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Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The Word of Wisdom, Reimagined



by Seattle Jon (bio)

"We are in the midst of the single biggest global epidemic of chronic disease in the history of human species. We will spend 47 trillion dollars over the next 20 years dealing with it. 90 percent of people who have it are not diagnosed, and in America alone it affects one half of the population. This chronic disease is "diabesity," and it is preventable."

So argues Dr. Mark Hyman in a fascinating article I recently read titled It's Time to Upgrade Your Biological Software. In summary, the good doctor points out that industrial food, agribusiness and pharma generate one-third of the U.S.’s economic profits and all profit from making people sicker and fatter. He argues that a majority of what we eat in the U.S. is not real food, but “Frankenfood,” and that Frankenfood is, in fact, more addicting than cocaine and heroin. Dr. Hyman’s example of a lab rat choosing sugar over cocaine EVERY TIME was both surprising and unsurprising at the same time.

His solution? Eat more real food.

But as members of the church, we already know this. It’s laid out in D&C 89, the Word of Wisdom. By my count, there are eight verses in D&C 89 that deal specifically with food, twice as many than those that deal with strong drinks.

If food addiction will be this big of an issue in the future, and if we already have scripture dealing with the topic, why are we not talking about it more? Imagine what would happen if church leaders spent an equal amount of time encouraging church members to eat better than they do encouraging them to be free of facial hair, tattoos, skinny jeans and multiple ear piercings. Couple this counsel with the ability to then exercise more (D&C 89:20) and I think we’d have a healthier, happier, more attractive and spiritually deeper church membership.

Is it time to reimagine what the Word of Wisdom means to us today?

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