A lot of news and talk has been floating around lately about the world of food. It’s no wonder – I guess we humans have a little addiction to the stuff! But these days there’s a lot more to talk about – the unbridled growth of the organic food movement, locavores and the the 100-mile diet, I’ve seen choices at restaurants increase more and more to include vegetarian and vegan, and this morning I even read about “rescued” food (trash treasures, or dumpster diving, whatever suits ya).
In every country I’ve traveled to, the uniqueness of the culture seems to reveal itself most around issues of the bathroom and the dinner table. People eat differently in Japan than they do in Argentina! (Eat with your hands above the table in Argentina (prove you don’t have a switchblade) and keep your sticks out of your food when you’re not eating it (or your hosts will think you consider their food as delicious as a funeral).
I’ve been reading Jesus for President, (seeing as how this is an election year and I want to research all my options,) here’s a quote:
“How do Christians eat? Christians eat with the poor folks, with the outcast, the marginalized, and the excluded – all who were never invited to anyone else’s party. Ours is a different kind of party. It’s more like a divine banquet than another political program. Society’s misfits are our people, our ‘constituency.’” (pg.241)
And some words from Jesus’ political manifesto:
Luke 14: “When you throw a banquet do not invite your friends…invite the poor.” (Jesus)
Mark 2: “But when some of the teachers of religious law who were Pharisees saw him eating with people like that, they said to his disciples, “Why does he eat with such scum?”
Jesus was a Pooravore.
He surrounded himself with the overlooked and the outcast, the misfits and the marginalized. He gave his rapt attention to those who had been ignored all day as they begged in the streets. They were his posse, his “supper club.”
Today Kat and I were walking through our neighborhood’s market streets with some great friends of ours from Chicago’s south side. I had been thinking and talking with God about some of this all morning. And there as we were walking past the Ten Thousand Villages store (a store about fair trade and justice for the poor) sat an elderly man with no teeth asking for money (the irony was hard to get past). Turns out his name is Bill (name changed to protect the innocent) and he lives in a nursing home not far from where we were.
Bill, like others at the home, is allowed $30 a month from the home (they keep the rest of his social security check, plus any money he makes at a job). He was out of cash and hungry for some hot dogs. I had a $1.25 on me so it we hightailed it down to the corner market and got some juicy ones. The store clerk even mircowaved ‘em for us.
I noticed that everyone in the store and everyone on the sidewalk was from the nursing home, which doubled as a mental institution. He and I sat under the shade of a tree in a park across the street from where he lives his life. He was just as interested in me as I was in him. I got the feeling he was lonely – his family rarely comes to visit him, though they all live in the city.
As I sat there talking with him about coffee crystals and cigarettes, it dawned on me that Jesus made it very clear what kind of diet Christians were to be on. A steady diet of conversation with the oppressed, for that is where their Jesus is. Though those hot dogs left a “mechanically separated” taste in my mouth, it was the best food I’d eat all day long.
Become a Pooravore, and watch your life change.
Gabriel Muzick-mcbride Biebl (via Facebook) 9:50 am on July 8, 2008 Permalink
Very nice. I think he was a drugamore too with alcohol.
Chadd 1:57 pm on July 8, 2008 Permalink
I like what you are thinking and practicing bro–God’s got me “chewing” on some of the same things! I look forward to catching up with you sometime and hearing more. You and Katrina are in my thoughts and prayers often. I’m praying today for you and your city. Chadd