Literature, Worship, and Life

Several of my classmates are in the armed forces. They are self-sufficient, deliberate and masters of time management. I used to manage my time, I found it exhausting. I usually ignore their military banter and haircut talk but my ears perked when they began to discuss eating schedules. It makes me cringe to even write the word "schedule" next to the delight that is eating, but those were their words, not mine.

"I read a book last year that teaches you how to prepare all your meals for an entire month in one day." Nightmares of Sunday afternoon's "chef's special" from my college cafeteria flashed through my mind. An entire week's leftovers casseroled and renamed. The Horror.

"I am not quite there yet. I prepare all my food for the week on Saturdays, but a month, that would be beautiful" he says as he unwraps and bites into a cheese stick. A cheese stick for the love of all things holy! --- At this point I blacked out. I vaguely recall images of a freezer and 60 containers each bearing a date and meal-time. I closed the freezer and opened the refrigerator. It is filled with cheese sticks. I awoke to the teacher calling my name asking my to translate the next verse. Sometimes our mind tries to protect us by blocking out memories of traumatic events. It took me a few weeks to piece this episode together.

For some people food is fuel. If they could eat one meal that would last them for an entire month, they would. Taking time to eat is just as annoying as stopping for gas. This fuel mentality is really just an effort in efficiency. Work and productivity are the goal and food is only a means to an end, that is, it keeps you going. Time spent making food, consuming food, etc., is time wasted. These people would be happy having nutrients fed to them through a tube, if it were socially acceptable. (In rare cases, however, the fuel mentality may be the product of an anti-establishment bent. "Only suckers need to eat!" Like I said, this is extremely rare, and usually short lived.)

I believe meal times are a heaven ordained break. No matter how much we eat for breakfast we will still be hungry for lunch. Don't try to fight it. If you prepare your meals for the whole week at once so you can nuke it and continue to work while you eat you are missing the point. Why not take 52 Sabbaths in a row so you don't need to be bothered with it the rest of the year? No, take a break, rest. It is meant to be this way. Some people are so driven they actually feel guilty or lazy taking time to make good food and enjoy it. I believe peace is better than productivity, and peace follows close on the heels of a meal well enjoyed. It turn, who knows, a peaceful mind and soul may yield the output you desired to begin with.

Many of us have so ordered our lives that taking time to cook/eat is either impossible or undesirable. Enter fast food. Is it any wonder that food called "fast" is likely to kill us just as fast as we can order it? Many will feel I am hypocritical here, knowing my family has a Sunday McDonalds ritual. Do not be fooled. We do not eat there because it is "fast" and we are cramped for time. It is written into the Bottig genetic code, in several important places I am sure, that no seasoning, sauce, or natural or artificial flavor can make food as savory as knowing it was a good deal. Any place can make a double cheeseburger, yes, but how many serve it with a side of dollar menu? When we gather together in the sacred halls of golden arches and red shoes we do not rush but linger for several hours in delightful conversation and reminiscing over times and friends both present and past. If church once a week isn't enough to make a man spiritual (and you and I know it isn't) then fast food once a week will do us little harm, I am sure.

Eating is the one thing we all have in common. As strange as we thought our parents were when we were in middle school, we still had this. Let us take advantage of this commonality. There is more in life than American Idol that can bring us together. There we days I did not want to be home for dinner, sure, but those times together shaped who I have become. I remember listening to my older brothers tell stories at the table and how my dad would laugh. "I need to learn this skill" I thought to myself. The dinner table was the first place I experimented with humor and witty conversation. Here I did not get pity laughs, but I did not get ridiculed either. I leaned my place as a member of the family, and I understood as I matured how my role changed. The way I talk to my father at McDonalds today is not the way we spoke when I was young. Our conversations have changed because we have changed. The way we converse around food has always been an accurate indicator of who I am and where I stood with him and the rest of the family. I was always accepted, loved and fed. I had things to look forward to as my brothers shared their lives and the adventures of dating, driving, and general mayhem. I learned important lessons as they were punished for revealing too much information. Through humor and casual conversation we opened the doors of our hearts to each other as we scarfed down chicken, mashed potatoes and canned corn.

We can spend the rest of our lives with this burden of food and the annoying hunger that disturbers us every three to six hours, or we can accept it for the gift it is and make the most of it.

