Religion of food.

Yesterday I ranted about the evangelization of weight loss as a means for achieving weight loss, and I haven't changed my mind in the last 24 hours. Everyone I know who loses weight goes back to the old set point or worse when they go off the diet, and they all go off the diet. I don't know if it's biology or psychology or some combination, but that's what happens. Good grief, haven't we watched Oprah struggle with this long enough to know? And yet Oprah would seem to have the one attribute I identified that makes it possible for an overweight person to achieve a continuous healthy weight, in that she always promoted weight loss and healthy eating. But then, she didn't have a particular plan of her own to tout in those days, and perhaps that made the difference.

Anyway, she may be largely to blame for the way diet books are written now, and as an editor I have to read a bunch of them. I can't stand modern diet books, especially ones that go into some weird kind of spiritual aspect to food. Let me explain.

My problem is not that the struggle against weight can lead you to religion -- faith can be crucial for for many people to get control of unhealthy behavior. Overeaters Anonymous, for example, like Alcoholics Anonymous, is essentially a higher-power-based program, although very open to interpretation and even agnosticism. I have no problem with any of that. But that's not what's being pushed by modern diet writers. The problem is not that they bring food is brought into the spiritual realm -- hey, we Catholics call that the Eucharist. It's that to them food is the spiritual realm.

I don't want to name names or point to particular books, as I would like to continue to work, so please accept that these are generalizations. You could easily find examples at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or your local bookseller. They're the books that like to use terms like soulful and spiritual and zen and clean in books that are essentially about how to force down kale.

But there are some not-so-spiritual aspects to the books I've seen.

They claim to not be into shaming, but they are so very much into shaming. Shamey shamey shamey. They will explain that everything bad that happens to you -- everything -- can be blamed on the fact that you eat like a pig. Bad relationships? Bad diet. Depressed? Bad diet. Lack of control over your life? Bad diet. Bad career? Who'd hire you, fatso? Even genetic diseases won't get you a pass. You know why you got multiple sclerosis, Huntington's, sickle cell anemia? Our foodies are happy to tell you that you may have inherited your genes from Mom or Dad, but your Pop-Tart sucking ways activated the genes. There is nothing that cannot be blamed on your bad diet, and nothing that cannot be saved by this better diet.

And guess what? Not only will your body be healed of all that inflammation -- we're all so full of inflammation it's a wonder we don't burst into flame -- but your very soul shall be nourished. Isn't that great? You thought a religious experience might involve long journeys, church attendance, study of philosophy and theology, meditation and prayer, but it turns out you just needed to eat this organic broccoli rabe taco.

On a more prosaic concern, the words that these writers try to conjure with are fingernails on the blackboard to me. It's not their fault that "nourish" is as ugly a word as "moist," but its sprinkled like Himalayan salt all over the place. Nourish your soul -- bleah. My soul just puked.

Other words they love to throw around include transform (because "lose your cheese butt" is pedestrian), sultry, and sexy. They throw in sex a lot more than you might think a book about food would. But every time I see sexy, I think of Phil Hartman as the editor of Sassy. Everyone should.

And let me just say, the terminology of foodism does its proponents no favors. "Larb" may sound find in Laos, but in English it's the sound you make just before you throw up. Other terms like "evoo" (thanks, Rachel Ray) are just baby talk, and perhaps you know how I feel about that. "Forbidden rice" is cultural chauvinism, making China sound mystic and dreadful ("forbidden" rice is black, is a genetic outlier, and so is expensive; "expensive rice" wouldn't attract the rubes). Vegans love lentils, and "beluga lentils" look like caviar -- so let's name them after meat! "Seitan" is likely a phony foreignism from Hippieville c. 1968, a fake term for fake meat that sounds like that which must get behind me.

And why, if it's so important that we eat local, are we all supposed to get our salt from the Himalayas? This ain't Nepal.

I think I might even be talked into vegetarianism if these people weren't so annoying. But not veganism; you'll get my ice cream from me when you pry it from my very cold, dead fingers.

Now, that may sound like I also have some food issues, and I'll agree that I use it for comfort -- but I don't expect it to solve my problems beyond a moment's enjoyment. Besides, I know I have a problem. The only problem they'd consider is that the books aren't selling and Dr. Oz hasn't returned their calls.

What it comes down to is, these writers are putting way more on food than food can handle, because it suits their purposes. I say, if you need particular foods to nourish (ugh) your soul, your soul is going to be in big trouble when real trouble hits. War, famine, accident, or just illness -- and illness will hit, because you're not getting out of here alive -- any of these could disrupt the ability to eat this soul-nourishing food. At some point you won't get to eat your organic beluga lentil and forbidden rice salad; will your soul just wither within you? Food does not make for a very good religion.

Of course, you could snipe back that food will get you through times of no faith better than faith will get you through times of no food. Could be -- but that just demonstrates that food and faith are poles apart.

That's enough on health food. Come back tomorrow for another Oreo review!