Sprouting Opinions

The Brussels sprout. The bane of childhood Christmas dinners and the enemy of all that is good and tasty. I saw loads of them reduced at my local Co-op, and concluded that many others were learning to reject them as I have done. Curiously, I ate four of them before Christmas, my hostess telling me that they had been specially cooked in honey and bacon, two of my favourite foodstuffs. They were certainly more palatable, and consequently failed in their usual mission of making me retch, which the regular, boiled ones are certainly wont to do.

Some 2011 research by Cornwall College found that sprouts contain a chemical similar to phenylthiocarbamide, which only tastes bitter to people who have a certain gene, which affects around half of the world’s population. Taste is therefore real and objective, but dependent upon factors beyond our control. Why does one man love tea but despise coffee? Why might one enjoy Bovril while rejecting Marmite?

'Taste' is the word we sometimes apply to personal preference: we have tastes in music, style, people, colour. These preferences are real and sincere, yet they are not objective, unassailable facts as to why something is to be accepted and its rival rejected. When running a church, deciding about some ethical application or holding an opinion, let us distinguish between tastes and clear, Biblical prohibitions. Sprouts are horrid, but I must admit that others seem to love them. My taste is not the final arbiter in matters of theology or ecclesiology, or styles of worship. That is reserved for God’s Word. Let us not elevate our tastes and preferences to so exalted a position.