Thanks everyone for your thoughts from yesterday. Here are some of my thoughts (in no particular order) on this subject keeping in mind that I could be wrong!
We should speak more publicly in our assemblies regarding proper stewardship of God’s creation. I’m guessing this would even extend to our practices in other areas.
Cruelty to animals should never be tolerated. I agree with Thomas Aquinas that cruelty to animals often leads to cruelty to humans.
I believe that human beings are the crowning glory of God’s creation. Like the Sabbath, I believe that animals were made for human beings. God did not make human beings for animals.
Animals were given as companions, meat of animals was given for food, skins of animals were given for clothes. A suitable helper for man was not found within the animal kingdom thus woman was created.
Man was given authority and dominion to rule over the animals but never to be cruel.
I believe that God, alone, is to be worshiped and not his Creation. This is, in my opinion, part of the context of Romans chapter 1.
I don’t believe our pets will be in heaven. Though I am quite okay if they are. Animals do not have spirits or souls. The Bible teaches that we will be changed to enter into heaven from physical to spiritual. The perishable to the imperishable. If God does the same things for animals I can’t find it in the Bible.
Within the animal kingdom, God created and designated some clean and unclean. There is clear evidence that God created animals for various purposes even for sacrifices.
I worry that the discussion of “animal rights” and notions of a “moral standing” of animals are in themselves seeds of new age, eastern philosophies of veiled animal worship.
I strongly believe that have a responsibility as Christians to honor and treat animals humanely. However, it is an abdication of our responsibility to humanity when the needs of animals are placed above the needs of people. There is something wrong when a society has harsher, stricter penalties for mis-treating an animal than it does for mis-treating a human being. We have laws which protect the eggs of “endangered species” animals and no laws which protect un-born babies.
It is not wrong to have a heart or concern for “all of God’s creatures great and small” this is a sign of spiritual sensitivity and compassion for those beneath us. God does care for even the smallest of birds (Matthew 6:26) but the point is how much more God cares for people.
I don’t know how to respond to factory farming. It’s inhumane, it’s cruel, it’s the ugly side of dominion. I respect those who take stands to boycott places which rely upon these institutions for product. Whether or not one person can make a difference is not really the issue. I believe the issue is staying true to your convictions and coming before God with a clean conscience.
I don’t know how to respond to “sport” hunting because I am not a hunter. I do have a personal interest in the fishing side of the discussion because I love to fish. I practice catch-and-release and am happy to eat my Salmon from the great waters of Costco.
You could probably make a case that the disciples who were fisherman used the latest available technology to catch large quantities of fish - even divine intervention.
As far as Jesus being a vegetarian today? He ate fish and lamb with his followers.
I have friends who have such a heart for and a way with pets. This is a good example for us all.
It’s okay to have a pet. To love our pets and treat our pets with kindness and affection is the good side of dominion. They play a valuable role in our hearts and in our families. I agree with those of you who have said we need to remain balanced. Interesting how most of our problems in life result from excess and lack – in other words - imbalance.
Thanks for wading through this with me. I know it has been a messy series of disconnected thoughts. And as I said in the beginning, I could be wrong.
I’m on my way to look for a car, perhaps my next post should relate to the moral standing of car dealerships?
9 Responses to “The Moral Standing of Animals (Part 2)”
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May 18th, 2005 at 10:07 am
I can’t disagree with any of your thoughts.
On the human and slightly silly side, I can’t help holding out hope that He will have some surprises for us, and if it’s necessary, in His infinite caring and wisdom, for our eternal happiness for our pets to be in Heaven, they will be there!
May 18th, 2005 at 10:10 am
I can’t disagree with any of your thoughts.
On the human and slightly silly side, I can’t help holding out hope that He will have some surprises for us, and if it’s necessary, in His infinite caring and wisdom, for our eternal happiness for our pets to be in Heaven, they will be there!
May 18th, 2005 at 10:14 am
Sorry for the duplicate comments. I’m new at this thing, and I don’t know what happened. Tried to delete one, but it didn’t work……
May 18th, 2005 at 11:23 am
I think it’s good to think about these issues we don’t discuss much. And I think you can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat their pets. And that goes all the way from the guy who kicks his dog to the lady that knits sweaters for hers.
“The Morality of Car Dealerships” on the other hand, might just be an oxymoron.
May 18th, 2005 at 11:28 am
Interesting thoughts. I don’t think, however, one can use the concept of morality and car dealerships in the same context.
Actually, I’ve bought four cars from the same dealership in the last 12 years. The general sales manager is a former deacon at our church and now an elder at a sister congregation and he always treats us with honesty and integrity. That, and he lets us have the cars at his price … but hey, somebody has to get a break at dealerships!
May 19th, 2005 at 11:17 pm
I agree with the tenor and content of Randy’s thoughts. Our Godliness in principle should restrict us from any cruelty or other such behavior regarding animals.
May 20th, 2005 at 11:51 am
The first Passover lamb was to live with the family that put the lamb’s blood on the front door.
In contemplating this, I’m convinced God intended for the killing of that lamb to be difficult. After all, it would have been at least living with the family if not part of the family. This doesn’t mean that I view animals only as object lessons.
But, it does give insight into the fury that Jesus wrought upon the merchants in the temple square. An industry had emerged that took the sacrifice out of sacrifice. Maybe that was a factor in God’s revelation to Isaiah that He had grown weary of Israel’s offerings.
Boy, did I get off the subject or what.
June 5th, 2005 at 8:56 pm
Randy, thank you so much for slogging through Matthew Scully’s “Dominion” and having the courage to take on this controversial issue. While God did give Adam & Eve dominion (Gen 1:26), in the very next breath (Gen 1:29) he commanded a vegetarian diet — recognizing that man would distort and abuse that power without limits. Only after the flood, perhaps as a consession to man’s hard-heartedness, did God allow him to eat animals. (You can imagine it was in the same spirit that he allowed divorce.) Animals are here for God’s glory, not ours — he gave us the big brains and thus responsibility to take care of them. But, as in the parabel of the talents, he’ll hold us accountable.
June 5th, 2005 at 9:12 pm
As far as paying lip service to being concerned about the institutionalized abuses of factory farming, consumer product testing, or circuses, for that matter, Christians fall into the trap of moral relativism if they acknowledge that it’s wrong, but don’t back that truth with action. If it’s wrong to beat my dog, then it’s wrong to beat a pig. We do have alternatives; we can pay the higher price for the free-range eggs or “certified humane” meat or cruelty-free laundry detergent. Our choices do have an impact on the marketplace. More importantly, the impact of our choices on our souls makes an eternal difference in the eyes of God. With information available on the internet (meetyourmeat.com, circuses.com, etc.) nobody can claim ignorance to these profane practices that are an obscenity to God. To paraphrase CS Lewis, God doesn’t like intellectual slackers any more than he likes any other type of slacker.