Why I am a Catholic vegan

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Good heavens, you list PETA as a resource? Sorry, but your credibility suffers when you provide links to an organization that sees no difference between gassing Jews and butchering chickens.

I grew up partly on a farm, with beef cattle, pigs, meat and egg chickens, turkeys, the works. All of our animals were well taken care of, and it is silly and anthropomorphic to decide, “Oh, those poor cattle. They would rather wander the open range free, FREE, then eat grain out of a feeder.” What utter bosh, and utter silly sentimentality. I’m against animal cruelty, of course, and think that stewardship requires humane and respectful treatment of animals, but PETA? Puh-leeze…

I’m not a vegetarian or a vegan, and it’s not likely that I’ll become one unless I develop some health condition that would mandate such a diet. However, if folks out there want to be vegans or vegetarians, that’s fine with me. Just don’t claim that it’s a morally superior position to hold.
 
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Sherlock:
I grew up partly on a farm, with beef cattle, pigs, meat and egg chickens, turkeys, the works. All of our animals were well taken care of, and it is silly and anthropomorphic to decide, “Oh, those poor cattle. They would rather wander the open range free, FREE, then eat grain out of a feeder.” What utter bosh, and utter silly sentimentality. I’m against animal cruelty, of course, and think that stewardship requires humane and respectful treatment of animals, but PETA? Puh-leeze…
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Obviously you have not seen the movie “Chicken Run”. It is quite clear that chickens wish to escape this mundane farm life and be free. Free to fly and sing and dance and make merry with their friends. You might say chickens don’t do this, but watch this documentary – it’s a real eye-opener which exposes the evil motives of farmers that seek to keep chickens in bondage, and yes, even kill them for the almighty dollar. It is animated so as to reduce the graphic violence and so you can share this important story with your children, which I encourage you to do. Also, since we do not have as sophisticated a language as the chickens, concerned human actors, including Mel Gibson, have lent their voices so all of us can become more educated on this serious issue.

(Uh, by the way, this was all tongue-in-cheek.)
 
Karl Keating:
I find vegetarians and vegans to be inconsistent in their principles and inconsiderate in their practices. The chief problem is that, while both disapprove of killing animals, they approve of killing plants.

From Catholic theology we know that man, animals, and plants all have souls. Man’s soul is a spirit and therefore is immortal. The souls of animals and plants, as St. Thomas Aquinas noted, are material principles. They die when the animals and plants die.

…

I don’t think it’s right to kill either animals or plants.

…

Since I’m against killing animals and plants…
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Karl,

I heartily disagree with your theology of soul that animals and plants have souls.

God-breathed into dust-formed figure had turned into a man. I have read somewhere that scientists put dying human on the weigh-scale bed and when person dies. Very very little weight came off from human being… compared with dying animal on same weigh-scale bed and none of its weight came off. It was assuming that soul have some weight.

Here’s website you can look at snopes.com/religion/soulweight.asp

Interesting but I know we shouldn’t base theology on this.

However, I believe that God allows Adam and Eve to eat any fruits in the garden except the forbidden tree. Once Adam and Eve got caught eating the forbidden fruit… God killed animal and gave them animal skins for their clothing. Then is God wrong on killing animals and plants for two purposes (eating and clothing)?

Throughout the O.T. history shows that Jews can eat any meat except for split-hooved animals such as pork, boar, etc.

Or calling O.T. animal sacrifices to Almighty God as victimization of animals?

Only thing is that I don’t support in torturing or abusing animals, only make their death to be cleanly sudden.

I can’t imagine my life without delicious animals. 😉

Mike
 
Milimac,

Sure, sure, I saw the documentary “Chicken Run”, but I saw it for what it really was—blatant propoganda from the enviro-anarchist syndicate.You obviously fell for it hook, line and sinker. Oh yeah, the documentary purports to show the nefarious schemes of a certain “Mrs. Tweedy”, but any Internet search will show you that in reality she is Ms. Leghorn—far from being an evil CEO, she is in fact an actress/activist employed by PETA. Get real, Milimac: “Chicken Run” was no “documentary”, but an entirely ficticious hatchet job run against the poor chicken farmers of this country. Oh, and if you can handle the truth (I doubt you can…) take a closer look at “Mr. Rocky”, the “Lone Free Ranger”: in real life he has been implicated in many terrorist attacks in rural areas, most notably the infamous Milk Truck Bombing that paralyzed Blooming Prairie, Indiana.

