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Faith and Factory Farms
"Man is what he eats." With these words, the great Russian Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann begins his seminal book "For the Life of the World," a meditation on what it means to live a sacramental life. These words might similarly serve as the overarching theme of The Humane Society of the United States' new All Creatures Great and Small campaign, which aims to raise awareness of our inherent responsibility as stewards of God's creation, and more specifically how that call to stewardship impacts the lives of animals.
The first phase of this campaign focuses on farm animals, and egg-laying hens in particular. At any given moment in America, approximately 280 million hens are condemned to a life spent in battery cages, contraptions so tiny that the birds can never spread their wings. Ever. Their entire lives. And the factory farms that confine these hens don't think twice about the suffering they subject these animals to. In fact, they scarcely think of the hens as animals at all but treat them, instead, as nothing more than mere units of production whose eggs can be distributed.
The trouble, of course, is that these mere units of production are a part of God's handiwork, created with instincts to spread their wings, walk around, nest, and live in cohesive social units. Hens are not widgets, in other words, but factory farms treat them as such.
The especially poignant element for Christians regarding the suffering of these animals is that Jesus, just before he himself was sent to slaughter, cries out in lament for his people, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem! ...how many times I yearned to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her young under her wings..." The master storyteller had countless metaphors at his disposal to explain his great love for his people, and he chooses the picture of a mother hen's love for her chicks. Contrast this beautiful picture of a protective love with the nightmare of today's factory farms and mother hens crammed together into battery cages and forced to lay eggs at unnaturally high rates, with never a chance to cover their young with her wings.
This intolerable situation, along with the equally intolerable confinement of veal calves and pregnant sows in spaces so small they can never turn around, has fundamentally religious implications. If we humans can subject fellow creatures to such abhorrent conditions in order to merely satiate our appetites, what does this say about our inheritance as the only creatures made in the image of God? This is not solely an issue, in other words, of cruelty to animals, but of relinquishing our very identity as the imago dei.
The All Creatures Great and Small campaign addresses this imbalance in its very name: that is, all creatures great and small, humans and hens alike, deserve to be treated with compassion, not for mere sentimental reasons, but because we are all a part of God's good creation and should be treated with a commensurate respect and dignity.
The Humane Society of the United States seeks to honor our calling as stewards of God's creation by encouraging everyone to participate in one great month of compassion, where participants pledge either to switch to cage-free eggs or use egg substitutes for the month of October, beginning with the celebration of the feast of St. Francis, the patron saint of animals. While such a modest change won't solve all the problems associated with factory farming, it's certainly a worthwhile step that would help us take our obligation to be responsible stewards of creation more seriously. For more information, visit humanesociety.org/allcreatures.
The Reverend Michael Bruner, a Presbyterian minister, is an adjunct professor of religion at Azusa Pacific University in California.
By Michael Bruner |
August 13, 2008; 11:50 AM ET
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Posted by: Gary Dillingham | August 15, 2008 10:04 AM
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To the previous poster who says "animals offer their lives"..... well, in truth - they don't. They're lives are "taken".
And "eating only what we need for optimum health" - has proven within recent years to be a plant based diet. Man can live quite well without animal products.
www.goveg.com
Posted by: Bea Elliott | August 15, 2008 8:08 AM
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I am delighted about the initiative to encourage a "kinder October".
As it happens I am trying to encourage the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle, Australia, to switch to free range eggs for diocesan/parish catering.
I shall circulate your article as widely as I can.
And THANK YOU for doing what you do.
Posted by: Olga Parkes | August 14, 2008 8:04 PM
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BB:
RE: Abortion.
What's so troubling about pro-lifers is that they're not considering the child's life at all. They'd rather have a living, breathing, thinking, aware child born into a family/household that doesn't want him/her, that will abuse him/her, that doesn't have the funds for him/her...than to abort an embryo that cannot think and that isn't aware. Now THAT is perverse. Talk about hypocrisy!
August 14, 2008 2:21 PM
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
The logic for abortion on demand could be used for euthanasia and murder of anyone who is not wanted or is inconvenient. Abortion of healthy unborn babies remains OUTSIDE normal medical practice, hence a law had to be introduced to protect the abortionist. Roe vs Wade came into effect in 1973 before ultrasound became a routine instrument used pre-natal care and Fetology became a special science within Obstetrics.
