Fat monks.
A friend asked me about it.
Many people assume there are no fat monks - and I say, “But there are Blanche! There are!” Maybe not in all monasteries, but the monasteries I visited/lived in had fat monks. And don’t forget Blessed Columba Marmion was kind of a porker.
I did some research, and the idea of fat monks wasn’t alway so unusual. In fact, in many respects, conventional monasteries often reflect the standards of nutrition and convenience of the upper middle class and wealthy of their day. Today, all one need do is visit any new or established abbey and check out their kitchens, laundry, common rooms, and in the case of some Benedictine abbeys - check out the individual cells.
So yeah - maybe we don’t see many fat monks today, but it could be because they have a gym in the monastery, a fashionable lean diet, as well as peer pressure not to look like a slob. Very few monks and nuns in the developed world go without anything they need, and in many cases what they want - not that anything is wrong with that. (Of course - there are always exceptions, such as strict observance Carmelite nuns and Poor Clares, as well as other communities.)
Back to obese monastics.
I found a very interesting site that discusses this very subject. I believe the study is factual and in my opinion and experience of contemporary religious life, understandable and believable. I’ll post a few of the points I uncovered:
The jolly image of rotund Friar Tuck could be only partially true, according to a recent study of skeletal remains from monks that lived during the Middle Ages.
Analysis of monks who lived from 476 to 1450 AD revealed most were overweight, but perhaps not entirely jolly. They suffered from conditions associated with obesity, such as arthritis and back problems.
The findings, presented at the recent International Medieval Congress at University of Leeds in England, has shed light on their monastic lifestyle.
The research could also help to explain civil unrest aimed against monasteries toward the latter part of the medieval age.Philippa Patrick, author of the conference paper and an archaeologist at University College London, analysed the skeletal collections at the Museum of London. Patrick said that by the time most monks were 45 and over, they were three times more likely than the overall population to develop a condition linked to obesity known as DISH, diffuse idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis. DISH affects the spine with lesions, making it harder for the person to walk and move. The monks also were three times as likely to suffer from weight-related forms of arthritis.
Monks were the couch potatoes of their time.
She said the monks’ sedentary lifestyle coupled with overeating led to the weight gain. Obesity was unusual in medieval times, a period when many people suffered from poverty, malnutrition and deadly plagues.“[The monks'] diet has been classified as ‘a form of high class diet’. That would mean very few people, only the upper echelons of society, could have managed to match the monks in terms of quality and quantity of their diet … but the inactivity probably didn’t help either,” said Patrick.She added that the monks ate animals they raised and used for secondary products, such as milk, butter, eggs and cheese. Monasteries also had extensive complexes of fish ponds to supply fish. - Read the whole story.
Every once in a while I will re-read some of Thomas Merton’s early writings. I was never a huge Merton fan, but I usually appreciated what he wrote. Nevertheless, his writings rarely edified me or moved me to devotion as other spiritual writers had. Of course his writings are insightful, informative, and provocative, but he seemed to be the antithesis of devotion. I would guess this is because Merton was more of an intellectual than a mystic, although others will disagree. Many of his followers consider him a mystic, and of course, they would know better than I do since I haven’t read all of his works.