Wake, up, Milimac.
 
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Sherlock:
Milimac,

Sure, sure, I saw the documentary “Chicken Run”, but I saw it for what it really was—blatant propoganda from the enviro-anarchist syndicate.You obviously fell for it hook, line and sinker. Oh yeah, the documentary purports to show the nefarious schemes of a certain “Mrs. Tweedy”, but any Internet search will show you that in reality she is Ms. Leghorn—far from being an evil CEO, she is in fact an actress/activist employed by PETA. Get real, Milimac: “Chicken Run” was no “documentary”, but an entirely ficticious hatchet job run against the poor chicken farmers of this country. Oh, and if you can handle the truth (I doubt you can…) take a closer look at “Mr. Rocky”, the “Lone Free Ranger”: in real life he has been implicated in many terrorist attacks in rural areas, most notably the infamous Milk Truck Bombing that paralyzed Blooming Prairie, Indiana.

Wake, up, Milimac.
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Oh, yeah?! Oh yeah!!! Just for that, I’m switching to the dreaded ALL-CAPS MODE WITH EXTRA PUNCTUATION AND NO PARAGRAPH BREAKS!!! CAN YOU READ THIS POST NOW WITHOUT YOUR EYES GLAZING OVER (I DOUBT YOU CAN…). I DIDN’T SEE “LONE FREE RANGER” BUT I’M SURE MR. ROCKY DID WHAT HE HAD TO DO TO DEFEND CHICKENKIND, IF IN FACT HE REALLY DID DO WHAT YOU CLAIM!!! I FIND NO MENTION OF THE MILK TRUCK BOMBING INCIDENT ON ANY NEWS SOURCE ON THE INTERNET OTHER THAN CBS. WHY DO YOU FARMERS HAVE TO TERRORIZE THE POOR CHICKENS WHO JUST WANT TO LIVE IN PEACE, PRACTICE YOGA, SING SONGS, AND DO THE CHICKEN DANCE!!!

GET, A, CLUE SHERLOCK!!!

By the way, I think you replied to the wrong post when you replied last time, which will probably only further the confusion of those stumbling upon these posts.
 
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EricCKS:
If animals are mistreated they do not produce as much thus affecting the bottom line decreasing $$. If they were not comfortable and afforded ample feed and medication they would not produce.
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Not true, Eric. Bovine growth hormone is given to cows to make them produce large quantities of milk even if they are not comfortable, and many animals receive antibiotics routinely to keep them from getting sick in over-crowded conditions.

Chickens and turkeys are bred to have minimal wings so they can’t fly, and their beaks are cut off so they can’t peck each other to death in their stressful, packed-in conditions, where they’re fed hormones to make them grow quickly.

And don’t get me started on veal calves.

Humans are very good at figuring out how to exploit animals for profit. I don’t think that’s what God meant when he gave man dominion over the creatures.

Tricia Frances
 
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triciafrancess:
Humans are very good at figuring out how to exploit animals for profit. I don’t think that’s what God meant when he gave man dominion over the creatures.
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People generally still have this romantic notion of farmers with big red barns and cows and chickens and pigs living out of doors and roaming around in big green fields. Today such farms are far and few between, and the overwhelming majority of meat consumed by Americans (especially poultry and pork) come from corporate, warehouse-style farms where the health of the animals is not a concern except insofar as the animal is kept alive just long enough to be slaughtered.

Not only are the conditions in these farms undeniably cruel, but also the sheer foolishness of them in terms of environmental impact and the risks of food contamination are quite real. If people thought mad cow disease was a pain, just wait until we get mad hog disease from feeding corporate-farm pigs rendered pork mixed in with their feed.

