Pope Francis considers culinary and sexual pleasures “simply divine”

Pope Francis, a critic of the “fanaticism” sometimes installed within the Church, considers that culinary or sexual pleasure “is simply divine”, according to an interview book published on Wednesday in Italy. “The Church has condemned inhuman, raw and vulgar pleasure, but has always accepted human, sober and moral pleasure,” said the Pope, in response to questions from Carlo Petrini, an Italian writer and gastronomer.

In the same interview, the Pope stressed that “pleasure comes directly from God; it is not Catholic, nor Christian, or anything else, it is simply divine”. “The pleasure of eating serves to keep you healthy through food, just as sexual pleasure is done to make love more beautiful and guarantee the perpetuation of the species,” added the pontiff.

The Pope is categorically opposed to “a fanatical morality” that rejects the notion of pleasure, which existed in the history of the Catholic Church, but constitutes “a misinterpretation of the Christian message”. This vision “caused enormous damage, which is still being felt strongly in some cases today”, laments the Argentine Pope.

“On the contrary, the pleasure of eating well, like sexual pleasure, comes from God,” insisted the spiritual leader of 1.3 billion Catholics.

In the book, the Pope underlines in passing his unconditional admiration for the film “Babette’s Feast”, which takes place in a 19th century ultra-Danish Danish Protestant community, invited to a sumptuous banquet prepared by a French cook who wins the lottery. “For me it is a hymn to Christian charity, to love,” says the pope.

The book “TerraFutura”, which contains three interviews with Pope Francis on integral ecology, was written by the world founder of the concept of “slow food”, created in the 1980s, to oppose “fast food” (food fast).

The publication focuses on Pope Francis’ social vision on ecology, expressed in the encyclical “Laudato Si”, published in 2015.

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