Friday 7 December 2018

Politics, Nutrition, Money and Religion

So I got thrown off the scent by builders and general domestic mayhem compounded by an immune system crash and mega-tiredness, but now I've remembered that one of the things I wanted to explore with you was an anarchist church issue about politics, nutrition, money and religion.

Because I have a problem about topics that are admissible in different contexts.

The thing is that, as a preacher, what I can talk about in church is religion, in the narrow definition. 

Let me give you an example. Let's think about intercessions. 

I can pray for peace in human society, for God to help the poor and the homeless and people in prison — but I'm not allowed to offer any opinion about the reality that poverty is substantially a political creation, and so is homelessness, and unjust (political) imprisonment certainly is — plus a lot of legitimate imprisonment also stems from social exclusion and disadvantage which has a political root.

I can also pray for the sick, asking for God to work a miracle and heal this or that person. But I will bring a whole big heap of trouble cascading on my head like an avalanche if I dare to express the opinion (which I firmly hold) that a lot of sickness — mental as well as physical — has a nutritional root, and all sickness whatever its cause can be helped and supported and health improved by right diet. I do realise that many of you who read here strongly disagree with my views on health and nutrition, which is why I now mostly keep very quiet about my thoughts on the matter — it is contentious and generates more heat than light.

I can pray for the church, too, and for more members. But I cannot express my view that one of the church's biggest problems is that it colossally wastes money by a) maintaining large, expensive buildings to house small congregations, and b) paying professional clergy. 

But then the problem arises of a group of people earnestly praying for the cessation of a problem they are directly and persistently causing. It is now known that sugar and refined carbs are at the root of a whole raft of clinical conditions, and refraining from eating them will ease or remove much ill health. So we get the scenario where the congregation earnestly prays for people suffering from a range of ills, then serves tea/coffee with cakes/biscuits/cookies at the end of the service. My husband used to joke that the Methodist Church is fuelled by cake. We encourage people into illness then pray for them to get better. 

Same with money. A week or so back, a member of a church near us encouraged us to go to a church social event and concert with a £16.00 ($20.00) entry ticket. Two days later, the same church had a concert on where one of our household was performing. Entry ticket £15.00 (£18.00). As some of us were really strapped for cash at the time, it ended up with the one who was performing buying our tickets to hear her play! 

But it didn't end there. When we arrived at the church and went to the desk to collect our tickets, the woman at the desk said, "To get in you need three things. Your tickets, your programme, and some raffle tickets. They're £1 a strip."

I stared at her horrified. I had absolutely no money with me. I said, "Are you telling me that even though I have a ticket, I cannot go in unless I buy raffle tickets." 

She laughed (one of those jolly, unctuous, dismissive laughs that makes you feel stupid) and said, "Of course not!"

What? 

That same church costs in excess of £95,000.00 a year to run! 95K! I kid you not! 

I used to go there. One of the things that put me off was the constant harassment for money. I vividly remember an occasion I attended — one of many events held on a regular basis. This was an auction of promises. The promises were donated by church members, and many were valuable, eg a meal out or a ticket into a stately home or something. It was, it's only fair to say, possible to donate something free like baby-sitting or dog-walking. But that was only the beginning. The occasion included a meal, for which you had to pay if you were attending, and you were also expected to bring with you a bottle of wine to share with other attendees. A bottle of wine costs several pounds and so did the meal. Then, you were expected to bid with generosity, paying over and above what the promises were worth, to raise funds for the church. In addition to this, at the same event they held a raffle, for which they wanted prizes donating and expected all attendees to be generous in buying raffle tickets at £1 a strip. I attended that event. I made no promises, but as we were allowed to auction items as well, I gave them a favourite figurine I had of St Francis. I didn't bid on anything, I didn't take any wine, and my husband paid for my supper. Not long after, I left the church. I think the tipping point for me was when the annual financial figures were published, and that church broke even at £95K, where the one I now go to had to make £6K a year to stay afloat. 

The church is meant to be inclusive, isn't it? But these things must never be mentioned. I remember an old lady in a church I once pastored telling me about how she lived in a hostel in her youth. When I knew her, she had a modest home in a rich suburb of London, but as a young woman she barely had two pennies to rub together. She said that the (church-run) hostel places were free, but in the reception area was a collecting box into which those living there were encouraged to put whatever they could afford. They were supposed to pray for God to help them pay their way, and she said she used to feel so ashamed that she did pray but still had nothing to give. She said she used to be so hungry, when she was out and about her eyes were always scanning the pavement in the hope that somebody might have dropped a bit of chocolate or something she could pick up and eat.

When I preach, I'm meant to stay off politics, nutrition and money, and just talk about faith. But I have a difficulty with that, because once you subtract from my life my political views, my nutritional discipline, and the way I spend my money, then you've lost the most substantial ways by which I express my faith.

Now, like most people, I often make poor choices — I waste money, I succumb to a delicious cake, and I can fall prey to simplistic or mendacious socio-political analysis. It's not getting it right I'm talking about, but seeing that faith is holistic.

This comes right down to details. Let's take the simple for-instance of Jesus saying, "Love your neighbour as yourself." What does loving your neighbour mean? Well, we have St Paul to clarify that for us in the famous 1 Corinthians passage about love. Love is patient, he says, love is kind, love is not easily angered. The thing is, we all know in our household that if we eat sugary food we become moody and irritable, our adrenals go out of whack, we get exhausted and snappy and the slightest thing annoys us. We have no chance of living up to what our faith asks of us, in other words, unless we stay off the sugar. This may not apply to you, I'm not saying it does; but it is most certainly true for us. You could preach at us until you were blue in the face, but unless we stay clear of the sugar it is biochemically impossible for us to achieve the moral status recommended and expected. And yet, the place I most often run into the social gatherings structured around the food that scuppers my chances of being any kind of loving at all — is church!