Again, for a conservative Christian perspective on vegetarianism and animal treatment, please see Dominion by Matthew Scully.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
Milimac,

I will address your lies (LIES!!) later…

I wanted to address (seriously) this statement by triciafrancess regarding chickens: “and their beaks are cut off so they can’t peck each other to death in their stressful, packed-in conditions”. Have you ever raised chickens, triciafrancess? I have (in fact I have a few pet chickens now), and was raised partly on a farm where we raised, among other things, chickens for meat and for eggs. No, chickens’ beaks aren’t “cut off”—the tip of the top mandible is cut. This is done because cannibalism in chickens is a problem, and despite your claim it is NOT confined to chickens raised in “packed-in conditions” or who are given an inadequate diet. We raised free-range chickens who had a whole farmyard to wander in (no fences at all), no crowding whatsoever, who had green stuff and insects available in addition to balanced nutrition from prepared chicken mashes, and still cannibalism could be a problem if the beaks weren’t trimmed. Once a chicken develops a sore (from pecking order squabbles), other chickens will sometimes pick on that spot and if allowed to continue will dominate and ultimately kill that chicken. It ain’t pretty, triciafrancess, which is why trimming the upper mandible is a humane practice.
 
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mlchance:
People generally still have this romantic notion of farmers with big red barns and cows and chickens and pigs living out of doors and roaming around in big green fields.
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I don’t know… around these parts farms look pretty much like you describe them. They probably aren’t all perfect, but I don’t think they sink to the level you propose either. Most of the farmers I know have their hearts in the right place. Their animals are their livelihood. They don’t keep them in the house with them, but they don’t abuse them either.

It’s awful easy to generalize…

Besides, if God did not intend man to eat animals, why did He make them out of meat?
 
Mlchance,

You wrote: “People generally still have this romantic notion of farmers with big red barns and cows and chickens and pigs living out of doors and roaming around in big green fields. Today such farms are far and few between…”

I have to echo what OhioBob wrote—here in Minnesota, most of the farms look a lot as you describe, with the exception that white seems to be a more common color than red, and of course pole barns are replacing the beautiful old wooden ones as the latter age or are damaged by weather. Actually, the same is true of the rural areas of Wisconsin and Iowa that I’m very familiar with, and even with South Dakota, though the further one goes West in that state the more arid it becomes, so the farms become, by necessity, large ranches due to the pasture requirements of the cattle. I have seen animals well-taken care of on farms all over this country, in Texas, Utah, Kansas… I travel the rural areas a great deal as I am (oh, horror of horrors!) a hunter, and generally hunt on farmers’ land with my hawk. I talk to a lot of farmers (because I ask their permission to hunt), and thus get a chance to see how their farms are maintained as well as get a feeling for their hospitality. I haven’t run across nasty, cruel farmers whose livestock look sick and stressed. I have seen, in short, exactly what OhioBob describes.
 
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Sherlock:
I have to echo what OhioBob wrote—here in Minnesota, most of the farms look a lot as you describe.
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I think you and OhioBob missed my main point. Mea culpa.

Yes, there are still some independent farmers out there, but their numbers have certainly dwindled, and their contribution to the food market in terms of livestock is minimal. I have a great deal of respect for traditional, independent farmers and ranchers. My paternal grandparents were ranchers until they were run out of business by factory farms.

It is on factory farms, where animals are literally warehoused 24/7, never even seeing a field, let alone living in one, that the problems exist. Unfortunately, most animals brought to market come from factory farms.

The problems with factory farms are too numerous to discuss in this media, and (as often) the internet is very little help given the preponderance of shrill PETA-like organizations and people on the web. Again, I wholeheartedly recommend Matthew Scully’s book Dominion (notice the lack of links on his site to PETA; a definite plus). Scully is one sharp cookie, and a Republican and a Christian to boot. 😃

Oh, and OhioBob, if God didn’t want someone to eat you, how come He made you out of meat? 😛

– Mark L. Chance.
 
