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Good morning. Bad news this week about the link between obesity and cancer especially in the young. As someone who has struggled with weight since a 1950s childhood I’ve been wondering why younger people have become particular vulnerable and only think it has something to do not only with the amount of food available but also the type and the price. Yesterday I had a long drive and stopped at a service station. On a whim I went into a burger bar and ordered a cheeseburger with fries – I haven’t had one for years, partly out of habit – I do try to eat my greens and avoid too many carbs – but also if I’m honest because being middle class and towards the end of my second decade pigging out on burgers doesn’t seem quite right. But then there was the hit; the sugar, salt and fat, which translated itself into a glance towards the sugary donut bar on the way out, as some part of my brain wondered how the hit could be repeated or extended. And of course it can, but not with the same intensity. The rush created by that mix of sugar and fat, or sugar, salt and fat is subject to the law of diminishing returns. You can never quite get back the first bite. It seems to me that the argument about obesity has come down to: is it mostly genetic or is it about will-power? My mother and grandmother were much the same shape as I am, so I am bound to think genes play a part. On the other hand doctors nag us to try ever harder to lose our spare pounds. And then the therapists weigh in, forgive me, suggesting that it is unhappiness that makes us overeat and if we could only lose our psychic hunger we would not get overweight, and we’d all look and feel better. I was rather delighted to find an early Christian ascetic suggesting that it was reasonable to allow the sin of vanity to drive out the sin of gluttony; exactly what today’s diet experts recommend. Overeating is not a new problem. What is new, though, is the combining of those magic three ingredients: sugar, fat, salt, to produce massive quantities of food which is not only addictive, but cheap. Will-power is fine for those of us who can afford to eat well and whose pride inhibits any desire we might have to pig out. We can easily, as the old books of moral theology used to recommend, avoid occasions of sin. Not so easy if you are hungry, depressed or poor, or you have low self-esteem. There are two sides to temptation – will-power is one, but the other is the responsibility of those who produce food which if over-consumed may contribute to rising rates of cancer in the young. We might all try to eat less but the big problem is surely beyond any individual to fix.