Food, Over-eating, and Gluttony

[ibelongtochrist]

Hello,

So, I just went to confession, and I confessed overeating (henceforth gluttony as well) and I come home ready to eat dinner! So, I eat to the point of feeling satisfied, then I eat a little more, and I wasn’t hurting or anything, so then I ate a little bite here and there. Afterward, I took a bite, but felt a little full. I took the food out and waited a little bit. I knew that if I were to eat I might commit gluttony…

After that I didn’t feel that full, so I ate a little more. Now as time has passed (5 minute rule of waiting, which I knew but chose not to completely follow), I feel full. Not necesarily bloated, but just very full.

My question is, have I committed mortal sin?

I knew that if I overate to the point of feeling beyond stuffed, it would probably be. It came to mind while eating that if I ate anymore, I might be gluttonous. (Don’t worry, there was and still is plenty of food for everyone else). I didn’t feel totally stuffed when I stopped eating, but as some time has passed by, I feel very full (not sick though). Or, am I being overly scrupulous and worrisome?

I just went to the confessional, and tommorow is Sunday! I would feel sad if I could not receive the Holy eucharist tommorow, especially since I just went to confession!

BTW, I have an addiction to food, not in extreme, but I am now cutting myself to 3 meals, so as not to overeat in snacks and cause myself to sin! I believe it is a result to boredom and not being satisfied (in my heart as well, henceforth I eat, and should probably pray!)

Thank you very much!

 

[thistle]

Modern Catholic Dictionary:

GLUTTONY. Inordinate desire for the pleasure connected with food or drink. This desire may become sinful in various ways: by eating or drinking far more than a person needs to maintain bodily strength; by glutting one’s taste for certain kinds of food with known detriment to health; by indulging the appetite for exquisite food or drink, especially when these are beyond one’s ability to afford a luxurious diet; by eating or drinking too avidly, i.e., ravenously; by consuming alcoholic beverages to the point of losing full control of one’s reasoning powers. Intoxication that ends in complete loss of reason is a mortal sin if brought on without justification, e.g., for medical reasons. (Etym. Latin glutire, to devour.)

 

[ibelongtochrist]

Very interesting, thank you. That is a well put definition.

 

[kristacecilia]

When trying to overcome any habitual sin or tendency to sin it’s very wise to stay very close to the sacraments. Go to Mass as often as you can and receive Our Lord in the Eucharist for strength. Make regular confessions- every two weeks at most. Also, it’s very helpful to meditate on the opposite virtue of the sin you are struggling with. In the case of gluttony, it would be temperance:

Temperance is primarily about desires for the greatest pleasures, and the greatest pleasures result from the most natural operations, which are those that have as their purpose the preservation of the individual and the preservation of the species. That is why the greatest pleasures are to be found in the consumption of food and drink and in the union of the sexes. And so temperance is properly about “pleasures of meat and drink and sexual pleasures.” These pleasures, moreover, result from the sense of touch. Thus, temperance is principally about the pleasures of touch, and secondarily about the pleasures of taste, smell, sight and sound insofar as the objects of these latter senses, ie., the smell of food, the sight of a beautiful body, etc., are conducive to the pleasurable use of things that are related to the sense of touch.

 

[Bookcat]

Individual acts of overeating…intemperance (gluttony in this sense) are “ordinarily” a “venial matter” for venial sin…(ones confessor can also guide one…there can be things that could be grave…like perhaps your doctor tells you if you do X your going to drop dead…etc etc)…one can discuss with your doctor as well in terms of your health.

Of course in drinking alcohol …catholicreference.net/index.cfm?id=33231

 

[tvdxer]

Hello,

So, I just went to confession, and I confessed overeating (henceforth gluttony as well) and I come home ready to eat dinner! So, I eat to the point of feeling satisfied, then I eat a little more, and I wasn’t hurting or anything, so then I ate a little bite here and there. Afterward, I took a bite, but felt a little full. I took the food out and waited a little bit. I knew that if I were to eat I might commit gluttony…

After that I didn’t feel that full, so I ate a little more. Now as time has passed (5 minute rule of waiting, which I knew but chose not to completely follow), I feel full. Not necesarily bloated, but just very full.

My question is, have I committed mortal sin?

