Weekly Newsletter from Christian Vegetarian Association CVA - December 15, 2017
From Christian Vegetarian Association (CVA)

  1. Annual Appeal for Support
  2. The Dec. – Jan. Issue of “The Peaceable Table” Is Now Online
  3. Original Sin, part 18
  4. This Week’s Sermon from Rev. Frank and Mary Hoffman

1. Annual Appeal for Support

The CVA relies on its supporters to print and distribute booklets for leafleting and all other aspects of its ministry. To donate, please go to www.christianveg.org/materials.htm 

2. The Dec. – Jan. Issue of “The Peaceable Table” Is Now Online

Contents include:

  • Free: Subscriber L. Miles Standish is offering gift packages containing The China Study, Cowspiracy, and What the Health. If you haven't seen any one or all of the three, contact him online or by snail mail.
  • In the Unset Gem, Albert Schweitzer cites the (Johannine) Good Shepherd passage to assure us that the more we have reverence for physical life, the more we will revere the life of the soul.
  • Both Ireland and Italy have committed to abolishing wild animal acts. See this NewsNote.
  • The Did You Miss This One book review sketches and highly recommends Rynn Berry's short book Hitler: Neither Vegetarian nor Animal Lover.
  • Try a Recipe for a luscious holyday main dish that tastes rather like a dessert - the Sweet Potato Pineapple Casserole.
  • This month's Poetry selection, "The Oxen" by Thomas Hardy, depicts the folk idea of the stable animals kneeling at midnight on Christmas Eve to reverence the birth of the Holy Child. The narrator longs to believe that it is true.

We welcome submissions, including poetry and pictures, for future issues.

To read this issue, visit http://www.vegetarianfriends.net/issue142.html  .

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah!

Gracia Fay Ellwood, Editor

3. Original Sin, part 18

Last week, I discussed attractions of participating in the scapegoating process. I think renouncing it can be far more beneficial.

The scapegoating process makes all of us vulnerable to the scapegoating mob. Just about everyone belongs to one or more groups that have been victims of communal violence, including groups based on ethnicity, nation of origin, gender (more often female but sometimes male), sexual identity or orientation, and economic class. And, when it comes to nonhumans, all but a lucky small minority have been treated horrendously by human communities. We would all be safer if society-at-large rejected scapegoating.

Some people seem to believe that as long as their own group is not targeted by the scapegoating process, they should have few concerns. However, it is easy to shift blame from one group to another. For example, shortly after the mob hailed Jesus as their savior, it called for his execution.

Public sentiment can readily change, and today’s evildoers can be tomorrow’s unfortunate victims or heroes. Alternatively, the victims of scapegoating can be banished or killed. Either way, the mob will need new victims as long as the scapegoating process remains intact. Therefore, undermining the scapegoating process protects us and those we care about.

Stephen R. Kaufman, M.D.

4. This Week’s Sermon from Rev. Frank and Mary Hoffman

Repentant Heavenly Lifestyles

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