Gluttony

It's not about how much we eat.

Several years ago I was at a conference on character where a psychology professor shared a story about an experience she had while spending time with an indigenous tribe in South America. The details of when and where are fuzzy, but I remember her sharing about how she asked a member of the tribe when they were going to eat, as they hadn’t yet that day. The answer was “We’ll eat in a day or two.”

When we think about the deadly sin of gluttony, our minds probably immediately go to food and drink. But gluttony is about much more than just how much we eat or drink. The above highlights how the culture we live in shapes our desires for food. Our culture shapes our desires for food in many ways, including our expectations and demands related to food. We miss a meal and get “hangry.” We depend on comfort food for, well, comfort. We eat when we are anxious, when we are bored, or even mindlessly while we watch television.

But, as Dr. Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung argues in Glittering Vices, gluttony has been misunderstood and misinterpreted. A junk food junkie and the picky gourmet can both be gluttonous. Gluttony is not about being overweight. In fact, it’s ultimately not about our stomachs and how much we put in them at all. Instead, it’s about our hearts.

DeYoung glosses gluttony as feeding your face while starving your heart. Gluttony is about how much pleasure we take in eating, and why. Food and drink are good, they are gifts from God designed for our pleasure. It is important to not equate gluttony with celebration and feasting. We should enjoy food and drink with others. Doing so creates social bonds, in a setting of love and community. And one day we’ll enjoy the best food and wine imaginable at the wedding feast of the Lamb of God.

But like many good things, we can go wrong here. We might use food as a drug, for comfort, as a way to crowd out or satisfy deeper desires. According to DeYoung, the key question is not how much is too much, but rather “How dominated by this desire for pleasure am I?” How hard would it be to limit this pleasure in my life, or give it up?

Forms of Gluttony

With this in mind, there are several forms of gluttony worth considering.

1. Eating too daintily or fastidiously.

In this, we seek pleasure in what we eat, with a laser-like focus on having a pleasurable experience. The pleasure is all that matters. An obsession with quality, even if quantity doesn’t matter, is still gluttony.

2. Eating too sumptuously.

This form of gluttony is an excessive seeking of the feeling of fullness, of being satisfied.

3. Eating too hastily.

When we put our food down our throats so fast we don’t have the time to enjoy it or even chew it, that can be a form of gluttony.

4. Eating too greedily.

Here, we eat so that we get what we want, preventing others from taking it first. We see the self-centeredness of gluttony here, as we focus on getting what we want even if others are denied what they want or need.

5. Eating too much.

This is what we normally think of as gluttony, namely, eating excessive amounts of food.

A Remedy

Food and drink only offer temporary satisfaction. We are made to flourish with something more. We need love, friendship, meaning, community, mission, and God, among other things, in order to be truly satisfied as human beings. Even then, in a fallen world, we will want more of these good things, which we will only experience fully in the new heavens and the new earth. In the meantime, we gratefully receive them as they come to us.

Fasting reveals our attachments to food and drink, what we rely on for comfort, our need to have our cravings satisfied. Several good things can come from fasting for a meal or two (or longer). After a fast, the pleasure we get from eating is experienced as more of a gift, rather than an idol. We more fully appreciate foods, the taste is more pronounced and better. Fasting can also nourish our desire for spiritual goods and our awareness of our dependence on God. When we stop cramming food and drink into parts of our souls and bodies that only God can satisfy, we actually feel our need for God in a deeper way and turn to Him.

Ultimately, gluttony is about the heart. If we open our hearts up to God and others, our desire for food will be put in its proper place. Then we can enjoy it as a good gift from the God who alone satisfies our deepest needs.