Posted on 06/07/2010 12:07:51 PM PDT by Borges
Factory farming, green living among topics sparking discussion Animal advocates gain ground in religious circles
In Genesis, the Lord created animals, said they were good and then gave man permission to eat them.
While not a universal belief, many Christians traditionally have embraced a biblical stance on animals as a source of companionship, food and labor, but not much else.
"We know from the Bible that God created animals, he cares about them intimately and he wants us to care about them," said Ben DeVries, 30, of Kenosha, Wis., who started a blog, "Not One Sparrow," to encourage his conservative Christian brethren to become more like shepherds than hunters.
During a time when people increasingly treat pets as family members, animal advocates are gaining ground in religious circles. DeVries is among a growing number of people of faith who have joined the appeal for help in promoting causes such as relocating homeless pets, preventing animal cruelty and investigating factory farming practices.
The Humane Society of the United States has started a faith outreach program that, within the past two years, has distributed 7,500 DVDs at church and college campuses on "Eating Mercifully." The DVD and booklets draw on Scripture to remind Christians of their duty to be good stewards of all God's creatures.
But defining what it means to treat animals with compassion ranges wildly across faiths and within denominations. For some, it means trying to end animal abuse, volunteering at an animal shelter, having their pet blessed or pushing for vegetarian diets.
Others seek to fulfill spiritual needs that go beyond a simple desire to treat animals with dignity and kindness. Some religious leaders welcome pets to worship services, memorialize them at death and discuss them as spiritual beings without distinction from humanity — the most controversial ideology...
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
You demean animals.
Ping for later
They do indeed.
I have four cats, and my son’s cats is living in his room for the past few weeks, which makes five.
Ugh.
Thoughts?:
Ecclesiastes 3:19-20 (New International Version)
Man’s fate is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breat ; man has no advantage over the animal. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.
“Dogs have masters, cats have staff.” Sorry—couldn’t resist. BTW, I am staff to two cats. :)
Ecclesiastes is written from the tongue-in-cheek perspective of an atheist to show that if there is no God, then life is empty and without meaning.
Ecclesiastes is full of existentialism. The viewpoint is that of looking at the world WITHOUT the Spirit of God. From that viewpoint, the constant refrain of “everything is meaningless” is correct.
Ok. What about this:
The Book of Job: “Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of the Lord hath wrought this? In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind.” (Job 12:9-10 KJV)
Still, "evangelicals care deeply for the way animals are treated but that doesn't mean we worship animals or put them in front of human beings," Cook said. "If it's a choice between saving Granny and saving my poodle in the fire, Granny wins every time."Hhhhmmm, how old is granny; how old is the dog? So many questions coming up under Obamacare.
Indeed, if we could always be as supportive of each other as our hounds are to us, earth would be a lot more like heaven --From Tilly to eternity: the death of the family dog.
Threads like this always make me hungry...
How do you view this?
“Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.” (Romans 8:21-22 KJV)
This refers to the “new Heavens and Earth” which will be a reality of the coming world where sin is not a factor.
Well, heaven just can’t be heaven without my departed felines. It just couldn’t be. I mean, man sinned against God. Animals didn’t. This breaks my heart.
Yeah, man sinned. Animals can't becuase they don't have souls. But men who enter Heaven won't have any sin left because they will have embraced the remedy.
People have had a friend in dogs for an estimated 30,000 years. So maybe we can return the favor.
Many mammals share a gene called FOXP2. But humans have a very unique, mutated form of this gene. It contributes much to our ability to speak in a complex way.
Scientists put this snippet into the embryos of mice, and were quite startled by the result: “chatty” mice. Not only did the mice chatter at each other a lot, but they had a greater vocal range than did normal mice.
It is believed that a smart dog can understand about 300 human words. Imagine if a dog could speak, with context, even a dozen words? Our whole relationship would change.
Imagine our joy when our dog could tell us just a few, critical things. Perhaps just some distinct one-syllable word contractions, but in context.
Just if they could tell us when they were in pain, we could take much suffering out of their lives.
Yet at the same time, their lifespan is short, so we could have the heartbreaking experience of saying goodbye to them, and they to us.
But animals are not people. While I don't think we should ever be unnecessarily cruel to an animal, I absolutely do not agree with the "vegans" and "save the horned owl, kill a baby" crowd that are trying to infiltrate churches.
Yes, our bodies go to dust, just like the bodies of animals. But also in Ecclesiastes 12:7 "and the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it."
Only man has a spirit given by God (as witnessed in Genesis where God breathes life into man, but does not do so with other creations).
Most would say the soul and spirit are different things.
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