By Lisa Kutolowski
I had just started a fast. It was a simple one. I planned to forego the 12-ounce latte I treat myself to every Friday when I’m in town for groceries. It’s a 30-minute drive from our homestead to South Royalton. Not long into the drive a thought about the latte came into my consciousness. Mmm… I love a good latte. As I engaged with the thought, I wondered why I had decided to not get a latte that day. In fact, giving it up started to seem silly.What did I think? That giving up a simple espresso drink was going to make me a better person? Besides, I am parenting a young child. It’s exhausting and I’m sacrificing things literally every day. Don’t I deserve a treat every now and then? Heck, isn’t this the point of the Christian path – to set us free from legalism?I continued my inner dialogue as I drove through the winding valley road. By the time I arrived in South Royalton, my mental senses were able to smell the espresso in the cafe, feel the warmth of the cup in my hands, see the latte art leaf on the top of the foam, and taste the sweet and bitter blend of steamed milk and espresso. I ordered a latte.
…
“What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate.” Romans 7:15
I was first introduced to spiritual disciplines in a significant way during my sophomore year of college – silence, solitude, fasting, Centering Prayer, Lectio Divina. I was grateful. Though only 20 years old, I already felt like my faith was running on the fumes of my high school zeal. I craved the tools that would help me plumb the depths of the Spirit. For years after this initial introduction, I would pick up these various tools in fits and starts. I read a ton about spiritual practices and I would frequently recommit to them, but my intentions would often falter.
Discovering the teaching on the eight thoughts was like finding a map for the spiritual journey. Whereas prayer, silence, fasting, and other practices are the vehicles that bring me to the wilderness of the interior life, the teaching on the eight thoughts is the map that reveals obstacles and pitfalls that I will encounter. The more I understand these thoughts and their habits, the more able I am to recognize their presence in the moment.
Sister Mary Margaret Funk puts it this way:
“The earliest training for a novice in the spiritual life is to notice that we have thoughts, and the major reason the work of the spiritual journey is so difficult is that we seldom notice these thoughts. Thoughts are part of our internal world, and the spiritual journey involves interior work because interior work governs our external life. We generally live life in a cloud of unthinking, totally unaware of the inner stirrings and sensitivities of our hearts.”[1]
The teaching on thoughts begins with gluttony, or thoughts about food. Food is the perfect place to begin because of its physical nature – acting on the thought requires bodily activity. In other words, it’s easier to catch a thought’s influence when acting it out involves opening the refrigerator as opposed to relishing in your perceived superiority over another (as in the case of pride). Additionally, our human lives necessitate relationship with food. Total deprivation is not an option. Thus, this teaching invites us into discernment of our needs and how our outer behavior supports a life of prayer.
We begin to notice our thoughts around food when we set intentions around our consumption – what we will eat, how much we will eat, and at what times we will eat. Any form of limit-setting can be a form of fasting. It has taken me years to understand the spiritual benefit of fasting and that while traditional fasting is a discipline that involves food, it’s not simply about food. It’s largely about our thoughts. As mentioned above, beginning to notice thoughts about food is the perfect training ground for purifying our hearts – to begin to create space between a desire and acting on that desire. Creating a little bit of space gives us the opportunity to choose what we do, rather than acting out of our well-worn habitual responses. Freedom is being able to make this choice. I can choose to order a latte, or I can order tea, or nothing at all. Spending a 30-minute drive convincing myself why I deserve a latte when the night before I had decided not to have a latte is not a sign of freedom. It’s a compulsion. If I had not decided to fast from that Friday morning latte, I may never have noticed my attachment. Fasting is a tool that reveals where we lack freedom.
Gluttony is Not Just About Excess
When we hear the word gluttony in our day, we think primarily of overeating. However, John Cassian refers to the spirit of gluttony as the desire “to gormandize,” meaning to indulge in good eating; to eat greedily. Or as a noun – being a connoisseur of good eating. Thoughts about food distract us from the spiritual life anytime they are out of balance with our actual food needs in terms of quantity, quality, or frequency. It is important to note that being out of balance could also mean eating too little for one’s needs. The simple goal of food is to adequately nourish our physical bodies.
Of these three – quantity, quality, and frequency – the teaching on quality of food seems to be the most relevant for our day. By all appearances, our collective society is very confused about food. Grocery store aisles are lined with hundreds of products that dull hunger pangs for a time but do little to nourish our bodies. “Food wars” abound between dietary philosophies that claim to be the best for the planet, ethical purity, and health. In an age of easy access to diverse foods and spices, we can be endlessly preoccupied with pleasure via taste buds, settling for nothing but the best coffee, bread, ice cream or chocolate (to name where I can easily become overly food pre-occupied). Food as a way of obtaining purity is a particularly tempting trap for the spiritually or ethically inclined in our time. Whereas previous generations may have felt morally superior based on church attendance, we may seek moral standing in our 100% organic/local/non-GMO/ethically-sourced diets. It is widely acceptable to spend a lot of our time thinking about food.
