The Food for Thought

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Here is food for thought! Parents in Hoke County, N.C. are very much concerned about what they feel is abuse of federal guidelines used in the meals the students are allowed to eat in our schools.  If students bring their lunches and the lunches don’t meet federal standards, the government regulations are requiring they buy a school lunch.  (John W. Pope—Civitas Institutute, Feb. 14, 2012). In respect to this, the question comes to me, just how much the federal government is able to dictate in the schools! As a boy back in the 40s and 50s I took my peanut butter sandwiches for lunch each day from grade 1-12, although there was no free lunch. It didn’t kill me, but I didn’t like that school lunch!

In the Hoke County incident, the four-year-old brought her lunch to school. The meal consisted of a turkey and cheese sandwich, a banana, apple juice and chips. But the school official believed it violated the U.S. Department of Agriculture guidelines, and so school authorities gave the girl additional food, $1.25 worth of chicken nuggets to supplement her lunch. The mother was upset!   After the fuss became public the school dropped the charge on the nuggets. (John W. Pope—Civitas Institutute, Feb. 14, 2012. But, nevertheless, this situation does provide food for thought!

ABC reported that students behave with better healthy lunches. Some schools have taken out the soda-filled vending machines and replaced them with ones offering only juice, water and energy drinks. Some have had local companies take over their cafeterias and offered fresh fruit and vegetables, whole grain breads and entrees free of additives and chemicals, instead of pizza and fries. Long standard-issue cafeteria tables made way for round tables, creating a more relaxed feel in the lunchroom. But the biggest change of all, it has been reported, was that discipline statistics plummeted. (Good Morning America, January 22, 2012). Diets here were more chosen than imposed. Here is food for thought!

We increasingly see how the federal government seeks to dictate the mandates in every corner of the educational domain; not just in eating patterns and diets of our children, but the diet of learning in the schools.  The menu that is being set up for the lunchrooms parallels the whole educational situation, since educational programs are increasingly being set up that don’t fit the diet of all the students. All students don’t fit into the same box. But Big Brother, Uncle Sam, knows what is best, it seems, although our educational achievement as an industrialized nation has plummeted. Why can’t students study what they can and want to learn, rather than be flooded with material they can’t grasp?

It is the school’s responsibility to teach good eating habits certainly, but to impose them?  It is important that students are not so hungry their learning is impaired, but on the other hand what effect does free breakfasts have on families eating together? I recall eating breakfast every morning with my family as a lad with true gratitude. With our new worldview in America, however, it seems we have denuded the religious influences and continually attack the nuclear family. It seems that in seeking to solve one problem, our educational system is creating many others. But here is food for thought!

One of the sad things I observed back when I was a public school teacher was the great waste in respect to the lunches.  At times students even tried to have good fights, I guess because for many of them didn’t realize the food costs real money, and that masses of people over the world are starving. Or did they care? The food not eaten was extravagant, a massive waste. Financially, wasted food costs America more than $100 billion annually, and the public school cafeterias are leaders in this waste, I wager.

The 21st century America lifestyle has promoted things like, stress, headaches, tiredness, poor concentration, hyperactivity, unparalleled obesity, and that’s just for starters? It is estimated over sixty-five percent of these symptoms are caused by what is eaten or not eaten. Obesity is one of the major health problems in our land, and giving free lunches and free or reduced breakfasts do not help when the students don’t eat the food. Many parents neglect teaching the right eating patterns, and the schools are totally failing at it. If students are taught to realize that their bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, and that God calls them to lead healthy lifestyles and to establish good eating habits, it would greatly help.

Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah – all with names referring to God, were to learn the Chaldean language and culture. Their names were changed to Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego—names exalting Babylonian gods. Here was imposition of one culture on another through education. But in this context is a message that can be related to Daniel and his three friends about diet—NOT JUST THE FOOD, BUT THE SUBSTANCE OF EDUCATION—physical and mental health. Here is food for thought!

In Daniel, chapter 1, Daniel himself takes on a challenge to show the value of a natural diet in l:12 and goes on to prove its success in 1:15  The diet the four Hebrew children had shows how God created specific nutrients in our food to help create and develop healthy eating patterns.  They refused the king’s program, as they persuaded the authority to let them eat their normal diets of vegetables rather than official diet Nebuchadnezzar had set up.  The diet they chose did much better in respect to their physical health and their mental health.  Daniel and his three friends not only excelled in their physical health, but they showed the highest achievement in knowledge and wisdom!

There is the politically correct ethical vantage point that in many ways can be compared to the Babylonian culture.  See it all about you! If a white dislikes a minority, it is racist, but if a minority dislikes whites it just a first Amendment right. All types of moral lifestyles can be taught, but if it is biblical it is to be discounted. If you believe God designed and directs creation, you are esteemed to be ignorant.  If you promote abstinence as the best way to avoid unwanted pregnancy, VD, or other adverse factors associated with violating God’s sexual guidance, you are judged antiquated!

We seemingly have gotten rid of the communist and socialist threats in America by renaming them progressive thinking. Parenting has been replaced with Ritalin and video games, as educators must continually work with undisciplined children. The Bible and the message of Christ are healthy both physically and mentally.  But there is the diet of political correctness, and it is far more damaging than a wrong nutrition diet in the school cafeteria.   Here is food for thought.

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by Joe Renfro, Ed.D., Educational Columnist, Radio Evangelist, Retired Teacher and Pastor, 5931 West Avenue, Lavonia, Georgia 30553, 706-356-4173, joerenfro@windstream.net

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