Free Love and Strict Diets

I think some people are hung up on the verses about meat. Yes, you can eat whatever meat you want. When I think about a "strict diet" though, it goes WELL beyond that. If you want to compare and contrast the two, this subject should be limited to vegetarians, not people on a strict diet in general.

You can easily eat meat yet still be on a strict diet. Examples would be avoiding sweets, highly processed foods, trans fats, fast food, meat preserved with nitrates (lowers oxygen levels, causes cancer), fish from farms (due to PCB's), large fish steaks like tuna/shark/swordfish (due to mercury content), beef that was grain-fattened (due to excess cholesterol and saturated fat), prepared food with too much sodium, white bread, etc.

Just because it falls under the category of "meat" or isn't specifically mentioned in the bible doesn't exactly mean that it's ok anymore. If things were left alone and we farmed like we used to, it would be different, but man has jacked with things too much.

 

Well I disagree with you corndoggy for a couple reasons.

First off, in the verse I quoted I Tim 4:3 the word meat is the Greek word βρῶμα orbrōma. This word means food, not necessarily animal flesh. The warning in I Tim is not to those who are vegetarians alone but to any who would tell you to observe special dietary restrictions AS A MATTER OF FAITH. Now if you for health concerns don’t want to eat certain things that is allowed. It is just when you try to tell someone it is sinful or not allowed by God that you run into a problem.

The words translated meat in our Bibles are often simply a reference to food be it animal or vegetable in origin. For example look at Genesis 1:29-30 where God told Adam and Eve what they could eat. Look at Leviticus 2. The “meat” offerings were made of flour and were in fact what we today would call bread. This offering had no animal flesh in it yet it is called meat.

My secondary objection comes from your comments about human additives to food. You mention sweets and fats and it is easy with modern foods to eat too many sweets. That figures into the question of moderation. But not abstinence. Then you mention meats preserved in nitrates. Perhaps you don’t realize that without those nitrates we would have widespread food poisoning. We would also reduce the world food supply by eliminating the ability of storage and transportation. You go on to attack fish farms for PCB concentrations, something illegal and tested for on a regular basis and mercury poisoning, something else that is tested for. It is true that mercury poisoning can be a problem in some wild fish populations but that is because of other pollution sources not our modern food production abilities. The you go on to attack gain fed beef and white bread.

I have a big problem with the so called “organic” food movement and anyone who buys this stuff. Modern science and modern farming has increased the production output of our farms and ranches. New aquatic farming techniques have boosted fish production from the hunter/gathering method to match modern agriculture. We can produce more food per dollar and more food per acre than ever before. Yet it is not enough and billions of people around the world still lack enough to eat on a regular basis. Then you organic food elitist snobs want to pay farmers more to grow less. They can switch to organic methods, increase the price, and make more profit while producing less. I don’t blame the farmers for doing this they are only reacting to the market. I blame the consumers. Because the bottom line is less food being produced and higher food costs. Perhaps you have enough to eat corndoggy and a few dollars more for your food is not only affordable to you it also does not result in you consuming less. But to billions of people around the world it is the difference between life and starvation.

Let me be very clear. I think people in elite countries like the United States who pay a premium for organic foods are causing the death through starvation of other people around the world. Perhaps that was not your intention when you bought the organic food at the market but that is the end result and I think if more people realized this the organic food industry would disappear and we could go back to feeding as many people as possible. Modern science has helped reduce starvation and the problem is not man “jacking things up” to much but ignorance and elitism.

OK, sorry to get so serious but this is an important issue to me.

 

I never said anything about organic foods so knock it off with labeling me one of those organic snobs. I don't buy organic stuff. Making sure I buy wild pacific salmon instead of from a farm is hardly being organic. Avoiding tuna steaks due to mercury content is hardly being organic. As for beef... the only reason they are grain fed before butchering is to increase the fat content because Americans like the taste better, and avoiding this step is hardly being organic. Buying natural peanut butter made out of nothing but peanuts and salt instead of something made out of hydrogenated vegetable oil is hardly being organic. Eating oatmeal instead of Captain Crunch is hardly being organic. Taking food to work instead of getting a Big Mac is hardly being organic. Buying whole grain bread instead of the plain white stuff is hardly being organic.

You can in fact be on a strict natural diet while not being organic. You can also do this without breaking the bank. Whole foods that are not processed are much cheaper than the alternative. I hear people talking about how much a diet like this costs yet I rarely see those same people buy big bags of plain beans or rice, which is really cheap. I never see those people in the discount bread store where you can get whole grain bread loaves for 75 cents. I never see them across the road from their beloved wal-mart where some vegetables are 1/3 of the price. Never see them eating plain oatmeal or grits for breakfast. Cost really isn't an issue.

