The Wolf I Feed

My friend, Sarah, who has a great blog of her own that you can read here, posted this question on Facebook today:

Informal and potentially loaded facebook survey...Do you think humanity is innately good or evil? When presented with a choice do you initially gravitate towards kindness or malice? Not what you actually do or choose, but what's your first reaction? Good? Or ill? And...GO!


Now, there is nothing I like better than a "potentially loaded" Facebook post.

Sure--I love to see smiling pics of the fam and find out that the Pinterest recipe was a huge hit with the book club set.  I have been known to spit coffee onto my computer screen at some of the "Some ee cards" out there (and quickly pull up another internet window so I don't have to explain something I'm so not ready to explain to my very observant ten-year-old).

But ask me for my opinion on a philosophical question and my fingers start itching...literally...to tell all of someone's 450 some-odd Facebook friends (most of whom don't know me from Adam) exactly what I think.

And, dear reader, I TOTALLY took the bait. I answered the question.

Well.  Actually...

I answered the first part of the question.   I talked about that Cherokee legend about the wolves (if you don't know it you can read it here) and I said that I thought it was our responsibility to feed our "good wolves" and the "good wolves" of those around us.

And then I got up from the computer and went to unload the dishwasher.  And this is the conversation that I had with my inner Jiminy Cricket:

Jiminy:  Really?  You really think it's our responsibility to feed "the good wolves" of those around us?

Me:  Yes.  Of course!  Don't you?

Jiminy:  Well, that's not what you do...

Me:  EXCUSE me?

Jiminy:  It isn't.  You spend more time telling your kids and Better Half what they're doing "wrong" or what you're frustrated with than you do telling them what they're doing "right."

Me (sputtering):  But...I shouldn't have to give them kudos for...they know what they're supposed to...how will they...?

Jiminy:  And when you're talking to your friends, you complain and criticize a LOT.

Me (indignantly):  I do NOT!  I share my opinions with my friends, but I am FUNNY...it's lighthearted satire...I don't complain and criticize!

Jiminy:  Just because your complaints and criticisms are thinly--very thinly--veiled with sarcasm and humor doesn't mean they aren't still complaints and criticisms.

Me (with my lips tightly pressed together):  I am so NOT talking to you about this, anymore!

Jiminy:  Fine.  But think about it.  What if you really focused on feeding the "good wolf" in others?  Made it a priority?  Stopped complaining, pointing out failings and frustrations and focused on the good?  Would everyone's "good wolf" grow?

Ouch.  I guess that's the answer to my friend, Sarah's question.

In my wolf world, the planned feedings, the feasts, the holiday dinners, etc. go (mostly) to Good Wolf.  That's not no say I've never planned a feeding for Bad Wolf.  Unfortunately, I have.  And when I do, it's a five course meal with all the fixin's.

But in my wolf world, Bad Wolf is friendlier.  His fur is softer.  He sits patiently at my feet and nudges my legs so I will pet him.  And before I know it, I'm feeding him scraps and snacks and tidbits of complaining and gossip and irritation and unforgiveness and judgement.

Good Wolf hangs back. He's not initially so friendly or inviting.  I have to approach him.  But once I do and offer my food, the devotion I get wildly surpasses that of Bad Wolf.

Everyone's wolf world doesn't look like mine.  For many people, Good Wolf is the friendlier one--the one that is forefront in the pack.  And I am so envious of those people.

But that doesn't let me off the hook.

So here begins my campaign to be more purposeful about  "Feeding the Good Wolves."

In myself, and in others.

Chick-Fil-Ugh

My personal experience with the fast-food chain, Chick-Fil-A is minimal.  I'll admit it.

I realize that it has an almost cult-like following (even before all of the media attention it's getting these days), but I'm not a part of that cult.

I've eaten there exactly one time in my life and I wasn't impressed.  To be fair, I was on my way home from a seven day cruise in the Caribbean.  And I don't care how great their spicy chicken sandwich is, it couldn't hold a candle to the kind of food I'd been eating the previous week.

There is no Chick-Fil-A in my tiny hamlet, but when my kiddos where tiny, some friends of ours (who have family in the Denver area) frequented it often.  They would bring us their extra Kid's Meal toys.  Now, as a home school mommy, any restaurant that gives a kid a "free" Usborn Book gets a big "thumbs up" from me.

But until recently, I never really thought about Chick-Fil-A.  Ever.

Now I'm thinking about Chick-Fil-A a lot.  Thank you, constant and instant media and social networking platforms.

Actually I'm thinking about some people's response to it.  And I'm bemused.

Here's what I understand (and I realize this is simplified):

The CEO of Chick-Fil-A, Dan Cathy, stated in an interview with a Christian publication that  although he doesn't consider Chick-fil-A a "Christian business," he does operate on "biblical principles." "We are very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition of the family unit....


So Mr. Cathy voiced his opinion on a social issue.  Fine.  Last I checked, his Constitutional rights as an American citizen allow him to do that.

But frankly?

The response to Mr. Cathy's opinion by political figures like Mike Huckabee and many Americans who share this opinion confuses me.

There now seems to be an even more cult-like support of Chick-Fil-A.  People are patronizing it en masse.  

So here's MY question:

If the CEO of PhillipMorrisUSA  stated that he "operates on biblical principles" and "is supportive of the family and the biblical definition of the family unit," are Mr. Huckabee and everyone else going to run to their nearest convenience store or "Smoker Friendly" and purchase and smoke a carton of cigarettes?

Because here's the thing:

Chick-Fil-A food (and fast food in general) ISN'T.  GOOD.  FOR.  YOU.

Here's a list of chicken nugget ingredients, straight from the Chick-Fil-A website:

100% natural whole breast filet, seasoning (salt, monosodium glutamate, sugar, spices, paprika), seasoned coater (enriched bleached flour [bleached wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid], sugar, salt, monosodium glutamate, nonfat milk, leavening [baking soda, sodium aluminum phosphate, monocalcium phosphate], spice, soybean oil, color [paprika]), milk wash (water, egg, nonfat milk), peanut oil (fully refined peanut oil with TBHQ and citric acid added to preserve freshness and Dimethylpolysiloxane an anti-foaming agent added).

Yeah.  

We have documented factual heart disease concerns in this country.  We have documented childhood obesity concerns in this country.  Celiac's disease is on the rise, cancer is on the rise and so are a host of other health issues.  Fast food restaurants are not helping this problem.

Frankly, since Mr. Cathy is in the food industry, and food is how we feed "the temple",

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own...1 Corinthians 6:19

I am so much more interested in how Mr. Cathy is going to apply the biblical principles of healthy food choices to his business practices.  But strangely, no one is discussing that.  Hmm...

Instead, political figures and Americans at large are willing to stand with someone on a social opinion even if to do so means to disregard factual health research, AND another biblical principle (the health of our physical bodies).

I still don't get it.  

So as for me and my house...

We are eating at home.