The unborn child has a right to its life like anyone else. The life of unborn is a gift from God and no mother has a right to take it because the child happens to be in her womb, anymore than she has a right to kill it after it is born.
Read Psalm 139 and Luke chapter 1.
Google the terms Fetology, Fetal Development and Hippocratic Oath.
Watch the following video on YouTube
The Silent Scream - Dr B Nathanson MD
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjNo_0cW-ek&feature=related
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
After you have gathered enough information and watched the video you will realize that to talk of an anti-abortion stand as hypocrisy is EVIL. Your present comment is based on ignorance.
Posted by: Anonymous | August 14, 2008 7:32 PM
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Terrific piece. Many thanks for this.
Readers may also be interested to know a few more facts about factory farming.
1. Dairy cows are kept pregnant their entire lives. Despite their strong maternal instinct, their calves are taken away at birth so that their milk can be harvested for human consumption. The cows are inseminated through a horrendous procedure that, if committed on human females, would be called rape.
2. Battery hens not only can't spread their wings; their beaks are cut (w/o anesthesia) off to deter injuries to other hens. Male chicks, being of no use in an egg factory, are smothered or simply tossed into waste containers to die. Or they may be be ground up (alive) for animal feed.
3. The notion of "cage-free" eggs and "free-range" chickens is actually an agribusiness propaganda program dreamed up by the industry to make people feel ok about continuing to eat products that cause animal suffering.
For more information on how animal foods are obtained and processed, take a look at www.veganoutreach.org.
Posted by: magpie | August 14, 2008 3:44 PM
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RE: Abortion.
What's so troubling about pro-lifers is that they're not considering the child's life at all. They'd rather have a living, breathing, thinking, aware child born into a family/household that doesn't want him/her, that will abuse him/her, that doesn't have the funds for him/her...than to abort an embryo that cannot think and that isn't aware. Now THAT is perverse. Talk about hypocrisy!
Posted by: BB | August 14, 2008 2:21 PM
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Well written and well said. Bravo! Please keep writing about compassion for animals. And please remember to consider a plant-based diet.
Posted by: DD | August 14, 2008 2:16 PM
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Wouldn't it be wonderful if all Christians cut down their meat and dairy consumption by 95%?
Even if factory farming was banned in our country, the world still wouldn't be able to supply the resources for farm animals.
It's a matter of greed (Numbers 11).
Someday we will all be held accountable (Hebrews 4:13).
Jan
Catholic Concern for Animals-USA
God's Creatues Ministry
Posted by: Jan Fredericks, LPC, MA | August 14, 2008 2:12 PM
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---
Behold, The "13-FiATS OF THe NEW-SONG! Below:
“THE TEN (10 plus 3 alternates) FiATS Of The NEW-SONG” Of The “Holy Cosmic Feelers Faith“:
---
1) "Let there be NO Worship of JEALOUSY as a G-D.!"
2) "Let there be NO Abuse of LOVE to forgive UNCORRECTED-SIN(s)!"
3) "Let there be NO Hassling over a NAME for G-d!"
4) "Let there be NO Denial of FREEDOM OF {ECLAT{I}{ONiTY} or
Apocalyptarianity as Religion et al!"
5) "Let there be NO Dishonoring of HONORABLE Parents!"
6) "Let there be NO Unjustifiable HOMICIDE or HURTING!"
7) "Let there be NO Sex with Non-CONSENTERS or BEASTS!"
8) "Let there be NO Theft from NON-THIEVES or NON-USERERS!"
9) "Let there be NO False WITNESSING or Un-JUST Judging!"
10) "Let there be NO Envy of {HU} {MATES} or Folks keeping these FIATS of O.U.R.
NEW-SONG!"
-
11) “Let there be NO Denial of the TETRA-NEEDS (Food, Shelter, LOVE & Clothes) to
Any 'Hue{Mate}Kind} on Hol{i} Space-Ship Earth(s)!'