Consider this question: Who enjoys their food more? Is it the man walking down the New York streets who will stop at any sidewalk stand and get any item with everything on it, or the gourmet chef who will only eat the finest foods with the best ingredients? For the first man every new food is an experience to be had. He tries things simply because anything is worth trying once. His personal motto might be be "variety is the spice of life" or "you never know what your missing until you've tried it". The chef approaches food differently. Food is not an experience, it's art. A new food is not eaten simply because it has never been eaten before but to gain a new color for his pallet, a color he might use to create a new dish in the future. The chef will not be compelled to sample every item from the sidewalk gourmet because he already knows such food has no place in his mouth, or his kitchen, whether he has tried a foot-long with all the trimmings before or not. I have to admit both men scare me when it comes to food, but if I were to entrust myself to either it would certainly be the chef. Unfortunately for me, most people are New Yorkers, not chefs.

When I frequent a restaurant I order the same dish every time. The New Yorker cannot appreciate this. "Have you tried everything else on the menu? How do you know you will not like something more?" It is human nature to assume the worst when one does not understand his fellow man. I do not know all the rotten things the New York eater thinks of me when I refuse to order a different dish, but his face says enough. Often they are compelled to change me, even rescue me from this bland life I lead. A variety of tactics are used. Typically they restate their fundamental belief in the form of a question. "How do you know you won't like something else more?" I cannot take them seriously here because I know they do not try new things to discover the food they like most, but because they enjoy the thrill of the unknown. Some are more crafty in their approach: they offer me wisdom. "Once you have tried such and such you will increase in learning concerning what you enjoy." A noble attempt, but no. Other times they appeal to my pride. "You not man enough to try that?" Please. Occasionally I get the hypothetical situation plea. "What if one day you are in a foreign country and all that have to eat is..." This argument can be augmented with a missionary plug. "What if you're a missionary? You wouldn't want to offend the people." Suddenly I am on an island where all they serve is battered shrimp and banana cream pie and if only I would eat their food the entire tribe will convert. Forgive me if I'm not convinced.

Unlike the New Yorker I do not find it amusing to try new things, whether food or otherwise. I am broadly content wherever I am and could go the rest of my life only knowing the friends I know now, doing the things I do now and eating the foods I eat now. The New Yorker might jump down my throat and say, "well what about before you knew those people or did those things or ate those foods you presently enjoy." They might think they have me against the ropes here, but this is only because they cannot appreciate the sincerity of my contentment. Even before I knew the friends I love so dearly now I was perfectly content with the friends I had before and felt no inclination to branch out. Even before I had tried my now favorite foods I enjoyed my former favorites just as completely. I find no thrill in the unexpected, and I rarely mourn an "opportunity" lost if all it would mean is one more experience I can check off of my "list of things I have tried". Do I know what I am missing? No. Do I care. Not at all.

People who know me well will not be satisfied with this description of myself, however, not because they believe I want to meet new people or try new foods but because they know I am not content to keep doing these same things for the rest of my life. If they think that I would not be content to stay in school forever they are mistaken, but that is not they are thinking. They are right to believe that my life is aimed in a direction, by my own choice, that will lead somewhere I currently am not. It's true, I am not content to remain as I am either in character or occupation. Even still, I only maintain this continual pursuit under the most severe obligation. I often feel like Moses, or possibly Jonah (I like Moses better), because I would love to stay where I am but the task has been set before me and the rod is in my hand. While I actively participate in it, it is not my choice to chase after this change, it is forced on me from above. If all of life were as meaningless as the food we eat I would be content to never change a thing and live a quite life with my wife in peace forever. I fear this is not my destiny and so I wait in hopeful dread. Dread because I do not like change, hopeful because it is not my choice.

If the New Yorker wants me to try something new he must forget his New Yorker attitude because his delight in new things will never inspire me. The chef has a better approach. "I have fine tuned this dish to perfection over time and I believe it is ready." The dish is offered to me not as something new but something complete. I can appreciate food as art more than food as something unexplored. But do not think it will be so easy to convince me to try your "new creation" by mere semantics. If you are not a true chef I will not humor you. A casserole made with 7 types of processed meat is not art. I grew up in a family of New Yorkers and I know all their tricks. No, food does not taste better as a left-over, fresh vegetables do not taste the same as canned and yes I can taste the onions, raisins and olives you put in this, no matter how many times you tell me I can't. When I was a kid I thought the only vegetable I liked was corn. I later discovered that corn was the only thing I could tolerate canned. I have found I like almost all fruits and vegetables when they are fresh and ripe. There was a time I thought I didn't like meat because I was only offered cold lunch meats, and I thought I didn't like cheese because I was only offered American singles. In a house full of New Yorkers I got "you're picky" but in a room of chefs I hear "I don't blame you." I have yet to find a meat I don't like when prepared by a chef (someone who views food as art) and a local cheese (Tillamook) has become a regular at my table in various varieties. I have a special place in my heart for the chefs who confirmed the maxim I discovered when I was young, (Steve reminded me of this in an earlier comment) "Food is supposed to taste good". Thank you for opening my eyes, but, if its all the same to you, I would be much obliged if you do not ask me to open them any wider.

