Shaming Children for Eating Snacks

Yesterday, the Christianity Today women’s blog ran my fuller response to Dara-Lynn Weiss’ tiger-mom approach to her daughter’s weight loss.

In further exploring the Vogue story, I found the following telling quotations indicating Weiss’ own ‘issues’ with food:

I have not ingested any food, looked at a restaurant menu, or been sick to the point of vomiting without silently launching a complicated mental algorithm about how it will affect my weight.

She also notes that she has been

on and off Weight Watchers, Atkins, Slim-Fast, LA Weight Loss, Jenny Craig, juice diets and raw food diets.

Here’s a taste of what I had to say in response:

…I know that a poor diet carries significant health risks. I know that certain foods predispose the body to certain ailments. I know that in a sense, there’s plenty to fear and to feel guilty about.

But there remains the fact that in Scripture, food is always a gift from God. The Garden of Eden is an edible paradise; the God of Israel rains manna and quail from heaven; creatures from lions to cattles to people seek their food from God, who invites anyone–even people who have no money–to come, buy, and eat. And God makes himself flesh, declares himself to be the “true Manna,” and breaks his body as bread, pours his blood as wine, for the life of the world, promising one day to host a marriage supper to celebrate the consummation of all things.

You can read my whole essay at the CT women’s blog here.