Is Your Church Making You Fat?

Plenty of studies have looked at whether being religious improves your health (in the U.S. at least, the current answer is a qualified yes), but Purdue University sociologist Ken Ferraro took a serious look at a different question: How does being religious affect your body mass index (BMI)?

In a 2006 study, Ferraro discovered that Baptists, including Southern Baptists, were most likely to be obese, even when geographic factors were controlled for (i.e., it wasn’t just the southern cookin’). “[Conservative] Protestants tend to have the highest BMIs,” he told me when I called him last week. The explanation? Ferraro has several guesses.

One has to do with your outlook on life. More fervent believers tend to see God’s will—rather than personal choice—defining their lives, said Ferraro. Another explanation is that groups like Southern Baptists, which frown on smoking and drinking, may be lax when it comes to restricting food choices. “You can’t abstain from food,” said Ferraro. “It’s a question of what and how much.”

Finally there’s the issue of what you eat when you go to church. “On any Sunday, you could walk into almost any Southern Baptist church in America and enjoy doughnuts and coffee before Sunday School, a potluck [meal] after the morning worship service, or an ice cream social in the evening,” says an article about obesity and the church in the Journal of the Southern Baptist Convention. In other words, high-fat foods are part of the culture.

But whether or not Ferraro’s explanations are right, he also found that church-going is not all bad when it comes to your waistline. For one thing, Ferraro discovered that while women who consumed a lot of religious media—like TV broadcasts of services for example—were heavier, those who attended services in person were not. He also found evidence that when men turn to religion, rather than food, for comfort they are more likely to keep the pounds off.

A Washington Post article this month (authored by a marathon-running pastor) showed that among a growing number of congregations, health is the newest form of ministry. One Baptist megachurch in Houston, for example, has a mission for sports and fitness, with an exercise center, fitness classes, personal trainers and a nutrition program. “We desire that our members develop both spiritually and physically,” says a statement on the church’s website.

Ferraro says he sees the same trend around him in West Lafayette, Ind., where he lives and works. “Some congregations have health clubs that are open to the general public for a modest fee.” That means nonreligious folks stand to benefit from this trend as well: A congregation near you may be offering health-club memberships at half the price of your expensive commercial gym. Ferraro has long urged religious folks to ask themselves some probing questions: “What does my community eat when we get together to celebrate?” “How do we support one another in getting and staying healthy?”

For those already committed to faith and fitness, however, the questions may be more immediate. Is it really possible, for example, as Ohio pastor Mark Brown claims, to combine scripture reading with treadmill workouts? Try it for yourself: Brown’s secret is a large-print Bible.

(PHOTO: CORBIS)

 
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