 

I saw George Will's column and was going to post it, but Swaimj beat me to it!

 

They were moderate in their food intake as well. I'm old enough to remember that what is now in a child's Happy Meal was the regular adult fare from McDonald's. The child-size drink was a small, the small was a large. The Big Mac was considered huge.

Same with fountain drinks from convenience stores. It was an almost newsworthy event when 7-11 came out with the Big Gulp, and it's only 32 ounces. Now a 64 ounce fountain drink is common.

Society's apetites for sex and food are equally inordinate, and their approach to each is the same. They look for ways to indulge their lusts without the natural results thereof: sex with no babies and food with little to no nurishment. Skimmed milk? Why bother?

Sodom's sin was not just inordinate sex, but overeating as well. Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread. . . Ez 16:49

 

That is very true. The sad thing is in our churches, we always condem one, which we should, and overlook the other.

 

Actually, I think there is a morality going along with food now, at least in many circles, even Christian ones. What you eat, where it comes from, if you are using recyclable material, if you recycle your containers, environmental issues with food, etc. This is what the article is about - the rising morality regarding food and the rising immorality with sex.

Does this mean overeating or not sharing food?

 

swaimj said they "ate like pigs" back when society by and large was sexually moral. I was saying they didn't.

Yes, saying this food is "bad" (meats, dairy) and that food is good (only herbs) is a sign of the times.

NLT "gluttony"
NIV "overfed"

 

The reason I didn't agree with it, and I may be wrong, but it seemed like the author was saying that we shouldn't be concerned about the morality of our food, which I think is lunacy. We have a whole new realm of food chain issues that affect people and this planet in negative ways including pollution, non-biodegradeable containers, chemicals, artificial ingredients, severe animal abuse, and many others that I wholeheartedly believe are moral issues. It makes me sick when I see church going people abuse both their bodies and this planet due to their food choices and think nothing of it.

 

I think your post proves the column's point.

It's not saying that what we eat doesn't matter, but that moral issues surrounding food have risen in inverse proportion to moral issues about sex.

There is more concern for the planet now than for sexual morality. In fact, if one does not recycle or if one uses paper plates, it is considered immoral by many, but if you want to live with someone (either same or opposite sex), that is fine.

 

I agree with the rising morality of food... what I don't agree with is the belief that there's an irrational delusion of the increasing morality of food, one that we shouldn't buy in to.

 

I think the New Age beliefs that have infiltrated the culture are partly at fault. The view is that the earth is sacred and that all is one, meaning that people and earth are connected and there is no clear delineation between them. This makes people no more special than the earth, a view held by most environmentalists with non-Chirstian spiritual views.

As for the animal issues - I am vegetarian and used to be an animal rights activist. I agree that it is not immoral to eat meat but originally in the Garden, there was no death so no meat was eaten. Sin caused animals to be killed so their skins could cover Adam and Eve by God, and after the Flood, God allowed meat.

However, I'm ahead of the game because I don't think we'll eat meat in heaven and I'll already be used to that! :laugh:

 

If it were wrong to eat meat God wouldn't have said to do it.

 

Yup, and I'm sure that everybody here actually does recycle them.

 

... and in the meantime some of those chemicals have severely harmed nature, making it worse than before. Ever heard of "death zones" out in the ocean caused by the runoff from nitrogen based fertilizer? That's just one example. It's often a trade-off for something just as bad or worse, not a cure.

 

You really don't think that massive amounts of food being shipped by boat and plane from halfway across the world doesn't cause pollution? You ever read up on how much fuel is burned transporting bananas alone? Some of those factories themselves on the other side of the world cause pollution directly, and they usually get their power from coal plants that burn extremely dirty coal... it is estimated that 25% of the air pollution in Los Angeles alone came from these plants over in China... you really think that some of that isn't caused by food procesing?

Regardless of that, there is also the issue of pollution caused by other sources getting into the food chain, and whether or not we should consume this contaminated food. One example is mercury in fish. I live close to a couple of plants, one nuclear and one coal firing, and all of our water sources are contaminated around here, yet there is a bottled water plant a mile away, there is a nature reserve where people fish right next door fish, another nature reserve in between the two where people both hunt and fish, and corn fields surround both. The water is so bad that there are a few signs saying you can only eat one fish a week.

The question is that should we allow ourselves to consume obviously contaminated food like this? If not, then you agree that nowadays there is a morality issue with our food chain. If so, then don't invite me over to dinner. :tongue3:

 

Why doesn't everyone just eat what they see fit for themselves, and not jump on people for eating, it's not anyone elses business what someone else, especially people they don't even know, eats, where it comes from, how it was cook, or what it's packaged in.