Bread Alone

Bread in the window waiting to be taken home.

“Not on Bread alone shall you live but on every word that comes from the mouth of God” Jesus quotes to the devil in the synoptic gospels.  But Jesus was obviously not French!  This country runs on bread.   It’s understandable when a gallon of gas is close to $7.50/8 and a loaf of bread is only about two dollars; a buck fifty.

When I first heard about the chain of stores Le Pain Quotidien (The Daily Bread) I was put off a little because I thought it used the words of “The Lord’s Prayer” in French.  It doesn’t.  The more time I spend in France the more I realize its truism.   People eat bread here daily; all the time.   Three meals a day it’s offered.  And it is wonderful!

The kinds of bread vary from region to region and from time of day to time of day.  In the morning it’s bread with jam and butter.  In the afternoon it’s bread with the main meal – a sandwich on a baguette – bread with some wine and cheese.  At night there is bread with soup or with a quiche or cold cuts.  Bread, Bread, Bread!

Strange to me at least, is to see people eating bread while walking on the street.  I think of that as something kids do or parents do to pacify hungry kids.  When you buy loaves of bread here you don’t get a bag; just a wrapper to hold the bread.   So people walk the streets holding their bread batons.  Only the most disciplined can walk home without nibbling (devouring) the treasure they carry.   It’s only a very lucky loaf that makes its way home with its ends in tact.

Frequent sight on French streets.

I haven’t really had breakfast that often.  I stopped after my first week or so at the monastery in March.   I was afraid I might not fit over the mountains if I ate the bread I love so much.  That being said a loaf of bread, some cheese, and a small bottle of red wine make the perfect inexpensive lunch under a shady tree on a park bench.  That I will confess to!

Almost every neighborhood has a boulangerie (a bread store) while, for economic reasons, many shop owners have combined the bread stores with pastry shops (patisseries).  It’s a little controversial here because some of the purists believe these two arts should not be mixed together.  I’m not that observant to see any bread or pastry suffering (and I keep trying them town after town after town).

A Bread only shop.

So while it would do the French some good to get back to Church and hear the Word of God proclaimed once again, I can understand how they can think they can live on bread alone.