Of course, nothing is wrong with eating and enjoying good, healthy, nourishing food. In fact, it is a natural good to do so. However, for those of us committed to spiritual growth, we are invited to find the middle way as a means of supporting our inner life. Refrain from eating more or less than our bodies need. Eat nourishing food, but not food that is overly rich or indulgent. Make intentional food choices, but do not make this a source of judgment of your neighbor. As we will discuss later in this series, the desert monastics are utterly clear that these teachings are meant only for the individual hearing them. We are never to use them to create standards or expectations for others, but rather we must preach the words to ourselves alone. Finding the middle way in relationship to food, then, is a task of discernment for each individual and the needs of their body.
Again, Sister Mary Margaret Funk is exceptionally clear:
“When food becomes my dominant thought, it becomes the center of my interior life. The self talking to the self becomes a conversation about my desire for food or drink. Using these guidelines of Cassian, a right ordering of my desire for food and drink removes the constant deliberation about what, when, and how much to eat. I am out of balance when I shift too far in any one direction. ‘Excesses meet,’ say the ancients (Conf. 11.16). Eating too little or eating too much is equally harmful. Extremes are indicators of thoughts being out of control. This first thought, the thought about food, helps the practitioner understand about balance in eating and drinking. If I can eat and drink moderately, then I can be moderate in other thoughts as well—thoughts like sex, things, and anger.”[2]
Remembering We are Creatures
Finally, the desert wisdom on gluttony points to a foundational Christian teaching: Our bodies are good. What we do with our bodies impacts our spiritual life. Our spiritual life influences our bodies. We are creatures on this earth just like black bears, ostrich ferns, morel mushrooms, brook trout, and ash trees. Just like all creatures, our creatureliness means we have carnal needs. Our existence is interwoven into ecosystems as much as any other living thing. This is good and to be celebrated!
Remembering that we are creatures with bodies matters for the spiritual life. Spiritual growth does not ask for negation or disdain of physical needs. Rather, spiritual maturity leads to an integration of body, soul, and spirit. In its original essence, Christianity holds the body in high esteem. God came to earth in a human body and through a human body. When the fully human, fully divine One died, the physical body was resurrected in anticipation of the redemption and resurrection of our bodies. What we do with these bodies cannot be relegated to the sidelines in conversation about spiritual matters.
Fasting and Preparing for Lent
This teaching on food thoughts is a particularly helpful guide as we prepare for the Lenten season. If a Christian fasts only one time a year, it is typically during Lent. Yet, how do we choose what to “give up” for these forty days? And how exactly does abstaining from chocolate prepare us to celebrate the Christ’s resurrection? When I first began fasting during Lent, I would stack up a pile of intentions – I would “give up” various foods, social media platforms, and negative ways of thinking while adding prayer practices, higher restaurant tips, and exercise routines. Somehow, preparation for Easter devolved into a 40-day self-improvement challenge to whip my life in to shape. (A challenge I never met, by the way.) Eventually, I discovered the humility and wisdom of the tradition’s simplicity. Lent is a return to the beginning and basics of the spiritual life – fasting as a tool that reveals where I lack freedom. Purity is not the goal; freedom is. And when we are free, we can finally love. Now when I prepare for Lent, I think about what in my life I grab without thinking. Where does ‘unthinking’ persist? Wherever that is—eating chocolate, turning on the car radio, or opening an app on my phone—therein lies the opportunity to catch my thoughts and create a little more space for freedom.
As I was trying to figure out what photo to use for this reflection, I realized I have had a picture of these grapes, chocolate, and coffee as my computer desktop since 2017. This photo is from my pilgrimage to France that year. I find it interesting that the one photo I chose to highlight from a month-long spiritual pilgrimage was an image of a snack. Clearly, this teaching is for me.
This post is part of the ongoing series:
Purifying the Heart: What the Desert Teachers Can Teach Us About Healing Ourselves - And Our World
Through the season of Lent, we are posting a series of reflections based on the teachings of the desert fathers and mothers. Each week we are highlighting one of the ‘eight thoughts’ of the desert system of inner transformation. In this series, we’re drawing on a deep well of ancient wisdom from an era and culture very different from our own, so it requires some translating. Read the introduction here.