Br. Dominic Koester, O.P., on Dietary Morality

"Everyone knows that some foods are good and some bad. Good foods such as broccoli, kale, wheat germ, kidney beans, and prunes should be eaten in abundance. Contrarily, junk foods like cookies, chips, candy, sugary drinks, and ice cream are bad and ought not to be eaten. These are the rules of right nutrition. If we do allow ourselves to eat junk food, it is by way of exception to the rule. Perhaps we allow the occasional 'guilty pleasure,' but even in this allowance we admit we are guilty of transgressing the rules of food morality. 

"It's not surprising that few people live up to these rather rigorous rules. What is surprising is that so many accept that such rules are correct. Sure, there are some disputed cases - we can't seem to make up our minds about eggs, for example - but in general we accept the precepts about which foods should and shouldn't be eaten."

In a recent commentary, Brother Dominic Koester, O.P., reflected on how, to be healthy, "one cannot simply avoid certain foods and stuff himself with others. . . . Rather, one must eat many different foods at the proper time in the proper amounts" and on how, whether considering food and/or all moral living, it is "not about being burdened under the yoke of rules, but about human flourishing."
 
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Dominicana: Dietary Morality (6 FEB 20)