Since food is relational and spiritual it is not unreasonable that churches should use food for ministry. This goes way beyond food banks for the poor, and pizza to lure in youth on Wednesday nights. While I will not get into all the particulars about how food can be used for relational and spiritual development, I do have this do say: Do not abuse the gift. You all know what I am referring to... the potluck.

Have you ever noticed that all potlucks smell the same? It doesn't matter what state you are in, the denomination, or the time of year, all potlucks have that same smell. There are other things in life that are an amalgamation of random variety that share this feature with the potluck. All garbages smell strangely similar. Unkempt public restrooms all share a common stench, even though the overwhelming fragrance proceeds from refuse composed of a unique plurality of edibles.

The lesson for potlucks is clear, the common stench is a warning of disfavor. How could disfavor extend to food you ask? This is unclear even to me, but the existence of a definite potluck smell is undeniable. “Well,” you might say, “don't all fast food places smell the same?” You are right, of course, but for different reasons. All hamburger places smell the same because they all make the same food. A KFC does not smell like a McDonalds, however, and a Taco Bell smells different than both. That is what we should expect from food. When you get home you know what to expect for dinner based on the aroma. Every food has this earmark, or fingerprint if you will, that declares its distinctiveness before the food can be seen or tasted. In this way every food is given an identity and personality. Potlucks strip all food of its identifying aroma, of its dignity really, by exuding an oder that is neither pleasant nor distinctive. As it is with the garbage, so with the potluck. Can we really expect these efforts to be blessed?

Food, one of the greatest gifts to mankind, a symbol of our unity, our glory, our distinctiveness, yea even our very souls, has been taken by the church and profaned in the potluck. Repent, I plead, and turn from your casseroles and gelatinous creations. Make foods in keeping with good taste and flavor. If food is relational what are we saying to our friends and neighbors when we invite them to church and offer them overdone Mostacholi à la bland with a side of 15 layer Jell-o dessert? Are there no cooks in the House, are we without culinary prowess? Do we think that, since everyone eats, anything will suffice? Maybe, since everyone breathes, we should poison our air too... but, as we have noted, the potluck has this covered as well. Perhaps I am looking at this all wrong. Maybe churches believe potlucks are a way of suffering for the Name. While we suffer, yes, no glory will be gained for our efforts. No. I say it again No! Food is a gift. Let us not reprobate, violate, or desecrate it any longer. What have we done? Where is our soul? Will we ever recover from this fall?

Food is relational, food is spiritual. What was the first role of man? Gardener. It may be true, in a manner of speaking, that we were created to worship God, but according to the text we were made to grow food to eat. The first perversion of God's great creation was accomplished through eating. Eternal life is secured by eating from the tree of life. When sacrifices were made at the temple the priests and the offerer often ate of the sacrifice. They could eat anything but the fat, which was for God. In one of the most heinous acts in scripture the sons of the high priest ate from the meat of sacrifices before all the fat had boiled off. God became so angry at this sin (they also caused the people offering the sacrifice to eat the fat as well) that Israel lost the ark of the covenant for a time.

In his own day people saw that Jesus loved eating. John the Baptist may have had a taste for locust but the Son of Man came “eating and drinking.” How many times has it been pointed out that Jesus was at a wedding when he performed his first miracle? A wedding feast in fact. He made sure they didn't run out of wine. Two times he provided bread for thousands of people to eat. It seems he talked about food so often the disciples misunderstood when he told them to avoid the yeast of the Pharisees, they took him literally. He even opened up the entire realm of food for all people when he declared that pigs and other such animals were no longer unclean. When Jesus was tempted what was the first tactic? Bread. It would be blasphemous to say that Jesus was gluttonous but the imagery of food surrounding his ministries and promises is profound. Most Sundays we celebrate the Lord's Supper and even this is based on the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God's most profound truth can be found in the accidents of wine and bread. While eating this last meal with his disciples Jesus made them a promise, “I will not eat it again until it is fulfilled in the Kingdom of God”. Eating is a kingdom activity! What is the first thing we will do in heaven? Celebrate at the wedding feast. Food and images of food open and close the pages of history and attend nearly every significant promise made to mankind.

