This is the second post from Sherry Antonetti. We’re so happy to have her here but she sometimes puts her feet up on the furniture. So read this and check her blog out over at Chocolate for Your Brain:
When I first picked up “Eat Pray Love”for summer reading, the catty part of me sat there thinking, “What does this woman have to be miserable about?” Her husband loves her, she has a career that allows her to fly to exotic locals and will pay for her to spend a year navel gazing. Nice work if you can get it. She just didn’t want to be tied down anymore at 34, but this is a real life and real lives are often very messy. I kept plodding forward. However, after reading the whole thing, I exercise my option not to see the movie.
Rather like the first leg of her journey in Italy, the nutritional content of this book is the equivalent of a large fragrant excellent Naples’ pizza. It’s tasty. It goes down sooooooo easy, but a steady diet is not good for you. To make sure I was being fair, I did a little substitute test. How would I feel about the spiritual advice or musings of a male author who decided after ten years of marriage, “No dear, I don’t want to be married anymore, it’s too much for me. Now I’m off to eat fried chicken and drink beer for four months, followed by sleeping and reading philosophical junk until I find myself, at which point, I’ll finish finding ballance in my life swimming in the Carribean and taking up with some hottie there who thinks the sun rises and sets on me.” Momentarily, I toyed with penning a satire, “Drink, Sleep, Sex,” the story of a man’s creating himself as an island on an island. Bleah.
But the book and the movie are the current stuff of feminine culture; a chick flick which explores the world of a woman exploring herself through the world. Because this is a story based on real life, it remains problematic both to dismiss as mere Hollywood whimsy (because it isn’t just that), or to attack it for it’s flaws as a theological journey. It’s one soul’s journey that from a Catholic perspective, went awol; a pilgrim’s distress, lacking GPS, thinking it is making progress. The main character crafts over the course of a year, a god that demands nothing but that she smile with her liver or smile at her lover, depending upon the day. Such counsel is a far cry from “Take up your cross and follow me,” but it was never intended as Catholic theology, and thus should not be treated with such high comparisons. Thinking and embracing the concept of “God is in me AS ME.” is not the same thing as accepting the reality that “We are created in God’s image.” I don’t doubt that there are women who will find this idea of a god that demands nothing of the soul, attractive –they may not have the resources to engage in a 12 month hiatus from reality, but I can see the spiritual danger of exchanging a God who requires we sublimate and sacrifice and love first, for one that demands nothing but that we be satisfied in our belly today.
The idea of finding God via appetite, via your wants is an inverse of what Catholicism demands; that we learn to see Christ in disguise, in others and then, to wash their feet, to feed the hungry, to offer one’s self up.
I felt sad at the end, for Liz, her ex-husband and for those who view her exerpience as emancipating rather than simply well written transcontinental indulgence. The desire to be closer to God is at the core of any sincere faith. The struggle not to be distracted or discouraged or mislead is the story of every saint. For those us still on this journey, the how of becoming intimately in love with God, I commend the tried and true method of fasting, prayer, service.
August 21, 2010 at 2:20 am
Wow, excellent review. If I might add anything, her (and indeed the common) obsession with "taking time out" to "search for myself" has an obvious flaw. We are not Aristotelian unmoved movers contemplating ourselves. To simplify the philosophy of the Jewish thinker Martin Buber, our "I" only finds itself in a "Thou". For her, this should have been her husband, friends, etc. And dare I say? God. Rather than her way of finding God as a corollary to herself.
August 21, 2010 at 2:23 am
Well said! Sadly the philosophy of Eat Pray Love is all pervasive. I just recently read a comment on another blog in which the commentor declared she really wasn't interested in a god that asked anything of her. It made me very sad. How do you convert that?
August 21, 2010 at 3:11 pm
"It's one soul's journey that from a Catholic perspective, went awol; a pilgrim's distress, lacking GPS, thinking it is making progress. "
Great money quote bc that's exactly what's happening in our culture/families today. In my own fam, two husbands have left their wife & kids to do the same..one still trots himself up to Communion every Sunday bc he knows "God love me no matter what."
The reason this book is selling so well is bc it validates that broken thinking and the reason the thinking of so many Catholics is broken is bc we've long since given up being "in the world, not of it."
August 21, 2010 at 6:19 pm
This book came recommended by a Catholic mom in our Catholic study group. (!!) I only got one third of the way through the book before I put it down. I could not deal with the self-centered viewpoint of the author. Spiritual journey? Pshaw! More like a self indulgent world tour–all expenses paid by the publisher.
I found it ironic that the very institution she abhorred in the beginning is where she ended up again. (didn't she have to marry the guy to get him in the usa?)
Love our difficult gut-wrenching Catholic way of life. Thank you, Lord!
August 21, 2010 at 6:22 pm
A Houstonradio host commented on the movie. His wife dragged him to it. Even she wanted to leave after the first hour! He said it should be called, "Eat, Barf, Mope!
August 21, 2010 at 7:30 pm
I'm going to have to let the "anonymous" stand because I am embarrassed to admit this.
I haven't read the book. I saw about 5 minutes of the author on Oprah a long time ago, felt a low boil and powered off.
I haven't seen the movie and do not plan to do so. The post-filming interviews with the star made me cringe: "I am a practicing Hindu…" blah, blah, blah. "I was converted during filming…" pass me the barf bag.
Those aren't the reasons I'm embarrassed. It's because I find myself jealous. Yes. I am jealous that some people get to be so ignorant of God's will (or are so willful that they don't care what his will is) that they get to toss a husband, travel to exotic places, have unrepentant sex with whom ever they feel like.
Yes, I know, I know, God's love and will are a far superior calling than my own temporal human desires, but sometimes I just want to embrace the hedonist in me. I just do.
August 21, 2010 at 8:59 pm
anon @230
it's alright, it's in our fallen nature to want to be selfish. we all at least think about it, even those who have gone on to become great saints. it's not in our temptations that we are made weak, it is in turning over our weaknesses to God that He makes us strong. i will admit that i struggle with a certain sexual sin and in my moment of temptation i cry out "Lord, i want so badly to do this right now, i am so weak, please protect me" and if my prayer is truly sincere and i truly believe that He wants to protect me, He gives me the strength to not fall into temptation. the thing about being a Catholic, or a Christian in general, and trying to become a saint is that it is not easy and that we have to go up against the entire world to achieve it, most especially in ourselves. i am my biggest obstacle. but i want to be His little saint so dearly, to love Him more than i could possibly imagine, that i sit at His feet and beg His love and strength and mercy. there are always days when we fall, when we choose our own will over the Lord's, but He allows us these temptations, these desires, to bring us ever closer to Him. if you fall flat on your face, your face is still further along the path than your feet were before you fell. every moment is an opportunity for growth and love. God's mercy abounds! He came to save those in need of a doctor, so don't be afraid to go to The Doctor with your ailments, no matter how embarrassed you feel.
August 23, 2010 at 3:54 pm
I read the book after seeing the title on a catholic blog. I too was left with a sad feeling. I wanted to tell the author that Jesus is the relationship she should be fostering. He is the only fulfillment. Not learning Italian, or her "spiritual guide", or some lover near the sea.
August 24, 2010 at 4:16 am
As a single person I fell for every Oprah-induced psychological fad there was. I know many women who still do fall for those fads. God bless the stalwart mothers who know that 'eat pray love' should really be replaced with 'fast pray serve'.