"Agrippa said to Paul, ‘Are you so quickly persuading me to become a Christian?’ Paul replied, ‘Whether quickly or not, I pray to God that not only you but also all who are listening to me today might become such as I am—except for these chains.’" Acts 26:28-29
For the most part, Laura and I are pretty quiet about our decision to become vegetarians (which we both made in the same year, independently of one another--but that's another story.) We are not the type to get green in the face at the dinner table of a gracious host and say, "Do you have any idea what you're eating?" or some such rude comment. In fact, I find myself being asked about it at least twice or three times for every one time I volunteer information about it, and to my memory I have not once in sixteen years proactively changed the subject to that of my diet.
It's kind of like faith in a way--we're a little timid about it in the current cultural climate, where folks have plenty of other stuff to disagree about without our making it a huge issue. And, like sharing one's faith, it can also bring out a defensive strain in people, as if my life choice somehow invalidates or places me in judgment over yours. It doesn't. And to get the other unspoken question out of the way, we're also not doing it to annoy you.
With all that said, as my thinking about this issue has evolved over the years (I admit that in high school I more or less did it to impress hippie girls), what I've discovered is that there are some strong connections between this one simple choice and my faith. And like my faith, I do feel it's something I can share with others, so maybe they can derive some benefit from it too. In all honesty, I do happen to think the world would be a greener and more peaceful place if there were a few more vegetarians in it. So just in case you ever wondered, here are a few ethical and theological reasons why I choose not to eat meat.
1. It's a compassion thing.
Prior to high school, I didn't have much of any concept where my food came from. That's not uncommon; we tend not to think about it these days. I guess I just pictured the first ten minutes of The Wizard of Oz. A farm someplace, with a kindly flannel-clad old man and woman raising up happy cows, chickens and pigs, who will live a long, full life and meet a relatively painless death. You don't need to know much about farming in the 20th and 21st century to know that's a fantasy. We can choose not to think about it, but let's at least not deceive ourselves.
I don't intend to gross you out with gory details, but suffice it to say that life is not good for your average commercial livestock animal in America today--nor is it especially good for the laborers whose job it is to kill them. If the subject is of interest to you, Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation was a huge eye-opener for me, even though it came out ten years after I had already become a vegetarian.
Now, I have no problem with the basic principle that organisms need to kill and eat other organisms to survive. I've heard the snide, "oh, but why do you want to kill those poor, defenseless carrots?" comments plenty of times. But for anyone who believes in right and wrong, there comes a point where you have to acknowledge that like any resource, there's probably a right and wrong way to use it. And especially if said "resource" has basically the same central nervous system, pain receptors and fear response as human beings do, there's got to be a more compassionate way than growing it in a cage in close quarters with thousands of other animals, feeding it stuff it was never meant to ingest (including, occasionally, bone protein from its ground-up relatives), pumping it full of antibiotics, and shooting it in the head on an assembly line. It's hard to think of the God who made all creatures, called them "good," and commanded Adam to tend them, live among them and give them names, being totally and completely OK with meat production as it is today.
2. It's a stewardship thing.
I've also heard the hilarious joke when people point at my plate of healthy green veggies, grains and beans, and say, "That's not food. That's what food eats." Lolz. I'll give you a minute to stitch your sides back up and stop slapping your knee. Shall we go on?
That joke actually illustrates one of the best points in favor of vegetarianism from a creation stewardship standpoint. Did you know that almost half of all corn grown in the United States goes to livestock feed? Almost half. In a time when the climate is changing, droughts are getting longer and worse close to the equator, the amazon rainforest is being cut down at an alarming rate, and one in seven children on this planet is going to bed hungry. Kind of makes you wonder whether we couldn't make a major impact for the world God made, even if just one meal a day we "cut out the middle man" (or cow, as the case may be) and ate "what our food eats"?
3. It's an eschatological (thinking about God's future for us) thing.
A central tenet of all three Abrahamic faiths is that God has a plan for this universe. The creation is not static, nor are the sufferings of today indicative of what always was and will be. God's world is going someplace. And if God, who made, loves, and died to save this world, has anything to say about it, the place where this world is headed is going to be a more loving place than where we live now.
Nobody knows exactly what form God's future for us will take. As Christians, we believe that Jesus' resurrection is the first and dominant interpretive key for what eternal life will look like. It's all about resurrection. The creation we know, the bodies we know, the earth we cherish, only no longer fallen, but just as God originally intended. And the thing about God's original intent is, uh,
Adam and Eve were vegetarians.
Apparently, all humans were. Meat was mostly off limits until after the flood, at which point God had largely thrown up God's hands and given up on the idea of an ideal, harmonious creation. As a parent of 2 small children, I can definitely relate to this, remembering how uptight we were about every little detail of pregnancy/birthing/infant care with Maggie, and now with Soren, mostly calling it a win when he walks out the door with a diaper on. The way I read it, it was a concession to a fallen world. Now, I am not a Biblical literalist, so I can understand the argument that we have, in fact, evolved to be omnivores. But as any science-friendly Christian will also tell you...evolution does have a way of moving on, doesn't it?
So, about that garden. About that idyllic place where God placed the human beings to be in harmony with God's other creatures. About that healing tree of life, which if memory serves, actually doesn't serve bacon. About that peaceful kingdom where the wolf will lie down with the lamb. I think we can lean into that future. By the choices we make today, we can begin to live as though the kingdom has already come. And a vegetarian diet is only one of a hundred different ways to do that. If it's not for you, fine. You might try striving for peace and justice in all the earth, or forgiving others as much as you've been forgiven, or loving others as God loved us. Seems to me that not eating cow, pig and bird parts is quite a bit easier of a way to work on that, but hey, you're free in Christ, so knock yourself out. :-)
So that's where vegetarianism fits into my faith. But just as I could stand to be a much better Christian most days, I could also stand to be a much better vegetarian. I eat fish from time to time. I eat eggs and dairy, a LOT, even though much of what I just said applies to that stuff too. Hey, they're tasty, and they keep my kids from rioting most of the time. We're not Pharisees. We try the best we can, and often fall on our faces, just like everyone else. But even eating less meat is a step in the right direction, toward a greener, more peaceful future. So there it is, for what it's worth. It's not the 95 theses, but it's worth some discussion...maybe over a nice tofu roast?
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