Cyndi's Two Cents
Keep anti-meat preaching out of my church
When Jim and I moved to Missouri more than a decade ago, we visited several churches until we found the one best suited to our spiritual needs. It was a balmy spring morning when we attended a church in one of the small towns near our home. That April morning was also the first day for a new pastor at the church. Within the first few minutes of his self-introduction to the congregation, he stated that he and his wife are vegetarians.
I couldn’t care less whether or not he and his wife eat meat, but to share it from the pulpit was wrong. He told us he didn’t eat meat before he told us he was the father of 3 daughters. “A life choice,” he called it, declaring his love for animals.
Needless to say, my husband and I did not go back to that church. Within 3 months, that church, whose membership is rural and agricultural-based, was looking for a new pastor. Coincidence? I think not.
It really ticks me off when people use religion to further their political agenda.
In 2011, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) organized a meeting with a group of faith leaders to call attention to animal welfare. Last week, HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle stood beside faith leaders to announce the launch of Every Living Thing, a national campaign to engage the Evangelical community on animal protection issues.
I am a huge proponent of treating animals humanely. We should all do it right on our farms every day. The problem is that people who do not eat meat are likely to have a skewed view on what animal welfare means to most of us who are stewards of our livestock. People with absolutely no experience or education in animal agriculture or animal husbandry have no business preaching to people in the pews about how we should care for our livestock.
The Every Living Thing initiative was launched with the announcement of a statement, signed by top Evangelical scholars and pastors. The statement cites numerous passages from the Bible related to the protection and preservation of all animals created by God. The statement does not take a position on policy nor does it call for us to stop eating meat. However, a pastor in the accompanying video on the website said in no uncertain terms that if we are going to live as Jesus wants us to live, we should not eat meat.
“I don’t eat meat,” he said. “Paul says in Romans 14 that some people have a conviction against eating meat and some people don’t and that we have to just respect each other. But there are principles to live by. The principle is that we are to care for the earth and the animal kingdom. To be a disciple is to be one who is disciplined, right? So to be a disciple of Jesus means that you are willing to give up some conveniences if it will bring your life more in alignment with God’s ideal.”
HSUS has led, with great success many times, efforts to change farming practices. The plan with this initiative is to appeal to Evangelical leaders and others across the country to sign the statement and, according to one of the authors, get Christians to think differently about animals.
Please talk to your pastor and your church board. Help them understand that people who don’t eat meat and don’t want you to eat meat should not tell you how to raise livestock.
The HSUS has been on this Jesus as a vegetarian thing for a while. It is theologically incorrect.
If you are an orthodox (small “o”) Christian, you believe that Jesus Christ is the Second Person of the Trinity, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit always was, is, and always will be. He became incarnate – that, is, he humbled himself to become man, with the true nature of man having a body and soul, yet never giving up his Divine nature. Kind of a mind boggler, but a Holy Mystery that boils down to this – Jesus faced all the same choices, dilemmas, and needs as all of us, but he always chose the right thing. One of those “right things” was obedience and observance of the Jewish laws. In fact, Christians believe that Jesus’ fulfillment of the law allowed him to be the sacrifice that saved others as he would by definition be paying for others’ sins as he himself was without sin.
Part of fulfilling Jewish law was observing Passover (as Jesus would have done many times, most famously, however, at the Last Supper). Central to the celebration of the Passover was the sacrifice of an unblemished lamb, and the eating of its roasted flesh. Ergo, Jesus was not a vegetarian.