I used to ask myself, "Why dinner and a movie?" If you want to impress a girl take her to a theme park, or sky diving or somewhere you can use a gun. Why something so ordinary? Dinner...everybody eats dinner. I figured you should do something that shows her a little bit of who you are. If you are a ninja, walk her down a dark alley in the middle of the night so she can see you beat the cuss out of someone trying to rob you. If you are a barber, cut her hair. A police officer, arrest her kid brother.

As I grew older I saw the flaw in my understanding: as much as men like to show off, women are not impressed. As a general principle, comfort rules... hence, the ordinary. Everybody eats. If that is too uncomfortable, see a show. That way you don't even have to look at each other, or talk. Its perfect. If it's a good movie, say, Breakfast at Tiffany's, or The Departed (best picture this year by the Academy), your golden.

Then again, the highlight of a really good date is the dinner, not the movie. The movie is just an easy way out in case you're a fool and you took her to an all you can eat that didn't include a salad bar. Food is the substance of relationships. When you first start dating you lie with food, "I'll just have a something light." The day after the wedding that salad is going to become lobster with a side of steak. At a job interview you can impress with food. My genius brother, Jason, deliberately ordered spaghetti at an important interview... and got the job. Why? They were impressed that he could eat such a messy dish without fear. Brilliant! The way we eat can tell a lot about who we are. The first time my brother (Jason again) introduced my parents to his wife to be, Cheri, my mother ordered the biggest dish and was the only one to clean her plate. Then she finished all the food left on Cheri's plate... after polishing off the remains of my dad's entrée. "You gonna eat that?" If Cheri was paying attention, and I know she was, she could have learned a lot about her future mother in law from that meal. Don't say you weren't warned. (The point here, for those of you who do not know my mother, is not that she eats a lot, but that she says and does whatever is on her mind, regardless of how it appears. Not a bad trait in a mother... unless you care about privacy or being embarrassed in public, which, by the way, home grown Bottigs do not.)

The TV program Everybody Loves Raymond (ELR) understood the important connection between food and relationships. In this show everyone is always eating, taking real bites and swallowing, sincere ingestion. They eat so much they must come hungry or they could never finish filming before they are all too stuffed to deliver their lines. Raymond's mother in the show, Marie, is often the focal point of the food fetish. Every time Raymond comes over she offers him food. When she is upset with him she takes away his food. To show she is proud of him, concerned for him, thinking of him, she makes food. This extends to the other members of the family as well. Robert, the less loved son, often has food taken away from him and given to Ray. The writers of the show, understanding this metaphor for life we call eating, demonstrate that Robert is a little crazy by making him touch food to his chin when he eats. When Ray and Robert's parents meet Amy's (Amy eventually marries Robert) parents for the first time they are accepting until they find out a horrible truth. Amy's dad has never eaten a muffin. "What kind of a man has never had a muffin?" The conclusion: he must be certifiable. This importance of food is demonstrated in Ray's wife Debra as well. Marie is never fully satisfied with her as a good wife for her son because she can't cook. In one episode, however, Debra makes braciole and it is surprisingly good. Marie's husband, Frank, even sneaks over to Ray's house to eat it so Marie doesn't find out. Normally a sour spirit, he becomes eloquent over Debra's dish. Handing her some flowers for the privilege of partaking in this delight he says, "Anyone who can cook braciole like this deserves a hillside full of heavenly scented marigolds and daffodils." It may seem out of character to anyone with a less intimate knowledge of the characters and the role of food in the show, but on ELR food is life and joy and the substance of relationships. Marie finds Frank cheating on her (by eating Debra's cooking) and she is deeply wounded. It turns out that braciole is the dish she used to win his love. He married her with the intention that "she would cook for no one else but me!" Food is a basic element of fidelity. At the end of this episode he renews his love for her, "Marie, a man needs more than braciole... he needs lasagna, soups... manicotti" and they embrace.

Food is relational.