Jerry Falwell: Religion and Obesity

I found this interesting…

In one of my other classes, Nutritional Anthropology, we are reading a book called "Fat Land", by Greg Critser. It attempts to explain the growing health issue of obesity in the US. In the first couple chapters, two each explain the questions, "Who got the calories in?" and "Who let the calories in?" The first question's answer is about the marketing strategies of food companies who made it possible to buy very calorie dense foods and very cheap prices. The second is different, in that it explains how family, school, culture, and even religion (aha!) allowed these cheap, high-calorie, low-nutrient foods into so many Americans. I wanted to make the distinction between the two chapters so that the idea that religion allowed calories to be taken in was not mistaken for religion promoting the calories to be taken in.

What the author of "Fat Land" argues is that there was a switch between (mostly Presbyterian) ideologies in the past fifty years (between the boomer and X generations) which made it okay for people to disregard their health in terms of weight. When boomer generation was growing up, Critser argues, there was the ideology of the "body as a temple", and taking care of it is just as important to living a good life as your actions in relation to others. Many, including Sylvester Graham, inventor of the graham cracker, thought, "overeating was a form of oversimulation," which could then lead to other kinds of sinful, indulgent activities. Others linked religion as a positive force for loosing weight, such as Charles Shedd, who wrote Pray the Weight Away. It included prayer-focused activities and exercises, and was used into the 1970s.

When the X generation began to be born, things were changing both in the secular world, and in the religious world. As we have discussed with other religion's changes, these changes came from a need to keep afloat in the changing environment of the secular world. Because the secular world was becoming more enticing as a mold to form your life into, religions needed to change in order to keep people coming to church. Two things happened—1. Churches began to allow slips on the smaller sins, like gluttony, and began advocating against larger sins, like abortion, and 2. There began the rise of the Fundamentalist movement, separating the body and soul, thus allowing the "natural" form of the body to take shape (which was usually overweight, because it's just all too easy to become fat in America). Churches changed their stance on sins like gluttony because they needed to "[hold] the flock together." One way of doing this was to be more all-inclusive, and not to point out differences between people among "the flock." In terms of weight, this showed itself in turning obesity into a self-help, or self-acceptance issue instead of a sin. The positive attitude change allowed people to feel okay with being overweight within their moral circle. Thus, Religion (as stated, mostly Presbyterian) had a role in allowing people to eat so many calories, and thus contributed to the current obesity issue in the US.

I would really like to hear others' opinions on this theory. I think it has some weight, but that religion was not a major player in allowing obesity. I think the other causes (family, school, and culture) had bigger roles. The discussion made our class think about the recent death of the prominent televangelist Jerry Falwell. He died of heart disease, likely caused by obesity. But, was his strong religion a major contributing factor to his ultimate death?