What about hunters who go and kill their game humanely?
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Catholicvegan:
A lot of people think that being a vegetarian is weird. Many people probably also think that being a vegan is being a tree-hugging nut, right? Well, I am here to tell you that I became a vegan for simple moral reasons. I became a vegetarian first, followed by going on to veganism. I learned about a meat industry that abuses most animals, and how their life is miserable until they are inhumanely killed. I encourage everyone here to explore vegetarianism and maybe even veganism. Here are some sites to get you started, or at least thinking.

www.peta.org
www.goveg.org
www.meetyourmeat.com
www.factoryfarming.com
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mlchance:
Oh, and OhioBob, if God didn’t want someone to eat you, how come He made you out of meat? 😛

– Mark L. Chance.
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Actually God made plenty of animals who would love to eat me (I’m “well marbled”) and they run a lot faster than I do. Luckily for me, none of them live in Ohio. 😉
 
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Mike:
I heartily disagree with your theology of soul that animals and plants have souls.
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Mike, you haven’t been reading your Aquinas or Aristotle.

See spot.colorado.edu/~pasnau/westview/st1a75-76.htm

where the Angelic Doctor writes
Saint Thomas:
Accordingly, then, it must be said that the soul in a human being ── sensory, intellective, and nutritive ── is numerically the same. Now, as for how that is the case, this can be easily grasped if one pays attention to the differences among species and forms. For the species and forms of things are found to differ relative to one another in terms of being more and less complete. For example, things with souls are more complete than things without, in the order of things, whereas animals are more complete than plants, and human beings more complete than brute animals. There are also different levels among the individuals of these kinds. For this reason Aristotle, in Metaphysics VIII, likens the species of things to numbers, which differ in species as a unit is added or subtracted. Also, in De anima II he compares the different souls to species of shapes, one of which contains another. Pentagon, for example, contains tetragon, and exceeds it. In this way, therefore, the intellective soul virtually contains whatever is possessed by the sensory soul of brute animals and the nutritive soul of plants. So a surface with a pentagonal shape is not tetragonal through one shape and pentagonal through another: for the tetragonal shape would be superfluous, being contained within the pentagonal. In the same way, Socrates is not a human being through one soul and an animal through another; rather, through one and the same soul he is both.
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Perhaps, God was breathing a spirit into Adam in Genesis. For man is composed of Body, Soul, and Spirit.
 
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Mike:
I heartily disagree with your theology of soul that animals and plants have souls.
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The “soul”, as Karl, St. Thomas Aquinas and Aristotle use the term, just means the life-principle of an animate body. Plants and animals are alive, after all.
 
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Mike:
Karl,

I heartily disagree with your theology of soul that animals and plants have souls.
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MIke, that is Catholic Doctrine. Read my post from St. Thomas Aquinas.

The Soul is what animates and distinguishes plain matter from life.

Now plants and animals do not have immortal souls, or souls with a component of Spirit like humans do, but the very fact that they are alive means that they have a Soul of some type.
 
Veganism can be called many things but “healthy diet” is not isn’t an accurate label. A healthy diet is one that can be sustained life long using only foods. A diet completely devoid of animal products is completely devoid of accessible B12. B12 is available in many plant products but the enzymes necessary fro humans to use it is only available in animal products. Vegans can obtain accessible B12 through injections or in less effective pill form. Longterm B12 deprivation causes degredation of the nervous system resulting in dementia. It takes around 20 years to reach this stage.
God designed us so that we have to eat meat.So there cannot be anything morally with eating meat.
 
So, my question is, do the vegans on this thread object to the actual eating of animal products or just the way they are treated?

For example, my husband and I buy our beef from his cousin, who is a “family” farmer. His farm is the stereotypical one “with big red barns and cows and chickens and pigs living out of doors and roaming around in big green fields”. He takes excellent care of all of his livestock and when they go to market, they are stunned and then the main artery is cut in the way a previous poster mentioned. In fact, it is very important to keep the animals as relaxed as possible during this process as this makes for more tender meat. If an animal was being mistreated, they would most likely tense up, no?

I guess what I’m trying to get at, is would you still object to eating meat from an animal that was well taken care of and slaughtered in a “humane” way, or is it simply wrong to eat meat, period. ?

Your insights would be appreciated.
 
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