This and the following few posts will examine the dietary practices of the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Springfield, Missouri. In the course of my conducting my analysis, however, I find that it is difficult to write about the religious or congregational significance of food at First UU Springfield for two reasons. First, references to food, diet, and nutrition are scarce at First UU Springfield’s weekly services and rarely does there seem to be any substantial connection made by church members between congregational/“religious” practices and eating practices. Second, the references to food, diet, and nutrition that are made are difficult to discuss because there is not a substantial theoretical perspective within the field of religious studies from which to approach diet and religion—at least, there is no theory that focuses on the issues I feel are most important in discussing diet and religion: the idea of dietary regimens as disciplines of the self and the larger economic context in which dietary and nutritional values are constructed. I consciously try to avoid filtering my analysis through the prevailing theories of dietary practices in lived religion literature, which largely take after Mary Douglas and see eating as a ritual/symbolic act and thus as something to be “deciphered.” Instead, suggestive remarks by Michel Foucault on “dietetics” (or nutritional regimens) provide me with an opening to establish an alternative conception of congregational dietary practices.
In compiling these notes about food and congregational practice at First UU Springfield, I was initially struck by the almost total absence of references to food and drink during Sunday services, a lack made all the more conspicuous as Thanksgiving neared. However, further investigations showed that a variety of opportunities to gather and eat are available to the confirmed member. The announcements insert of the weekly bulletin lists such groups as the “Monday Lunch Bunch,” which meets at a restaurant the last Monday of every month (Perkins Family Restaurant in September, Ryan’s Buffet in October and November) to “eat and discuss all manner of things,” and “Soup and Social Justice,” a group that meets on the third Sunday of every month in the church kitchen to (as the group name suggests) eat soup and discuss social justice.
Though most of these gatherings are fairly insular and attended only by regular members, the offer of coffee (fair trade) after every Sunday service gives non-members the significant opportunity to meet congregants. In my experience, non-members who accept the offer are quickly engaged in conversation by a member or two, who offer to answer their questions. In every case, the only aspect of the meal that is explicitly connected to religion is the discussion that accompanies the food; the food serves as the medium through which people are brought together and around which discourse is directed, even though in some cases there does not appear to be an unambiguous link to Unitarian Universalist culture or religious precepts.
