'We are what we eat' is a familiar saying, first attributed to Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, 2,500 years ago. And yet, as most of us will be aware, monitoring what we eat is not always easy, for a whole lot of reasons.
Early in my career, I was a Medical Social Worker based in a small regional hospital and worked alongside the Hospital's Geriatrician. One day I accompanied him to the bedside of a person who was having issues with her weight, so much so it was affecting her health. It was the reason for her admission and special weight reduction diet. However, the diet seemed to have little effect. In response to the doctor's questioning, the woman assured us that she was careful about what she ate, but food just seemed to stick to her. (Not an uncommon reality for many people – especially as the years tick by). The doctor, with sudden insight, reached over and opened the draw in the woman's bedside table. It was stuffed full of chocolates and biscuits. He was not amused. 'The only way you gain weight', he said, 'is through your mouth'.
'We Are What We Eat' we eat is a common issue. Just Google the number of Cook Books based on that title. In 2016, even the United Nations produced an exhibit to draw the world's attention to the impact caused by an unbalanced diet. For some, it is the result of not having access to enough healthy food. For others, it is because they overeat. The exhibit also drew attention to the global necessity for food and agricultural practices that are adequate, secure, and safe. And it is with this last issue we come to the Gospel reading set for this coming Sunday that covers a conflict between Jesus and the Jewish Leaders (Mark 7: 1-8, 14-15, 21-23).
The conflict arose because some of the disciples were ignoring the strict Jewish code on hand washing. Living as we are in the midst of a Covid-19 outbreak, we have become well informed about the need to sanitise our hands numerous times a day. And we do it because we understand the importance and relevance. However, the Gospels were written long before the discovery of bacteria and viruses.
For the Jewish legal experts, it was about power and control. They had taken the written laws (found in the Old Testament of our Bible) and turned them into a complicated oral code that controlled every aspect of life. It included the way a person must wash their hands. Ignorance was no excuse. Nor intelligence, for that matter, even if the rules were ridiculous. They had made so many conditions it was impossible for the ordinary person to know or keep them – and this included most of the people who flocked after Jesus.
What I find interesting in Sunday's Gospel reading is the way Jesus cuts to the core issue. He ignores the petty rules and regulations. Things are neither clean nor unclean in a religious sense: only when people make them so. It is when we focus on the minor issues in life, we tend to lose sight of the major ones. We then reveal our attitudes through our thoughts and actions, our moods, our plans and choices.
Jesus showed us that the only law that matters is love. And it is the love-relationship we have with God that affects the way we treat others and ourselves. As Pope Francis once said:
Keep your gaze fixed on Jesus Christ and learn from him how to love with a truly human heart, to care for the lost and hurting members of his flock, to work for justice and show solidarity with the weak and the poor. Learn from him to give hope and dignity to the destitute, and to go forth to all those places where people are in need of acceptance and assistance1.
Kia mau te rongo me te pai ki a koe i to haerenga
May you find peace and goodwill on your journey.
Phil
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1http://popesprayerusa.net/2017/09/18/pope-francis-encourages-devotion-to-the-sacred-heart/
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