Christian Vegetarian Association Blog - Are We Contributing to Violence with Our Food Choices?


	CVA BLOG

Are We Contributing to Violence with Our Food Choices?
January 27, 2014

Welcome to the weekly CVA blog! In it you will find famous quotes, news and commentaries.

Foods that Contribute to Violence

Famous Quote: Philip Wollen

It’s Time to Evolve

Bible Verse: 2 Timothy 1:7

Animals Deserve Dignity and Respect

This Week’s Video: Blitzen, Lawrence and Alexander's Welcome Home

1. Foods that Contribute to Violence

What and who we eat might be contributing to violence around the world. Products containing animal flesh, dairy, eggs, palm oil or GMO’s contribute to violence toward animals, people and the environment.

Please visit How Your Food Habits Contribute to Violence.

Whenever possible we should to our best to make choices that align with our innermost values and beliefs. Every day we have to make food choices and those choices are of paramount importance if we want to decrease violence in the world and contribute to bringing peace and restoration. Avoiding animal products, especially, and replacing them with compassionate plant-based foods have a huge impact on reducing violence in all of God’s Creation.

2. Famous Quote

"To the tortured animal, the only evidence of the existence of God is the absence of the torturer. In their cages, I would have little difficulty concluding that my jailer was living proof that God is deaf, blind, indifferent or dead. Standing in front of a torture chamber I realized the beast was outside the bars and I was two yards away from becoming an atheist."

~ Philip Wollen

3. It’s Time to Evolve

“Slaughtering animals for their meat is a socially-permissible ethical transgression”, says Bob Comis, farmer and writer. Comis raises pigs for food and agrees that he makes a living unethically, and that what he does to pigs is terribly wrong.

Please visit The importance of our evolution beyond killing for food.

Mr. Comis recognizes that there’s no need to kill animals to survive, and that killing them is unethical and terribly wrong. He tries to cause as little suffering to these creatures by raising them in the least abusive way he knows, but at the end, the pigs encounter a terrifying and painful death.

It’s time to evolve and to see that the practice of eating animals must end. It’s time for more peace, more joy, more health, more unity and more compassion.

4. Bible Verse

(RSV) 2 Timothy 1:7

“…for God did not give us a spirit of timidity but a spirit of power and love and self-control.”

As advocates of God’s Creation we need to gather strength to face the many difficulties arise when we are spreading a message of compassion. Our strength comes from our faith, which is rooted in the Faith of Christ. A faith that calls us to expose victimization and especially to be the voice of those who rely entirely on our capacity to show compassion.

5. Animals Deserve Dignity and Respect

Read this excellent New York Times’ op-ed in which the writer, Frank Bruni, examines the advances in ethics as far as non-human animals go. New laws, new documentaries, penalties for animal abusers, etc. and especially the increasing awareness that non-human animals are simply not different than us in the sense that they value their lives as much as we values ours, is pushing humans to recognize that we need to treat animals with dignity and respect. This simply cannot happen if we continue to use them for our benefit.

Please visit According Animals Dignity.

God’s animals raised for food only know misery and death. There’s no respect, no love and no dignity in the way they are treated. What we do to them, we do to ourselves, because we see misery, sickness, and devastation arising from it.

6. This Week’s Video: Blitzen, Lawrence and Alexander's Welcome Home

Videos about factory farming such as “Farm to Fridge” are very useful when trying to expose the victimization of God’s animals. However, it’s also useful when we help people view animals raised for food much like those animals called pets, because truly there’s no difference in their capacity to suffer, feel joy, or fear, etc. This short video about 3 male calves given a second chance at Farm Sanctuary is a very valuable tool when I give presentations at High Schools. After teenagers watch the video, I ask them: “What animals did these calves remind you of?” Invariably their answer is: “Our dogs!” Sometimes this is all it takes to start making the connection.

Please visit Blitzen, Lawrence and Alexander's Welcome Home.

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