Christ became one with mankind....and animals?

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Did Christ become one with mankind, and nature? I have asked my friend with a green thumb this question, and it has been on my mind.
Jesus Christ is true God and true Man. He is not God and Man and Animal.
 
Interesting responses. My thoughts are that all of mankind is part of the cosmos, but has a dignity greater than other created things. After all, it wasn’t the animal kingdom who participated in the “happy fault” (St. Augustine of Hyppo), which gained our Redemption, but man’s great evil which God permitted for a greater eternal good: our Salvation.

On the other hand, if the human race has a dignity equal to that of the cosmos, it would logically follow that using trees for firewood, for example, would be a grave sin. After all, trees are a living organism. The same would follow for butchering cows and other livestalk for our nourishment, for the natural moral law would dictate that the ends do not justify the means. You cannot committ an evil for a good to come out of it because that is contrary to God’s nature, and everything that flows from it.

No, it must be that human beings have an intrinsic dignity above all other created things and because of this, we have an awesome responsibility to be good stewards towards the rest of creation, not cruel masters or careless caretakers.
 
youtube.com/watch?v=nK5uPBF-s5Y&feature=channel_page

This is what we should all be about, I think. God is love and this demonstrates that love.
Awww…look at the fuzzy widdle kitties! Anyway, this proves that we have an awesome responsibility, as persons with rational souls, to protect and uphold our neighbors dignity in all aspects of natural life, as well as other lesser creatures, which are also created by God. For if animals have the capacity to protect one another, how much infinitly more should we, being made in God’s image…
 
No, it must be that human beings have an intrinsic dignity above all other created things and because of this, we have an awesome responsibility to be good stewards towards the rest of creation, not cruel masters or careless caretakers.
Well said. And completely right, I think. There is a distinction between most living things, and those for which suffering is a reality. Many animals suffer pain, terror, and grief. We should always remember that our stewardship extends to care of God’s created animals. If God loves His creation, He surely is not pleased with those who cause unnecessary suffering.
 
Christ called Himself the Good Shepherd…that must mean he felt that people and animals had something in common

He rode on a donkey…he talked about the birds being fed by the Providence of God…I think he must have liked animals a bit

FWIW, the shepherd metaphor is equally likely to be taken from the way in which kingship had formerly been described. The “good shepherd” passage occurs in John 10, & that gospel contains several references to the kingship of Jesus. What people so often miss is that the riding on a donkey is an implicit statement of kingship - see 1 Kings 1.34 🙂

 
The Popes don’t make doctrine. The Church discovers them in the revelation of Christ. According to the Church all things alive have a soul. The soul is the animating principle of a living being.

Angels don’t. Anything that is both corporeal & living, does.​

 
That is a reasonable but staggeringly broad definition of the word soul and one that most people would have problems with. Few Christians would equate the same word that refers to our immortal being for which Christ died as the same type of entity that animates a flower.

I’m not arguing that this is what the Church says or even that that is one definition of the word soul. I’m just saying it does little to enlighten this discussion.

George

All men have souls that are self-aware, but not all souls are endowed with self-awareness. There is more than one kind of soul - it’s egotistic of man to fancy that he alone he has a soul, merely because he alone is said in Genesis to have one. The essential characteristic of a soul is life, not self-awareness - & grass, monkeys, & amoeba are certainly alive. 🙂

 
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