not to say anything original. If I do, ignore it.”

The best example of this is the sheer fact that two whole chapters of the book are dedicated to returning to a pattern of repentance. Mathewes-Green is no poser: when she wants us to capture the spirituality of ancient Christians she really means it.

Community was a big deal for ancient Christians. Thankfully, it is becoming a big deal again through the use of small groups and other communal ways of organizing the modern church. We still have a long way to go in terms of understanding why we are gathering together. For many of us, myself included, I too often treat small groups like a communal experience: I am gathering together to experience something with other people, like going to the movies or a concert. We share what is going on in our lives and pray for each other, but we seldom take ownership of each other’s spirituality and actually journey together through spiritual darkness or common struggles. Lent and Advent are great teaching moments for our communities to learn how to do the heavy lifting of faith together, and Mathewes-Green spends the majority of the book going over the ways that worship, action and prayer can bind a church community together. Speaking about church communities, she writes:

In communities, at work, and particularly in families, people are put together in something like a three legged race. God means us to cross the finish line together, and all the other people tied together with us play some part in our progress. They are there often times to rouse our stubborn sins to the surface, where we can deal with them and overcome them—striking them in the head and the chest, as St. Theophan says. (84)

It is hard in our culture to let others play a part in our progress. We are taught in school and in old westerns that a rugged individual can do anything if he just puts his mind to it. What Christ calls us to is different. It’s a togetherness, a sharing of our responsibilities with one another. We are all brothers and sisters, sharpening each other into the persons God has called us to be.

The Illumined Heart: Capture the Vibrant Faith of the Ancient Christians
Frederica Mathewes-Green
Paraclete Press
$9.69 (Book Depository)

Bacon, Idol Worship and the Kingdom

This is the seventh post on the subject of Animal Care, one of the five spheres of a Christian ethic of eating. We discussed before what ethical treatment of animals means, how it is accomplished and why it is so important. Now we will turn our attention to meat eating in the New Testament, particularly the area of sacrifice. After this discussion we will move into a discussion of a “rule” to eat ethically.

There are three main passages that detail the eating of food, particularly meat, in the New Testament. The first one is in Acts 10, when the apostle Peter has a vision from God that tells him all animals are now clean and acceptable to eat. This Christian is most thankful for this vision, because without it I would be living in a world without bacon, and that’s not the kind of world I want to live in.

The next two passages are in 1 Corinthians. Paul makes two major statements about food sacrificed to idols (this was almost always animal sacrifice). Once Gentiles became Christians they were confronted with a problem that did not affect Jewish converts: what to do about non-kosher food, particular food that was part of idol worship. Throughout the Greco-Roman world the butcher’s work was integrally tied into temple worship: the food sold at the market by the butcher was from animal sacrifices. The early Christians, understandably, became wary of eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols. Paul offers his advice on the subject in 1 Corinthians 8:

Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat sacrificial food they think of it as having been sacrificed to a god, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

He picks up the discussion again in 1 Corinthians 10:

Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? Do I mean then that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons. Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

The messages in these three passages are united around one common point: meat can be part of the diet for a Christian, even meat considered unclean by the Jewish faith.  1 Corinthians 8 & 10 seem to conflict on the food that is dedicated to idols. When it comes to spiritual knowledge in 1 Corinthians 8, Paul is advising that people not get so wound up in a proper theological justification for eating meat that is sacrificed to idols that they cause former idol-worshipers to stumble. The conversation seems to allow for the fact that food sacrificed to idols is not tainted in any way by the sacrifice, since idols aren’t real. Paul turns the whole argument upside down in 1 Corinthians 10 though, as he makes a case concerning food sacrificed to idols not in terms of knowledge but in terms of worship. Reading between the lines, what Paul seems to be saying is that while we may know that eating food sacrificed to idols does not taint the meat or make it unclean in anyway, the fact that it was sacrificed to idols means that the person who consumes it is participating in the sacrificial act. It is interesting that the conversation would turn this way, but what I think Paul is doing is making a point about allegiance to the new covenant of Christ’s kingdom. Animal sacrifice is a sign of a covenant relationship with a god. So, if we follow this logic, the Christian sign of the covenant relationship is the Lord’s Supper. Paul is arguing that eating food sacrificed to idols is to capitulate to the Roman culture. To abstain from food sacrificed to idols is then a sign of allegiance, a counter-cultural act that designates the Christian as a citizen of Christ’s kingdom and not a citizen of Rome.

This leads me to a very provocative point, and one I have thought long and hard about. I truly believe that these passages still speak to us today. When we view these passages in light of our modern day agricultural practices, I believe that idolatry is alive and well today. The way the majority of animals are treated in the industrial food system is influenced by the idols of money, violence and consumerism.

Ask yourself: could that bacon cheeseburger you just ate be food sacrificed to an idol?

Bottom line: it should be a matter of conscience that the meat in our supermarkets and restaurants is meat sacrificed to the idols of money and violence. To eat meat that is not sacrificed to idols, we should look to farmers and businesses that raise animals humanely and sell meat that is butchered in a humane manner. Jesus told us that we could not serve both God and money. Even though stone and wood idols have fallen out of the norm, Paul reminds us that our allegiance is to Christ’s kingdom. We renew the new covenant every time we eat the body and blood of Christ during communion. With food being so central to the practice of Christ’s kingdom, we can in turn do our part to build Christ’s kingdom in this world by renouncing food that is sacrificed to the idols of money, violence and consumerism.

In Charge of My Own Spirituality

There are may reasons that I gravitate toward spiritual disciplines and ancient forms of spirituality and worship:

• I think old things are cool.
• I appreciate beauty over timeliness
• I appreciate literary quality over marketing
• I am a routine-oriented and enjoy discipline
• I feel comfortable with repetition

But as I have spent time questioning why I gravitate towards having spiritual disciplines one answer kept rising to the surface of my heart:

I don’t trust myself.

At all.

One of the benefits of spiritual disciplines for me has always been that I am not in charge of them. I don’t make up my own way of prayer—instead, I pray guided by prayer books and ancient spiritual practices. I don’t make up my own way through the Bible—instead, I use the lectionary (or let my wife pick which book of the Bible I should read).

It’s true that I enjoy the beauty of ancient traditions, but I think it essential that contemporary Christianity continue to produce new forms of worship rooted in our ancient faith. What is really essential, I believe, is not the smells and bells. The guidance is the crucial part we have been missing. Without it, we are left with a me-centered form of spirituality. Part of discipleship should be to move from a vague, me-centered sense of spirituality into spiritual formation and spiritual discipline.

In most churches today we do a tremendous disservice to congregations by telling them to be in charge of their own spirituality. Go read your Bible, we say. Go pray for a few moments each day. But we don’t teach them how to do these things, and we let them choose their own ways. It’s like a Choose Your Own Adventure book for spiritual growth.

I may come off as a liturgy snob. That’s not my intent. I do not really care how you implement spiritual practices in your church, family and personal devotions. What is most important to me is that you cede control of your own spirituality. Learn from others how to read and pray. Let others lead you for a while. Then you will be stretched and shaped by God’s story, and not your own.