The pleasures of food and the good life

Abstract

Contrary to the claims of some critics, the Christian tradition is not opposed to bodily pleasure. In fact, approached rightly, the pleasures of good food and drink can be occasions of divine encounter. Despite outlying examples of extreme asceticism, Christianity holds two truths in tension: pleasure is rooted in the goodness of God and God’s creative work, and yet, due to human “disordered loves,” pleasure can be powerfully corrosive to virtue. This article explores the tension by sketching the history of caution toward the pleasures of the palate by way of select philosophers and theologians (Pythagoras and Plato, the Desert Fathers and Mothers, Thomas Aquinas, and contemporary figures such as C. S. Lewis and Norman Wirzba). Drawing on the theology of the icon and Aquinas’s distinction between joy and delight, this article also offers a constructive case that affirms the goodness of pleasure and its positive role in spiritual formation such that even humble onions and coffee mugs can serve as implements of worship.