In the small village of Okeford Ftizpaine in South West England, locals are up in arms after their parish church made the decision to sell off their 150-year-old, antique Victorian-era wooden pews.
As comfortable as old wooden pews are, I would not personally object to being able to sit on something more modern and easy-on-the-backside, especially during the weekly sermon by the local vicar.
Not the people of Okeford Fitzpaine, though. They would rather keep their old pews.
However, it turns out the removal of these ancient bench seats is rather a matter of necessity as the sanctuary requires more flexible furnishings to allow space for people who are… how do you say it nicely? More rotund than the average human.
A recent report by the church committee concluded: “We have had occasions at weddings where the couple has been too large to be able to walk side by side down the aisle. With different chairs, we would be able to widen the aisle.”
They also added that the pews were not suited to the “human form of today” — presumably, that means the larger human form.
The Facts About Christian Fat
At the outset, this article is not about ‘fat-shaming’ anyone, so please don’t crucify me! I’m simply reporting the facts.
And here are the facts about Christian fat:
Back in 2006, Kenneth F. Ferraro, a Professor of Sociology and Director of the Center on Aging and the Life Course, conducted a study entitled: “Does Religion Increase the Prevalence and Incidence of Obesity in Adulthood?”
His conclusion was that religious commitment, especially when supported by a religious community, was linked to an increase in the rate of obesity. In fact, church attendees were more likely than people who were not church members to be greater than 20 percent overweight. The study also found that Church members had, on average, higher total cholesterol and blood pressure than people who were not church members.
Moreover, Ferraro discovered that there are more obese individuals in states with a higher proportion of persons claiming religious affiliation, with Baptists being the worse offenders.
Another study by Northwestern University found that young people of a healthy weight who frequently participated in religious activities were twice as likely to become obese by middle age than their less-religious peers.
Similarly, in 2014, Coventry University academic Deborah Lycett examined the body mass indexes (BMIs) of more than 7,000 people and found those of believers were almost a point higher than those of atheists.
Even more recently, in 2017, Karen Hye-Cheon Kim Yeary, Ph.D., from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences conducted a systematic literature review of studies of religion and obesity and found a ‘large body’ (no pun intended) of quantitative data confirming the fact that the more religious a person is, the more likely they are to be overweight.
All in all, the research indicates that the more firm your faith is, the less likely you are to have a firm body to match. Maybe all churches will be widening their aisles soon enough.
Why are Christians more likely to be fat?
Perhaps this phenomenon is not entirely unexpected. After all, many religious traditions and activities occur within the context of eating. Christians seem to have a feast for virtually every occasion, with Easter and Christmas being the most notable. I, for one, am very fond of hot cross buns!
Religious feasts aside, anyone who has ever been part of a Christian faith community will attest to the fact that cultural Christianity goes hand-in-hand with eating. Whenever Christians gather, there seems to be food involved. Potluck suppers are common fare. The spread after the Sunday morning service is something to behold. And every mid-week Bible study is accompanied by decadent treats and excellent coffee. We can’t open our Bible without opening a packet of potato chips as well — most especially when we gather with other Christians. We call this excuse to gather and eat by its own special name — ‘fellowship.’ The word ‘fellowship’ makes organized gluttony sound like a religious exercise that enriches one’s soul — enlarging one’s faith as well as one’s waistline.
Gluttony is listed as one of the ‘seven deadly sins’ according to the Catholic tradition, and yet, it is rarely ever mentioned in church circles. Rather, the church tends to focus its disdain on other potential addictions such as alcohol, tobacco, drugs, and, especially, sex. With all of those sources of pleasure largely absent from a good Christian’s life, where else are we supposed to turn to for a ‘guilt-free’ shot of endorphins? It has to be food, right? So, maybe — just maybe — the sin of overeating is the one sin that pastors and priests tend to overlook, and the laity don’t rate as very serious in their hierarchy of ‘things-likely-to-annoy-God.’
If it’s any consolation, though, even Jesus was accused of being a glutton, and a drunkard, such was his propensity to gather around the table of Christian fellowship and indulge.
So, is it okay for a Christian to be fat?
The Reverend Marcelo Rossi, a priest in the Catholic community of Canção Nova in Brazil, allegedly dared to suggest that “Fat women don’t get into heaven” during a sermon in July 2019. He was promptly attacked and thrown off the stage by an offended parishioner — a woman to whom Reverend Rossi’s assessment might have been intended in the first instance.
Personally, I disagree with Reverend Rossi’s assertion. In fact, I don’t think the angry woman was unjustified in attempting to throw him down from his lofty pulpit. There are two things that are abhorrent about Reverend Rossi’s point of view: One is the suggestion that anyone would be excluded from Heaven on account of their size. The other is the suggestion that this imaginary rule only applies to women, while men — it seems — are free to waddle through the pearly gates with bulging waistlines in tow.
Ridiculous!
Reverend Rossi’s nonsense aside, is it a sin for Christians to be overweight? It is not a simple question to answer without offending someone, but I’ll give it my best shot.
