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A priest a vegetarian?

Should priests and other such like "personnel" of churchs be vegetarians?

  • No

  • I don't care

  • It would be for the best

  • Doesn't have anything to do with anything

  • Yes

  • Aren't They?


Results are only viewable after voting.

stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
Of course not. If God didn't want us to eat cows, He shouldn't have made them out of steak
Educational lesson in place here [I hope you can appreciate mine as much as I appreciate yours:]
1): It was not about eating or not eating meat. It was about vegetarian or vegan. Not about you or me, but about priests. So don't act offended.
2): In Genesis God clearly points out which food He created for humans
3): Use of common sense will give you the answer: You become what you eat; eat pig, become pig [stands for arrogance] etc
*): Also the fear, anger, hate that is in the animal, quite obvious knowing how badly they are treated, will get into you

So knowing these scientific facts, I expect nothing less then a murderous roar soon, although "miracles do happen"

But final advice: Deep inside you know the above points are true, so why not accept it.
I'm not vegan. I try to be vegetarian. Still cheese addicted

So I can't call myself a vegetarian, because now and then I eat this cheese. Even sometimes I kill some worms when walking. Also when I have worms inside, I take a big pill (albendazol). The pill works by making it impossible for the worms to absorb food. So I just kill worms, also animals. Can't call myself vegetarian.

Most important is to be truthful. Just admit you are not yet perfect. Life gets so much easier that way is my experience

Extra note: I think there is nothing wrong with eating meat. "God" will not judge you. You only create karma, that's all. And that is very easy to understand. Just go into the jungle and find a siberian tigre or lion and ask him friendly if he would like to be your lunch. Probably before finishing your question he has finished his lunch. So God won't judge you, but definitely tigre or lion will judge you. And good to remember the animal is like the human also a creation of God.

Eating vegetarian or vegan will give your spirituality a big boost. But if you are a soldier you better eat meat, because being vegan you will be too much of a softy to kill anything.

So it is not about good or bad. It's about what your goal is in life. And what you can handle.

IMHO
 
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A Vestigial Mote

Well-Known Member
I'm not particularly keen on forcing my way of life down the throats of others. To me, THAT is unethical.
On the surface that certainly sounds like an obvious trespass... "forcing your way of life down the throats of others" - but when you get down to brass-tacks, this is what multi-member society is built on. An extreme example - some people would like to murder as part of their way of life. As a cohesive group of citizens, we don't allow that. We force those individuals to adhere to the collective/shared standards of "law." And what is a basic "law" besides a majority consensus on right vs. wrong? Hell... sometimes it isn't even THAT! How many laws are to protect specific interests? Things like zoning, certain forms of licensing or building codes. All of it an attempt to FORCE you to comply to specific "ways of life."

If it ever comes to the point that the vegans/vegetarians greatly outnumber the meat-eaters, the cash-flow for meat products mostly dries up, and we start having real discussions of the ideas surrounding the keeping and slaughter of animals (not just concerns of morality, but things like the environmental concerns, consumers' health issues, mental health concerns of the grunt-level employees in the industry, etc.), there could very well be laws written that outlaw meat. Imagine that! In that fictitious (but entirely plausible) future - you may actually have to leave the country if you still want that bacon.
 
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YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
On the surface that certainly sounds like an obvious trespass... "forcing your way of life down the throats of others" - but when you get down to brass-tacks, this is what multi-member society is built on. An extreme example - some people would like to murder as part of their way of life. As a cohesive group of citizens, we don't allow that. We force those individuals to adhere to the collective/shared standards of "law." And what is a basic "law" besides a majority consensus on right vs. wrong? Hell... sometimes it isn't even THAT! How many laws are to protect specific interests? Things like zoning, certain forms of licensing or building codes. All of it an attempt to FORCE you to comply to specific "ways of life."

If it ever comes to the point that the vegans/vegetarians greatly outnumber the meat-eaters, the cash-flow for meat products mostly dries up, and we start having real discussions of the ideas surrounding the keeping and slaughter of animals (not just concerns of morality, but things like the environmental concerns, mental health concerns of the grunt-level employees in the industry, etc.), there could very well be laws written that outlaw meat. Imagine that! In that fictitious (but entirely plausible) future - you may actually have to leave the country if you still want that bacon.
An interesting scenario but is it really wise for lentil slurping vegans to come at heavily armed carnivores? In the wild, that does not tend to go too well.
 

Axe Elf

Prophet
Educational lesson in place here [I hope you can appreciate mine as much as I appreciate yours:]

I'm afraid that's probably not going to happen.

1): It was not about eating or not eating meat. It was about vegetarian or vegan. Not about you or me, but about priests. So don't act offended.

Gee, and all this time I thought vegan/vegetarianism WAS about eating or not eating meat. My bad. And I don't see why priests would need to deny themselves the full experience of God-given delights (i.e., a double butterburger from Culver's), either.

