蜜芽传媒

Good Morning.

Chocolate, as a drink, is first recorded among the peoples of the Central American rainforests, around 1500 years ago. The Aztecs believed it had aphrodisiac powers, which does put a rather different spin on its association with bedtime than we do today. Yet it wasn鈥檛 until 1847, in England, that Joseph Fry came up with the notion of combining cocoa powder with cocoa butter, adding sugar, to thereby create the chocolate bar. I suspect that many of us have been enjoying this innovation over these last 24 hours, not least in the form of Easter eggs. Some of us may now be regretting an overindulgence.

A few years back I was experimenting with the relationship between prayer and our physical senses. To explore taste, I decided to ask groups of people to pray whilst slowly allowing a piece of chocolate to dissolve in their mouths. One day I badly underestimated how much I needed, and had to hastily source extra supplies. My group ended up with a mixture of milk, plain and orange flavours. To my surprise I discovered that the sweeter the chocolate, the more joyful the prayers that participants recorded. The fruit version seemed to particularly encourage prayers for creation.

I rather warm to the discovery that on a day of penitence I might aid my prayers with a dark bitter chocolate, conversely for a feast day, I could opt for a sweeter product. Today, being Easter Monday, falls firmly in that latter category.

And so, I pray:

God, you give us taste and smell, through which to enjoy the foods of the Earth, help me this day to enrich my prayers through the application of my senses. Amen.