Let us re-frame the question
Christians love to retreat into dualistic thinking — the kind of thinking that reduces everything down to just two options where one is the right way, and one is the wrong way. Dualistic thinking works well for the sake of simplification and conversation but not for the sake of truth or the immense subtlety of actual personal experience. Or, to put it simply, this kind of thinking takes no account of the individual person, which is exactly the opposite approach to that of Jesus Christ.
Therefore, instead of asking if being overweight is sinful or not sinful, let us re-frame this question. When we eat or drink to excess, let us ask instead, “Is this helpful or unhelpful in light of my present situation?” This allows more room for the shades of gray that personal circumstances bring to a situation. This brings me to my next point:
Let us answer for ourselves
Whenever we start talking about what is acceptable and unacceptable when it comes to a person’s body type, we get into dangerous territory. We could easily make assumptions — based on our own experiences and understandings — that have the potential to seriously hurt others.
Therefore, in any discussion about what is a healthy or unhealthy weight, let each person examine themselves and not others. After all, it is easy to look at another person who is overweight and judge that person. However, there are many potential reasons for a person to be overweight. For example, we know that some people have medical conditions that can contribute to their obesity, such as a thyroid disorder, while others can gain weight as a side effect of taking certain medications.
Meanwhile, others struggle with emotional traumas, like depression or abuse, and they eat out of pain and despair. Who hasn’t done that? Then there are women who have had several children in a short period of time and find it very difficuly to juggle the challenges of life — often on limited sleep — and lose weight at the same time. I could think of many other examples of legitimate reasons why someone could be carrying a few extra pounds.
That is why I am training myself to think the best of other people by assuming that each person is doing the best that they can with the hand that they have been dealt in life. We do well when the only person we judge is the one staring back at us in the mirror — that goes for all things, not just our body mass index!
Let us see ourselves and others through his eyes
As a person who has struggled with my weight for much of my adult life, I understand how easy it is to descend into a state of self-loathing over one’s body. When I fall into this trap, I like to remind myself to think of myself as I think of my own children.
As a Father, I look at my own children, and I simply love them. They don’t have to look a certain way before I love them. In fact, if my children were big or small, I would still love them. Why? By virtue of the fact that they are mine and are, therefore, a source of joy and pride (most of the time!). Now, I am by no means a perfect Father, so I do not claim to love my children perfectly. However, as Christians, we believe that God is the perfect Father of all, who loves us perfectly. Thus, what we look like is immaterial to God. We ought to look at ourselves and others through that lens.
In fact, we know from Scripture that people regard the outward appearance of others, but God looks at the heart — which brings me to another point:
Let us not play the comparison game
We live in a world where we are bombarded with images that supposedly represent the ideal body — and yet they don’t even come close to representing reality. A new study from the Boston University School of Medicine has found that models for the lingerie company, Victoria’s Secret, have gotten skinnier over the past 20 years, even as the average size of women in the U.S. has gone up. While Victoria’s Secret models have shrunk to a mere size 4, American women have grown to an average dress size of 16–18, researchers found.
Having a ‘perfect’ body is an unattainable dream, and yet we still go looking for it. Research has shown that the use of Instagram amongst young adults and has been shown to have negative effects on body image — with strong links to depression, social comparison, and disordered eating.
If Christians truly believed that the heart of a person was of the utmost importance, they would invest much more time and effort into cultivating a healthy inner life. In fact, if any group of people ought to be above the ‘cult of body image,’ it ought to be Christians. The Christian faith ought to be the one safe ‘place’ for people to come as they are. Let us not play the comparison game!
Let us look at the real sin
I have a friend who can eat absolutely anything without ever putting on any weight. He is the guy who goes back for a third and fourth slice of pizza without a second thought. No one would accuse him of the sin of gluttony because we tend to only ascribe the sin of gluttony to those who we view as overweight. We make two assumptions. Firstly, we assume that just because a person isn’t overweight, they are not a glutton. Secondly, we assume that just because a person is overweight, they are a glutton. In fact, anyone — big or small — can be a chronic over-eater.
Therefore, at the end of the day, being fat isn’t a sin. Overindulgence is. A lack of self-control certainly is — whether with food or anything else. Even so, we ought to be gracious to each other because over-indulgence can sometimes be a symptom of some other struggle.
Not for me, though. I was fat because I was a glutton. Let me explain.
The last word
I know what it is like to be overweight. Therefore, I won’t be judging anybody else who shares the struggle — Christian or not. You won’t find me fat-shaming anyone with cherry-picked Bible verses like “A Christian’s body is the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19); We, as believers, must show self-control in all things (2 Timothy 1:7); Gluttony, one of the seven deadly sins, is clearly rebuked in Scripture (Proverbs 23:20–21).”
In fact, I’m tired of the Bible being used to evoke guilt and shame.
At the end of the day, our value does not consist in the shape of our body. We are his beloved children, regardless of what we look like, and our ability to love and serve others is not diminished by the size of our waistline.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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