I knew that if I overate to the point of feeling beyond stuffed, it would probably be. It came to mind while eating that if I ate anymore, I might be gluttonous. (Don’t worry, there was and still is plenty of food for everyone else). I didn’t feel totally stuffed when I stopped eating, but as some time has passed by, I feel very full (not sick though). Or, am I being overly scrupulous and worrisome?

I just went to the confessional, and tommorow is Sunday! I would feel sad if I could not receive the Holy eucharist tommorow, especially since I just went to confession!

BTW, I have an addiction to food, not in extreme, but I am now cutting myself to 3 meals, so as not to overeat in snacks and cause myself to sin! I believe it is a result to boredom and not being satisfied (in my heart as well, henceforth I eat, and should probably pray!)

Thank you very much!

Excessive eating is almost always a venial sin except if it truly endangers your health.

The situation you described is at most a venial sin, perhaps no sin at all.

 

[Joseph_Kemp]

Excessive worry over “gluttony” is one of the most ridiculous of fears. “Overeating” is a GREY AREA. It is impossible to say precisely when you have crossed the “line,” whatever THAT is. This in itself seems to be why people worry so much over gluttony. It is a very, very subjective area.

The Catholic Encyclopedia says:

“Gluttony is in general a venial sin in so far forth as it is an undue indulgence in a thing which is in itself neither good nor bad. Of course it is obvious that a different estimate would have to be given of one so wedded to the pleasures of the table as to absolutely and without qualification live merely to eat and drink, so minded as to be of the number of those, described by the Apostle St. Paul, “whose god is their belly” (Philippians 3:19). Such a one would be guilty of mortal sin. Likewise a person who, by excesses in eating and drinking, would have greatly impaired his health, or unfitted himself for duties for the performance of which he has a grave obligation, would be justly chargeable with mortal sin. St. John of the Cross, in his work “The Dark Night of the Soul” (I, vi), dissects what he calls spiritual gluttony. He explains that it is the disposition of those who, in prayer and other acts of religion, are always in search of sensible sweetness; they are those who “will feel and taste God, as if he were palpable and accessible to them not only in Communion but in all their other acts of devotion.” This he declares is a very great imperfection and productive of great evils.”

The mortal sin of gluttony, like any mortal sin, verges on the harm done. The Catholic Encyclopedia makes this very clear. Gluttony only becomes a mortal sin when it harms our body in some drastic way, or if it prevents us from fulfilling our “grave obligations” in life (like fulfilling a promise to help someone, for example.)

Gluttony, as others have said here, is often just a venial sin. Eating a lot of food is often no sin at all. Some people simply need more food than others in order to function normally. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with enjoying food for what it is. Saying that eating for enjoyment (as long as it isn’t harming you) is sinful is simply ridiculous.

If you are eating so much that you are getting stomach aches, or are having medical problems, or are giving yourself digestion issues, ie., harming your health in some way, then this could verge on mortal sin. It is simply abuse of the body. Very, very few people normally function this way. Usually only people suffering from a food addiction or illness have such difficulties (which automatically lessens culpability.)

Eating a few desserts and having a big main course are NOT sinful. I am glad that others here have noted the venial nature of most “gluttony.” Merely eating a lot of food, if it is not harmful, does not even qualify as sin. What one person may consider “overeating,” another may simply consider necessary and beneficial to health – enjoyable, even. This is so astonishingly subjective it barely even bears thinking about.

 

[thomasf]

Over eating is not always an act of will. It can be a health problem, or behavorial problem, etc.

 

[TrueLight]

Hello,

So, I just went to confession, and I confessed overeating (henceforth gluttony as well) and I come home ready to eat dinner! So, I eat to the point of feeling satisfied, then I eat a little more, and I wasn’t hurting or anything, so then I ate a little bite here and there. Afterward, I took a bite, but felt a little full. I took the food out and waited a little bit. I knew that if I were to eat I might commit gluttony…

I would not focuso on gluttony every time you eat, if that is possible.

This is going to sound like a platitude, but focus on eating to live and not living to eat.

 

[puzzleannie]

Hello,

So, I just went to confession, and I confessed overeating (henceforth gluttony as well) !

overeating is not, by definition, gluttony.

Gluttony is putting food ahead of one’s duty to God and his neighbor and eating to the point of actual physical ill effects.

you don’t “commit gluttony” just because you ate a few more bites even when you felt full, or because you went off your diet