When the Homily is about Immunology

The Quest for THE Cure

The world is desperate for a cure....DESPERATE! A cure for what, you ask? EVERYTHING. And not just ANY cure; we are in dire need of a quick cure, a simple cure, an easy cure. A cure that ultimately will excuse us of any and all personal responsibility for whatever it is that ails us.

Alas, sad news, breast feeding is NOT a cure for obesity.

Well then, what on earth has "caused" the epidemic of obesity in America (AND other places in the world too - though the media would have us forget this)? Now please, keep in mind, I speak as an obese man who has struggled with weight issues since I was a kid, so I'm allowed to be judgmental. Here's a couple possible epidemiological thoughts:

1. Sedentary lifestyle. Hey, a century of "progress" and we are generally free to live a life of leisure. Most of us work AND play in front of a desk. Desperate for our children to get SOME form of exercise, we drag them away from TV's and haul them into all manner of soccer, football, or little league programs - thus adding to our already insanely busy lives which curiously enough was supposed to be filled with all manner of leisure time. Being so busy, we find it all too easy to skip sports and let TV and video games babysit our kids. Once upon a time, kids played - and I mean PLAYED - outside. There was precious little need for "extra-curricular" sports.

2. Fast food. Not just McDonalds, but all manner of "fits perfect into any busy lifestyle" crap food you can buy at the store. Ready-to-go lunches for the professional mom who doesn't have time to makes lunches coupled with individual serving sizes of of all manner of food or drink product composed primarily of high fructose corn syrup just ITCHING to fill our children with massive doses of empty calories. Then when they start freaking out in school from all the sugar and crap they eat, we drug em up on ADHD drugs. In my own kids I've seen that the extent to which they appear to have ADHD (BIG TIME!) is dependent upon how much outside play they have had and how much crap they have managed to eat.

3. Labor. Related to Number one, but worth expounding upon. Even the scripture says that by the sweat of your brow shall you eat...and while I'm not saying the work I do isn't work, but it sure as hell doesn't lead to any brow sweating. And we wonder why we get fat? Dude, it's freakin' obvious....the only way NOT to get fat is either to eat nothing but lettuce, PAY some business to let you come and dance, lift weights, or ride a stationary bike for many hours a week (you ever stop to consider how stupid this really sounds?!?!?), or find a hobby that you can do for many hours each week that requires you to sweat profusely. When actual sweating is required for you to eat, I'll bet you'll see a much lower incidence of obesity.

And really, it's not just about obesity. For every societal problem we are desperate to find a quick and easy cure. I think it is part of the entitlement culture we have begun to foster. Personal responsibility has all but vanished and we seem more and more able and inclined to blame others or powers beyond our control for EVERYTHING that hinders us. In fact, I think we pound this into the heads of our children all the time.

Little Leagues that no longer keep score or refuse to recognize outstanding players for fear of making all the other players feel bad is a fantastic example. Less and less are we allowed to call anything inferior or wrong, rather they are simply called different. It's a wonder we can do math anymore...and in fact, largely we are failing that too. Black and white issues don't bode well in a rainbow coalition world.
For every personal failure we seek to find a society wide issue to blame, which is all too easy to do. Injustices abound today, but precious few of them are personal.

Thomas Sowell has an interesting column today that addresses this issue. While I don't know if such entitlement philosophy is to blame for people lashing out in violent anger at society...though such murderers themselves almost without fail blamed society for their woes....I do believe we ought to do more to "EMPOWER" people by teaching them responsibility, personal responsibility.

I certainly need to take this lesson to heart. For what am I personally responsible for that I'd rather let someone or something else take the blame? Oh dear, better be careful.