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as well as becoming members of a social communion that is the ecclesia.
From this eucharistic perspective, one could argue that there is a
reverse intentionality of cognition, for the point of departure is not the
I that intends objects, but rather a prior gesture of God s gifting of
signs exceeding all signification, yet rendering signification not empty
but nourishing, because of their superabundant source. The I is con-
structed from the other that nourishes, and promises yet more to fulfill.
As in the Mexican molli that we explored in the previous chapter, there
is always more to taste, new flavors yet to discover, not from a horizon
of melancholic imagining of the impossible, but rather from already
savoring the giftedness of the other, despite the partiality of tasting edible
signs. One is captivated by the other who pours itself upon oneself, and
one falls in love with it, as Pedro falls in love with Tita by savoring and
eating her lavish meals. In this erotic/agapeic pilgrimage of savoring as
knowing and knowing as savoring there is the perpetual rediscovery
that, at the end, knowing the self is becoming aware of Being as partici-
patory in the known the other given as food.
In the next chapter I shall explore this (participatory) ontological (which
is profoundly theological) dimension of the gift, and the invitation to recep-
tion that is also a call to sharing of such superabundant giftedness.
82
For a biblical approach to the relationship between eros and God s Word, see David
M. Carr, The Erotic Word: Sexuality, Spirituality, and the Bible (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2003).
3
Being Nourished: Food Matters
In his Theory of Religion, Georges Bataille remarks that the world of
things is perceived as a fallen world. 1 However, he argues that, in the
prelapsarian world, all creatures stand in a relationship of difference
but without transcendence, and thus within a realm of pure imma-
nence. In Bataille s prelapsarian vision both the eater and the eaten,
though distinct, are part of the same immanent reality. But in the world
after the Fall there is subjugation, and thus to eat something is to posit
the thinghoodness of that which is eaten. According to Bataille this
process of objectification is intensified by men s use of tools, for these
are instruments of the subjugation of nature. The human history of
war and violence is a result of this long genealogy of subjugation. For
Bataille economy and religion go hand in hand, for both are humani-
ty s search for a lost intimacy, whereby violence and sacrifice serve as
practices for such a recovery. Thus Bataille suggests that economics
and religion promote violence and destruction rather than peace and
communion.
In this chapter I will argue with Bataille that the fallen world initi-
ates a severance not only between creatures and creation, but also
between creatures and the Creator. I offer a brief digestive exercise
on the Hebrew Scriptures narrative of the Fall in the book of Genesis
2 3, and emphasize how food and eating are central in this story of
severance from God. Furthermore, and echoing Bataille, eating sug-
gests consumption of another, a certain destruction and transgression.
From this perspective, eating is a mark of the transient: a mark of
finality, and of mortality. Mikhail Bakhtin points out that, in every act
of eating,
1
Georges Bataille, Theory of Religion, trans. Robert Hurley (New York: Zone Books,
1992), 2.
Theology of Food: Eating and the Eucharist Angel F. Méndez Montoya
© 2009 Angel F. Méndez Montoya ISBN: 978-1-405-18967-5
78 BEING NOURISHED: FOOD MATTERS
the body transgresses & its own limits: it swallows, devours, rends
the world apart, is enriched and grows at the world s expense. The
encounter of man with the world, which takes place inside the
open, biting, rending, chewing mouth, is one of the most ancient,
and most important objects of human thought and imagery.2
But not only food is destined to be consumed by the transgressive act
of eating. Death is also the eater s fate. While eating sustains life, nonethe-
less the eater himself shall just like the eaten products die. From this
perspective of the ephemeral and transgression, food signifies death.
Thus, a conventional reading of the narrative of the Fall could echo this
same line of thought: death and transgression are inevitable, and it is
significant that they both arrive through an eating mouth.
However, beyond Bataille, I will argue for a more positive reading of
creation and food and eating, which simultaneously looks at the origins
and destiny of creation. In this alternative alimentary reading, God is
presented as a superabundant banquet gifting creation both at its begin-
ning and its end. God s gift to creation does not presuppose sin. In this
Catholic alimentary theology, eating is not only a sign of communion
with one another and with God, but also a means of deification that
constructs a space for peaceful community. Two Eastern Orthodox
theologians, Alexander Schmemann and Sergei Bulgakov, will be invited
to this table of reflection, helping to find a more positive theological
reading of food and eating. Furthermore, creation itself will be envi-
sioned as a sign of deification, wherein the Eucharist becomes the main
item on this theological menu, since this partaking of God-as-food is a
Christian-Catholic paradigm of being nourished.
The feminine figure of Sophia the Wisdom of God will be also
invoked in this theological understanding of God s superabundant ban-
quet. In the sapiential scriptural texts, Sophia is portrayed as a woman
who counsels God before the creation of the world, and is both hostess
and cook at a lavish banquet. She nurtures creation, but, more astonish-
ingly, she is also food itself. After looking at some biblical texts on
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