The UK is affluent, educated, and home to as many as 1.6 million people who struggle to eat food each day (1). Not because they cannot afford it or don’t have the time, but because they cannot bring themselves to.
Indeed, the UK has the highest rate of eating disorders in Europe and sadly the numbers are on the rise.
What you may not be aware of, however, is that some of these sufferers are praying, believing, churchgoing Christians.
According to Christian organisation Anorexia Bulimia Care (ABC), a church congregation of 200 will typically have around four or five people suffering with an eating disorder at any one time.
“Research we’ve carried out at events and conferences found that 90% of church members knew someone who was suffering from an eating disorder. Seventy per cent of them knew someone in their own church,” says Jane Smith, executive director of ABC.
“Of those that we spoke to who did know of someone suffering in their church, over half of them said that their church leaders did not know what was going on.”
Given the church’s emphasis on people being made in the image of God and its well-known commitment to feeding the hungry at home and abroad, the deliberate rejection of food by a Christian can be hard to understand.
So why do they do it? Are they just being selfish or silly? Or is there more to it than meets the eye?
Premier Christian radio host Maria Rodrigues-Toth has taken many calls from listeners who have suffered from eating disorders. The details of each caller may be different but what they share in common is low self-esteem.
“A lot of the time it’s a sense that they are not pretty enough, not interesting enough, they’re not worth what God has made them to be,” she says.
Arianna Walker is executive director of Mercy Ministries, a charity that provides a six-month residential programme for young women suffering from life controlling issues.
She isn’t surprised that there are girls in the church struggling with self-image and eating disorders. Every woman who comes to Mercy Ministries comes through a church and is from a Christian background.
“Being a Christian does not make you immune to the challenges of this world,” she says.
“Churches across the country are reaching out to the communities which is great and these people are getting saved and becoming Christians,” she explains.
“But then six months down the line it is revealed that individuals were abused, self-harming or addicted to drugs.
“Now they’re in church and trying to discover what their faith in God looks like with all the baggage from the past.”
With size zero models dominating the fashion industry and women’s magazines with page after page of airbrushed beauties, it’s not surprising that girls feel under pressure to "look like them".
"If we have a culture where there are a lot of unrealistic images portrayed, this does place a pressure on the more vulnerable, especially teenage (or younger) girls, to believe that they ‘should’ be able to achieve this," says psychologist Dr Kate Middleton.
This is just a part of the problem, however, and the deliberate rejection of food goes beyond a desire to resemble slim models and celebrities.
"I can honestly say that I have only ever had one or two eating disorders that have been started by a diet to look thinner,” says Jane.
“I would say that 99% of all our calls are to do with emotional triggers, emotional trauma for the child.
"More commonly, we find family rows, breakdowns, bereavement and bullying are the major factors."
