Today’s Daily Office reading from 1 Timothy (4:1-16) gave me pause, verses 1-5 in particular:

Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will renounce the faith by paying attention to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, 2 through the hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared with a hot iron. 3 They forbid marriage and demand abstinence from foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. 4 For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving; 5 for it is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer.

As someone who tries to abstain from certain foods, it might be useful to think about what’s going on here. The context doesn’t make it clear, but it seems like Paul may be referring to a kind of gnostic tendency that takes a dim view of the body and material creation. At least that’s the impression I get from someone who would “forbid marriage and demand abstinence from foods.” Paul suggests that such abstinence is an affront to God since the goods of this world were “created to be received with thanksgiving.” So, my sense is that Paul is dealing with a type of gnosticism rather than a “Judaizing” tendency that would insist on an observance of the OT dietary laws.

And Paul elsewhere comes out strongly against the view that any part of God’s creation is unclean in itself; in 1 Corinthians 10 Paul seems to be advising his hearers not to eat meat sacrificed to idols if their eating it will cause offense to others, i.e. they will appear to be eating it as a sacrifice. But he goes on to tell them to eat “whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For ‘the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.’ If one of the unbelievers invites you to dinner and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience.” The idea seems to be that one should avoid meat sacrificed to idols not because there is anything unclean about it in itself, but because it may create the appearance that Christians endorse the sacrifice.

A similar attitude may be at work in Augustine’s critique of the vegetarianism of the Manicheans. While many of the early Fathers were vegetarians or at least tended to abstain from meat, Augustine sharply criticized what he regarded as the Manicheans’ superstitious practices of not eating meat. There certainly is a strain of vegetarianism that avoids eating flesh in order not to “pollute” the self. And the Christian rejoinder is entirely proper: nothing is bad or “unclean” in itself; all things are created by God and, insofar as they exist, are good.

However, are there grounds for abstaining from meat (or other foods) for other reasons of conscience? They key here seems to be provided by Paul himself when he says “nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving.” A surface reading of this would suggest that it’s enough literally just to give thanks to God for our food. And this is surely right. But I wonder if there’s more to be gotten out of the notion of receiving with thanksgiving than just that.

Maybe “receiving with thanksgiving” implies an attitude toward creation which ought to be expressed in our practices of eating (among other things). How can we say we are receiving food with thanksgiving if, for instance, our methods of farming pollute and exhaust the land? Or, indeed, if farm workers are coerced or exploited? To receive with thanksgiving would seem to imply, at the least, respecting the integrity of creation. If someone gives you a gift, you don’t express gratitude by destroying it.

Likewise with respect to animals. It would be odd, to say the least, if someone used this passage as a proof-text against vegetarianism and to defend current industrial farming practices. Few contemporary vegetarians adopt their diet for fear of being “polluted” by animal flesh, and one hardly shows respect for one’s fellow creatures by torturing them.

But: aren’t I contradicting the Apostle here when he advises us against “raising any question on the ground of conscience”? The most accurate way of reading Paul here, it seems to me, is that he’s cautioning against ostentatious displays of one’s own oh-so-refined moral sensibilities. For, while he tells us not to ask questions about where food presented to us by a host comes from, he does say that we should refuse food if we’re informed by our host that it came from a sacrifice. And this is both for our sake and theirs. For, if we were to accept meat which we were explicitly told was sacrificed to idols, our host might take that as an endorsement of the idolatry, which could potentially lead them astray, possibly by reinforcing their own belief in the efficacy of the sacrifices.

How might this translate in our contemporary world? For one thing, it cautions us against flaunting our scruples in front of others. But at the same time it warns us against setting a bad example or witness for others. In most cases only an insufferable prig would demand of his host whether the food being served was organic, fair trade, shade grown, etc. Surely the right thing to do is to accept the food offered with thanksgiving (both to the host and God). However, on other occassions it might be necessary or at least laudable to witness for a better way of interacting with creation. Just as there were idols in the ancient world, there are idols today: efficiency, profit, wealth, displaying a refined palate, or appearing sophisticated or worldly. There are occassions where it might be better to refuse something becuase not to do so will reinforce, in oneself and others, allegiance to these false idols. Refusing a modest meal from a friend is one thing; refusing foie gras at a fancy cocktail party something else.