From: abulsari@aton.abo.fi (A. Bulsari)
Subject: The Christian argument for vegetarianism
Organization: Abo Akademi University
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 14:01:39 GMT


From: Michael Traub <traub@btcs.bt.co.uk>

          The Christian Argument for Vegetarianism


Excerpted from the book:
Christianity and the Rights of Animals, (Crossroad Publ. Co., NY)

by

Rev. Dr. Andrew Linzey
Director of Studies
Center for the Study of Theology
University of Essex


   It is well known that during the last thirty years or more, farmers
have  been  under  increasing pressure  to  tailor traditional farming
methods to  the needs of  cost-effective production.   Farming animals
intensively has become the norm.
   It seems to me the only  satisfactory basis on  which we can oppose
systems of close confinement is by recourse to the argument drawn from
theos-rights.  To put it at  its most basic: animals have the right to
be animals.  The natural life of  a Spirit-filled creature is  a  gift
from God.  When we take over the life  of  an animal to the  extent of
distorting its natural life for no other purpose than our own gain, we
fall into  sin.   There  is no clearer blasphemy before  God than  the
perversion of his creatures.
   To  the question: 'Why is it wrong to deny chickens the rudimentary
requirements  of their natural life, such  as  freedom of  movement or
association?' there is, therefore, only one satisfactory answer: Since
an animal's natural  life is a gift from  God,  it follows that  God's
right is violated when the natural life of his creatures is perverted.
Those  who, in  contrast,  opt for the welfarist approach to intensive
farming are inevitably involved  in speculating how far  such and such
may or may not suffer  in  what are plainly unnatural conditions.  But
unless animals are judged  to have some right to  their natural  life,
from  what standpoint  can  we  judge  abnormalities,  mutilations  or
adjustments?  Confining a de-beaked hen in a battery cage is more than
a moral  crime;  it is a living sign of our failure  to  recognize the
blessing of God in creation.
   What  makes  this  situation  all  the   more  lamentable  is   the
realization that the use to which animals are put in intensive farming
goes  far  beyond  even the most generous interpretation  of need.  It
will  be  obvious  that  humans  can  live  healthy,  stimulating  and
rewarding  lives  without  white  veal,  pate' de  foie  gras,  or the
ever-increasing  quantities of cheap eggs.  The  truth is that we  can
afford to be much more generous to farm animals than is frequently the
case today.
   Churches  need  to reflect  in their  own  collective  actions  the
sensitivity they frequently hope for in  others.   [In England], under
present legislation, animals can be  subject to  intensive farming and
are so on Church  land.  It  is  anomalous that the  Church of England
should   allow  on  its  land  farming  practices  which  many  senior
ecclesiastics oppose  and  which  one bishop  recently  likened  to an
Auschwitz for animals.
   The Christian  argument for  vegetarianism  then  is simple:  since
animals belong to God, have value to God and live  for God, then their
needless destruction is sinful.  In short: animals have some right  to
their  life,  all  circumstances  being  equal.   That  it  has  taken
Christians  so long  to grasp  this  need not  worry  us.  There  were
doubtless good reasons, partly theological, partly cultural and partly
economic,  why  Christians   in  the  past  have  found  vegetarianism
unfeasible.   We  do  well not  to judge too hastily,  if  at all.  We
cannot  relive others' lives, or think their thoughts, or  enter their
consciences.   But what we can  be  sure about  is that living without
what Clark calls "avoidable ill" has a strong moral claim upon us now.
   Some  will surely question the limits of the  vegetarian world here
envisaged.   Will  large-scale  vegetarianism  work  in  practice?   I
confess I am agnostic, surely legitimately, about the possibility of a
world-transforming  vegetarianism.    But   clairvoyance  is  not   an
essential prerequisite of the  vegetarian option,  and what the future
may hold, and its  consequences, cannot easily be determined from  any
perspective.  What I think  is important to hold  on to  is the notion
that the  God  who provides  moral  opportunities is  the same God who
enables  the world, slowly  but  surely,  to respond to them.  >From a
theological perspective, no  moral endeavor is wasted  so  long as  it
coheres with God's purpose for his cosmos.


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