Feb 2, 2025
Epiphany 5C
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
Several times in my life I have had the privilege of staying in a monastery. At the Cistercian (white monks) monastery at Tarrawarra I began to learn about Benedictine spirituality. Their day is carefully balanced between prayer, study and work.
At a glance it would seem like a recipe for drudgery.
But not so, for you see, even the most menial of tasks is to be viewed as an act of love, and the implements, such as plates, cutlery, pots and cook’s knives, are to be regarded with reverence, all making a contribution to the well-being of the community.
I learned to revere my knives when they went missing – for six months – after moving house. Without my knives I felt somewhat out of sorts – and it gave me the insight that part of who I am is a home cook. It is a way in which I embrace God’s love, and so today, through the lens of Paul’s letter to the community in Corinth, I offer to you a theology of home cooking.
Love is patient – time spent in a kitchen is time being patient. ( show of hands – who has cooked a meal – or a cake – or a slice – can you hurry cooking? Not without consequences! Rice will take 12 minutes, not a minute less, even in a rice-cooker! And meals will be set aside if the onion is underdone. You can’t hurry cooking.
And it’s not just the cooking – you need care with preparation, care with selection, and if you have a kitchen garden you take care and are patient with the growing, learning to roll with the seasons and the seasonal variations.
When viewed as a a gift of love, for partner, for family members, even for self, cooking, providing food is at its heart an act of love.
Taking time to shop, prepare, cook and clean up, is time that could be utilised doing what society considers more worthwhile things, like studying, reading, and volunteering.
But time in providing food is life-giving, life saving even.
Love is kind – there are all manner of ways to live out God’s love through kindness. In my experience the home is the hearth of kindness, and the kitchen is the heart of the home.
When Jeanne was in hospital there were several kindnesses shared our way, gift of soup, gift of cake, a meal at the home of another, not to mention biscuits, chocolates and gifts of fruit. From one kitchen to another God’s kindness was shared through these gifts to my family.
Beyond the family kitchen God’s kind hospitality flourishes in church spaces – from our kitchens, slices, biscuits and sandwiches, sometimes a mountain of pancakes, or at other times a nourishing breakfast.
love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude
Us home cooks – We share our recipes, our techniques, even our produce.
A neighbour might ask for a lemon or an onion or an egg or two – safe in the knowledge that if we can we will help. And it might be that we are short a half cup of sugar, and our neighbour can save us from trekking to the supermarket. In love for our neighbour, we share our learning and our pantry.
And in the process we strengthen community threaded and woven in God’s love.
My neighbour Rudi, was grateful for the offer of plums, and in return brought eggs, cucumber, lettuce and eggplant. Not a hint of envy or boastfulness, just strengthening of relationship as we got to know each other a little more.
Love does not insist on its own way.
If the home cook insisted on their own way, they would ignore the dietary needs and preferences of others. It is an act of love for sure to prepare a meal for your vegetarian friends or family members when you are a meat eater.
It is an act of love to leave out dill or coriander or flavours that your partner or children dislike.
Love is not irritable.
Okay us home cooks are not perfect, and sometimes we might feel a bit cranky. But regardless of whatever else is going on, the hard wired desire to feed ourselves and others overrides any momentary irritability. Even if the broccoli has hair in it, (pretty annoying) we will thoroughly wash the broccoli and extract all the foreign matter to ensure safe eating. Or those plums we have shared with the rainbow lorikeets and wattle birds, we get on with the job, cutting out the pecked bits to make the most of the fruit.
Rather than be irritable, any challenge is a chance for a creative response. Those old veggies in the veggie drawer, rather than condemn them to the compost bin or worms, we try to minimise wastage, and find creative ways to use the end of the celery or last vestiges of a pumpkin.
Love transforms irritations into opportunities! A pumpkin risotto from the end of the pumpkin becomes a gift which can be frozen and brought out when we don’t have capacity for a meal.
Love keeps no record of wrongs
This is a hard one, when a guest has behaved poorly, it is a challenge to issue another invitation, it is a real act of generosity to give them another chance.
And do you remember young children tipping their bowl over? We don’t stop loving our children or providing meals when they reject our love offerings.
Love sees us modify the menu to ensure the growing littlies get some good nourishment. ( like cutting out scrambled eggs or omelette for the four year old who dislikes egg). It is a faithful and loving act to find an alternative, perhaps a tomato and cheese toastie.
Love does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth
One of the responsibilities of the home cook is to source ingredients. Often it is unclear who has grown and prepared our produce, but when we learn of unsafe work practices or slave conditions, love demands that we do our best to make ethical choices.
Tinned fish is a case in point. I sometimes struggle to find sardines that have the label MSC (Marine Stewardship Certified). Such certification lessens the risk that worked have been trapped on boats for months or years at a time in slave conditions.
It might be that we learn that a particular food stuff is damaging to endangered habitat, such as palm oil production, which is known to endanger orangutans – or plastic based wipes which add microplastics to the environment.
The way of God’s love is the way of the truth of things and avoids wrong doing, as much as we are able. Sometimes ethical choices are not possible as manufacturers do not promote the ways in which they might endanger lives or habitat.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
No matter what is going on in our lives, love keeps on keeping on, especially in the kitchen. When there’s a death in the family, or an unexpected diagnosis, the kettle still goes on for a visitor, and meals are served if only for one’s self. If we can’t get to the shops our family and neighbours will ensure we have bread and milk, and enough essentials to sustain life – or there is now online shopping to deliver what we need.
Love never ends.
I have been known to tell my children “kitchen’s closed” but truly, my love for cooking never ends, and neither does my love for my children. There are always provisions for them to assemble a snack of some sort.
The home cook can be seen as having identity as provisioner/provider, home procurator, (monastery quarter master). We take on a responsibility for the entire household as an unending gift of love.
There are budgeting dimensions, and careful stewardship of resources – both at home and in the church community. You will see the church budget has a line for hospitality, tangible evidence of love shared through this ministry.
I would like to add, love is creative
Creativity emerges in designing menus, table setting, presentation of plates and platters, even in the garden layout. There is always room for delight and play! Last year Claire brought us some plum paste! Who even knew you could make plum paste!
And what a good opportunity to learn from each other. Since the Portarlington breakfast with Craig Castree I have been learning more about the edible garden. For instance I have learned how to extend the zucchini season with better care of the zucchini plants! Valuable help in when to plant what, eggplant went in after I pulled up carrots.
And I subscribe to some good cooks, Jill Dupleix’s Cous Cous with zucchini and chorizo! I get excited trying out a new recipe and sharing my learning.
Eating in season, and reducing freight is an act of love for God’s good creation too.
What I have offered you is my take on a theology of cooking. It is grounded in Benedictine spirituality, where work is a gift of love, and I have used Paul’s letter to the Corinthians to tease out some of the nuances.
The heading, love lets go of power is just that, love according to Paul is not the exercise of power, but the exercise of patience and kindness and so forth.
May our lives be enriched by the sharing of love in our kitchens and in our community.
Karen Eller