12) "Let there be NO Procrastination nor LAZYNESS nor Idleness & Sloth!"
13) “Let there Be NO Denial To Self Nor Others in contemplation of REALITY, aka Ye Holy Cosmic Miraculous “TRANS{FiNiTY} [immortal REALiTY]"
--- Soon soon, WE will un-seal the teachings on
How To Decode thee TEN FiATS OF THE NEW-SONG (+3 alternates) and related Teachings for TRANSFiNiTE-CiViLiZATiON & WORLD-PEACE via the American GRiDARiAN-DEMOCRACY-MOVEMENT!
---
PS: WE will win the TEMPLETON PRIZE, NOBLE PEACE PRIZE et al, in the Very Near Future! And We will share it with NEWSWEEK & Bloggers here!
Thank You for your TiME (via TEMP.) not clock nor space time imagination!
LiFE/Photons awarenes, is a Miracle & so BiRTH can never be, nor ever was any kinda a Suffering/Sin/Curseth/Moksha(stop Reincarnation) via man-made Pre-Apocalyptic Storys!
---
Goobye ALL, EVERY & ANY "NiCOLATAIN(s) competing for a Name for their-god, iNSTAED of O.U.R. G-D [innate] System!
Goodbye MECCA!
Goodbye JERUSALEM!
Goodriddence TiBET!
GoodRiddence NEPAL,
Goodbye ARMiSTAR!
Goodbye VATiCAN!
Goodbye CANTERBURRY!
Goodbye E.ORTHODOX's,
Goodbye HELLENiC's, Pagans, Wiccans, Witches, Shamnset, Voodooists et al!
Sir/Mams:
WELCOME. HELLO, ON-board the "HOly COsmic Feeler's FAith" [Ho-Co-Fe-Fa innate] SYSTEM ON O.U.R. Holy Cosmic Nebula-Built Space-Ship {Planet of man} EARTH of Many, awareness, as if Religion!
---
TRiViA: Did Ye Knowth that to Us ECLAT{i}-ON's, not OFF's, that We Worship the genuine Holy-Cosmic-CONSTiTUTiON & the LAWS OF "IT"s (Eclati, Almighty..) NATURE are O.U.R. [One Universal Religion] CLAUSE,
in order, not only to Know, then Predict & Control, but rather To ultimately Magnify, Make Honorable & Thus Uphold 'O.U.R.' True (opposite of MYTH-illogical thinkings) Ho-Co-Fe-Fa System
knowing that the 'Real END OF TiME's' will occur 2.5 to 3.5 Billion Years from Now! Especially, when we are inevitably destined to 'Merge' with OUR Sister Galaxy ANROMEDA!
Hence, LiFE/Photons is a Miracle & never is Birth Any un-kind of Pre-Apocalyptic as idf genuine god story(>1 competing deitys & Worlds)) instead of REALity G-D Story(1 Eclat+i)!
AMAZiNG (No Grace!).
Posted by: Here are the 13-Fiats of the APOCALYPTARiAN's NEW-SONG coming from O.U.R. Old-Song/Storys-NATiON | August 14, 2008 2:08 PM
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It seems to be characteristic of the modern age to turn everything into commodities and business enterprises. Even religion very often tends to go the same way. Even a business that causes human beings harm is allowed to be pursued on the grounds that it is good for the economy. Think of cigarettes and pornography for example.
Posted by: Anonymous | August 14, 2008 1:48 AM
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Animals who offer their lives and give us their flesh to become food for us need to be allowed to live a life that is worthy of their natural state as God created them. Yes, to move and live freely until they are slaughtered for our table is the least of the freedom human beings can grant the animals.
Eating only what we need for optimum health all our lives is one important change in lifestyle that is required, not just for one month as part of a protest action.
Abortion on demand of healthy unborn babies in the womb of healthy mothers, in the name of reproductive freedom, is an unutterable abomination. Yet how many who fight for animal rights readily support abortion on demand. The hypocrisy of it is shocking.
Posted by: Anonymous | August 13, 2008 10:28 PM
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The Bible also says to "treat others as you would like to be treated". Ask those who abuse animals if they would like to be treated that way!