Monk of Mequon

This article showed up in my facebook newsfeed today:

Study: Last Supper paintings supersize the food

Has even the Last Supper been supersized?

The food in famous paintings of the meal has grown by biblical proportions over the last millennium, researchers report in a medical journal Tuesday.

Using a computer, they compared the size of the food to the size of the heads in 52 paintings of Jesus Christ and his disciples at their final meal before his death.

If art imitates life, we're in trouble, the researchers conclude. The size of the main dish grew 69 percent; the size of the plate, 66 percent, and the bread, 23 percent, between the years 1000 and 2000.

Supersizing is considered a modern phenomenon, but "what we see recently may be just a more noticeable part of a very long trend," said Brian Wansink, a food behavior scientist at Cornell University.

The study was his idea. For biblical context, he sought help from his brother, Craig Wansink, professor of religious studies at Virginia Wesleyan College in Norfolk, Va., and an ordained Presbyterian minister.

The Bible says the Last Supper took place on a Passover evening but gives little detail on specific foods besides bread and wine.

"There's nothing else mentioned. They don't say there's a fruit cup or carrot cake," though other foods such as fish, eel, lamb and even pork have appeared in paintings through the years, Brian Wansink said.

For the study, he used paintings featured in the book "Last Supper," published in 2000 by Phaidon Press. They include perhaps the most famous portrayal of the meal, by Leonardo da Vinci. Computer technology allowed them to scan, rotate and calculate images regardless of their orientation in the paintings.

Details are in the April issue of the International Journal of Obesity.

The study is "not very meaningful science," said Martin Binks, a behavioral health psychologist and a consultant at Duke University Medical Center. "We have real life examples of the increase in portion size — all you have to do is look at what's being sold at fast-food restaurants."

A more contemporary test would be to analyze portion sizes in Super Bowl commercials, he suggested.

"That would be a much more meaningful snapshot of how this society's relationship to food has changed," Binks said.

Well at least these paintings are being used for something?

 What's the same and what's different?

Kohlmeier's first conference

Kohlmeier's fifth conference. 

I kind of miss the long hair... 

 I know Pr. Cwirla posted about this last week. But if you haven't read the latest issue of "For the Life of the World" you should really check it out. 

It contains some awesome articles on Apologetics. Including, Dr. Angus Menuge and Mark Pierson two of the people to blame for my interest in Apologetics. 

You can read it here!

 As I was looking through news headlines today I saw this article:

NEW YORK -- Someone will probably get fired over what's going on right now, but in all honesty, they shouldn't. Whoever is responsible has managed to do in one half-inning, what even $1.5 billion couldn't do. Make the new Yankee Stadium, with it's nod to the past, actually feel like a game from the past.

 

How? Well, the speakers/music/PA system blew out just at the end of the bottom of the sixth inning. That's made the last two innings arguably the most pleasurable to grace the Bronx since the 1950s or 60s.

 

The only thing you can hear right now at Yankee Stadium? Nothing. Just the hustle-bustle of the fans in the seats. The sound of the ball being hit and the pop of it going into the glove. It's really quite something to experience. A very nice nod back to the golden days of baseball before every unoccupied second was filled with booming club music or the dreaded "We can't hear you!" meter.

 

Even the famous (or infamous, depending on your viewpoint) "Cotton Eye Joey" was forced to become "Silent Eye Joey."

 

I have to say, I've been going to baseball games since I was a kid and I can't ever remember a game being devoid of brain-thumping sounds.

 

Kind of makes you feel like you could actually be at the old Yankee Stadium.

I wish I would have been there. (Okay, so that probably has a lot to do with my love of baseball and the fact that the Cubs were playing.) I can't imagine what a MLB game would be like without music filling any space where something 'exciting' wasn't happening. 

Of course, there would still be some music, but it would come from the fans. You can't have a baseball game without starting with the National Anthem. After all, we all know that the last two words of it are "Play Ball!" I'm sure that the majority of Baseball Stadiums wouldn't be able to go through the 7th-inning stretch without singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game." (Root, root, root for the Cubbies!) And it just wouldn't be baseball in Milwaukee without a rendition of 'Roll out the Barrel.'

At some point that ceased to be enough. We are very audio oriented people. We get very uncomfortable with 'too much' silence. Students walk from class to class with headphones on. People will have their iTunes blaring while on their computer. I edit out 'extended' silence when I go through HT-Radio each week. The majority of people are extremely bored by silent movies. Star Wars would probably be a pretty lame movie without John Williams Score. The rubrics for silence in the Liturgy are often ignored. And if not, Pastor better not have them last too long or people will look around wondering what's wrong.

Does silence have any meaning? Or is it always just awkward?

(Yes, you can answer the questions in the cool comment box below!) :)

Pr. Weedon's Blog is really one of the best out there. 

Not only does he pass along great Lutheran and Patristic quotes that I would probably never come across otherwise. He also posts hymns, homilies, random thoughts and not so random thoughts. Recently, Pr. Weedon has even introduced me to some awesome new music through his blog. 

So, now I pass The High Kings unto you.