Weekly Newsletter from Christian Vegetarian Association CVA - June 19, 2017
From Christian Vegetarian Association (CVA)

  1. Original Sin, part 40: Love as a Source of Meaning
  2. The July Issue of “The Peaceable Table” Is Now Online
  3. This Week’s Sermon from Rev. Frank and Mary Hoffman

1. Original Sin, part 40: Love as a Source of Meaning

Last week, I noted that Viktor Frankl, in his book Man’s Search for Meaning, found hope and meaning through love, despite the extreme deprivations of the concentration camp. Here’s what he recalled:

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth – that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way – an honorable way – in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory . . .”

I’d like to comment, first, that Frankl’s thoughts apply to women as much as men. “Man” was widely used at the time of his writing as generic for “human,” and it is good that this is no longer the case. Second, just as the angels are enraptured by “infinite glory,” the love Frankl describes does not need to be directed at a single person. The love can have a universal quality, which is what I will consider next week.

Stephen R. Kaufman, MD

2. The July Issue of “The Peaceable Table” Is Now Online

Contents include:

  • The Glimpse of the Peaceable Kingdom features an orphaned bunny who was rescued by a farm family in Yorkshare, UK. Seeing the pathetic creature on the sofa, the family's lactating companion cat picked him up and carried him to her "nursery" to join two new siblings.
  • One of the July Unset Gems, by theologian Elizabeth Farians, manages to elicit a chuckle as it encourages the reader to stop eating animals - the perfect bumper sticker message.
  • In this month's NewsNote, a beautiful scene on Sumburgh Head, a spur at the tip of Shetland, hides an environmental tragedy.
  • Robert Ellwood Reviews the entertaining Seafurrers: Ships' Cats Who Lapped and Mapped the World, by Philippa Sandall. For good measure, Robert adds a story Ms. Sandall omits: that of "Unsinkable Sam," who survived no fewer than three ships' sinkings.
  • Enjoy the Vegetable Nut Loaf, a Recipe taken from two Jewish veg cookbooks.

To check out this issue, go to http://www.vegetarianfriends.net/issue148.html 

Toward the Peaceable Kingdom,
Gracia Fay Ellwood, Editor

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

True Salvation Includes Veganism

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