At Newmarket Baptist we are asking how  ‘Slow Food’ can help reframe our understanding of what it means to be “church.”

The “Slow Food” Movement arose in Italy as a response to the negative impact of multinational food companies and its influence is spreading around the world – slowly!

Slow Food opposes the standardisation of taste, protects cultural identity tied to food and seeks to safeguard processing techniques inherited from tradition.  It involves valuing time to prepare, eat and build community through food.

It is sometimes critiqued as being an elite pursuit, however Jesus himself would often seek out the best feed in town!  Far from extravagant eating, Slow Food is about the celebration of the connections that food can make with sustainable production and local food traditions that are often lost in our economy.

Together we are discovering that that if we read the gospels without getting hungry we aren’t paying attention! The how, what, where and with whom Jesus eats is a central point of gospel conflict. “Understanding about the loaves” (Mark 6:52) is presented as essential to understanding Jesus’ ministry of reconciliation.

This ministry is symbolised in the offer of wilderness bread and of his body and blood in the Eucharist.  Our prayer is that like his  followers at Emmaus, it would be in the offer of hospitality to strangers, and at the breaking of bread that our eyes will be opened and that Christ may be made known among us.

Many of these ideas take shape for us at our Flemington ‘People’s Pantry’  and at our regular ‘People’s Table’ liturgies.

Our community curator Marcus Curnow assists Rev. Dr. Simon Carey Holt in teaching ‘Table Spirituality: Hospitality, Community and Mission’ through Whitley College.

You can follow Simon’s food and spirituality blog Eating Heaven.