I find I'm drifting further and further out to sea with this. The gap between what I privately believe and practise and consider important, and what I can express and publicly espouse in church, is steadily increasing, so that the teaching under which I sit feels less and less relevant. It's not that the preached word as I presently experience it is untrue, it's that it's uncoupled from the practical expression of daily life. It's like a recipe that gives the ingredients but not the method, or scientific theory without the backing of practical experiment. And I'm not sure where to go with this; my faith discipline is becoming increasingly a private bubble inside but dislocated from the body of believers in which it sits.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh yes! I so agree with you Pen. Being obese myself (and hating myself for it) I'm aware it seems to be the unmentioned sin in church meetings. As you say, it's positively encouraged at church coffee meetings, after service fellowship, etc.
Sugar is my poison of choice and I keep running up against it in so many places whenever I'm trying to give it up.

I would love to see more posts about what you eat (and don't eat) to keep healthy.
I never could understand why the Methodists refuse to allow wine in their social church meetings but they're quite happy to support gambling! I think they've got those two ideas muddled up. I believe there's no difference in principle whether one buys a lottery ticket or a raffle ticket.

Our church gathering has only been meeting for about four years but I'm pleased to say that in a couple of weeks, we will be giving out £3,500 in vouchers in our high street.
The vouchers were bought from 7 high street businesses and we've been praying for them. We live in a very deprived, depressed are of Cornwall - a former mining town. Our church mission statement is 'Living Real Love'.
Kay

Pen Wilcock said...

Hi Kay — "Living real love" is a beautiful mission statement! I really like the idea of both supporting local businesses and helping local people in poverty.

About Methodists, wine and gambling — in Methodism, non-alcoholic wine is part of our inclusiveness, allowing children and recovering alcoholics to participate in our eucharist; I think it's a helpful witness. Until the 1990s, no form of gambling was permitted in the Methodist church at all; at that point the rules were changed to cautiously admit it. However, it is still very unusual in Methodism, and I personally have never been to a Methodist church where there was any kind of gambling, even a raffle. The raffle tickets I mentioned in the post were sold at an Anglican Church, where (because changing circumstances made it appropriate) I attended for a few years.

I have posted a little about nutrition here, because it is very important for me in maintaining health. I have been able to address depression, fibromyalgia, heartburn and acid reflux, liver problems, extreme fatigue, swollen legs, varicose veins, and probably other things I've forgotten now they no longer bother me, by being careful what I eat. I have also been able to help my husband and other family members. However, when I posted here about my nutritional path it evoked such strong reactions, that it would have been hard to counter without flat contradiction that would have felt extremely rude, so I decided to avoid the topic. I can recommend the work of Robert Lustig (lectures on YouTube), Eric Berg (book, and numerous YouTube videos), Gary Taubes (clear and excellent books), Charlotte Gerson (you have to ignore the attempts of big Pharma to discredit her excellent work; books and YouTube — "The Beautiful Truth" is a good video by a teenage lad about Max and Charlotte Gerson's work), and Gerald Green (he wrote only one book, but it's good — https://www.amazon.co.uk/Breaking-Through-Untouchable-Diseases-Gerald/dp/0953240789/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544251878&sr=8-1&keywords=Gerald+Green). After a lifetime on the trail of taking personal responsibility for my health, I can recommend the work of these people. Mainstream practitioners are often scathing about them — but then I am often scathing about mainstream practitioners, and I am very happy with the results of the approaches of these people I have listed, applied persistently in my own life; they keep me well.
I am not a doctor or any kind of practitioner, and I am not qualified to give health advice, so you should not take what I say as advice for you to follow. But I ave personally found the work of these people immensely helpful.
May your own health be blessed; may you be peaceful, may you be well.

Anonymous said...

I am afraid that I have neglected my nutrition to my detriment. since being put on the FODMAP elimination diet and learning what foods affect me I am better than I have been in a long long time. Sadly because of this and genuine food allergies my diet is very limited. But better that than how I used to live.

I, too, have been seriously disturbed by happenings within congregations I have attended. Sadly money can become a religion of its own.

God bless.

Pen Wilcock said...

Hi Anonymous — I'm so glad your health has improved on your restricted diet! that's good news indeed. May you be blessed, may you be happy, may you be well.

greta said...

oh, golly, the things that pastors can't actually speak about in church are legion! and that goes for the congregants as well. when our previous priest was with us, we were always invited to share our petitions. a problem began to arise because one of the nuns, who is very politically conservative, began to pray for 'our dear president and all he is trying to accomplish.' pretty soon, liberal-minded folk were sending equally political petitions heavenward. (it's possible that Too Much Sugar bears some blame.) it was like watching missiles being launched across the sanctuary! our current priest has solved the problem by simply not permitting us to utter a single petition. we just skip over that bit. not the best solution, perhaps, but it certainly is more peaceful!

Pen Wilcock said...

I can imagine it. Puts me off even more. Was the nun ever specific about what the dear president is trying to accomplish?

Rebecca said...

"It's not that the preached word as I presently experience it is untrue, it's that it's uncoupled from the practical expression of daily life." ExACTly! Here, too.

Anonymous said...

Thank you and bless you for your kind, helpful reply. x
Kay

Pen Wilcock said...

Hi Rebecca, hi Kay ! xx

greta said...

nope, little sr. philomena (not her real name) was never specific. she was just very enthusiastic about ANYTHING dear president might want to do. while i'd like to think that she has seen the error of her ways after this past week, i rather doubt it.

Pen Wilcock said...

Actually there's something that touches me deeply about the dogged loyalty of my US Conservative friends to their president. It's a rather beautiful thing that tells me more about them than him.