2): In Genesis God clearly points out which food He created for humans

"God said, Let Us [Father, Son, and Holy Spirit] make mankind in Our image, after Our likeness, and let them have complete authority over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the [tame] beasts, and over all of the earth, and over everything that creeps upon the earth. So God created man in His own image, in the image and likeness of God He created him; male and female He created them. And God blessed them and said to them, Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it [using all its vast resources in the service of God and man]; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and over every living creature that moves upon the earth."
--Genesis 1:26-28 (Amplified Bible)

If I have complete authority and dominion over all the resources of the earth, then I can choose to eat them if I see fit. Besides, if God didn't want us to eat meat, then why did He put the wrong kind of teeth in our mouths? We have some flat, grinding molars like a cow, too, but we also have incisors and canines that were made for ripping and tearing meat. Our physiology indicates that we were created to be omnivores.

3): Use of common sense will give you the answer: You become what you eat; eat pig, become pig [stands for arrogance] etc

That's common sense?

"You can't be what you eat, baby, or I'd be you." --Ted Nugent

We ingest hydrocarbons, proteins, and other nutrients, and those building blocks do become the materials from which we are made--but we don't become turkeys after Thanksgiving or develop the ability to breathe underwater after a fish fry. Besides, becoming vegetarian wouldn't help matters much--you'd just become a vegetable for the rest of your life. So peas, lettuce pray--because I don't carrot all.

*): Also the fear, anger, hate that is in the animal, quite obvious knowing how badly they are treated, will get into you

Being slain while in a state of terror does cause adrenaline to inhibit the normal production of lactic acid in the muscles after death, which can cause the meat to taste different and go bad sooner. On the other hand, dog meat is supposed to taste BETTER when the dog is killed in a state of terror, so dogs used for meat in Asian countries are often treated poorly intentionally. But in either case, you still don't absorb the emotions of the animal.

So knowing these scientific facts, I expect nothing less then a murderous roar soon, although "miracles do happen"

I'm sorry, I must have missed any scientific facts you presented. Could you run them by me again?

And why would you expect a murderous roar, when nothing but a little education is required?

But final advice: Deep inside you know the above points are true, so why not accept it.

Because they're not true.

Most important is to be truthful. Just admit you are not yet perfect. Life gets so much easier that way is my experience

Of course I'm not perfect, but what does that have to do with anything?

Just go into the jungle and find a siberian tigre or lion and ask him friendly if he would like to be your lunch. Probably before finishing your question he has finished his lunch.

Yeah, that's why we don't eat lions and tigers. But ask a pig or a cow the same thing, and they never seem to have anything to say about it.

Eating vegetarian or vegan will give your spirituality a big boost. But if you are a soldier you better eat meat, because being vegan you will be too much of a softy to kill anything.

Anything that you do to honor God can give your spirituality a boost, but I think we should take a lesson here from Ghandi. He was, of course, a vegetarian, but his usual diet of leeks and onions left him with terribly bad breath, and even somewhat undernourished. Since Ghandi also walked everywhere barefoot, which caused huge callouses to form on his feet, you could say that Ghandi was a super-calloused fragile mystic vexed by halitosis.
 

A Vestigial Mote

Well-Known Member
An interesting scenario but is it really wise for lentil slurping vegans to come at heavily armed carnivores? In the wild, that does not tend to go too well.
Eh... once we vegans have worked out the kinks in the serum that makes all the animals uber-sentient, we'll have them all on our side by that point anyway. And the party will really get started once we've got the sharks with freakin' laser beams attached to their heads ready to go.
 

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
Eh... once we vegans have worked out the kinks in the serum that makes all the animals uber-sentient, we'll have them all on our side by that point anyway. And the party will really get started once we've got the sharks with freakin' laser beams attached to their heads ready to go.
One can dream I suppose. :)
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
What does a priest do, generally? What's their goal? And what qualities make for a good priest?

Are they there to maintain the status quo or social order -- if necessary by suppressing non-traditional ideas or behavior?
Is it their job to enforce a set of rules, some of which may seem arbitrary and purposeless; some of which may even be counter-productive or hurtful?
Or are they there to promote the greatest happiness and prosperity for the greatest number?

There are arguments in favor of each, but the first two carry a lot of disturbing historical baggage and I think most of us in the West would lean toward the third alternative, as do I.

I see the prime directive of the clergy as combating the natural tribalism of our species, the tendency to put one's personal or tribal interests above those of out-groups:

"There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus."
Galatians 3:28-29 King James Version (KJV)


Tribalism was functional when we all lived in little bands, like chimps. Today it causes nothing but war and strife.

Back in the Pleistocene, our natural moral universe extended only to members of our own band. We felt no more moral obligation to the tribe in the next valley than we did to the animals we hunted.
This is our natural, moral state. It's hard-wired.

Gradually our moral universe expanded, but there is still ethnic, religious, class and national bigotry. If a priest's job be the promotion of peace, love and harmony, I'd expect the best priests to be the most cosmopolitan, the least tribal; the one's with the widest moral compass.

Society honors its peacemakers; its Jesus, its Gandhis, its Martin Luther Kings. These extended moral consideration beyond their own status-communities to include The Other.

Ideally, then, wouldn't the ideal priest would be the one with the widest moral universe; the one who extended moral consideration not just to his own religious community, his own ethnic group or his own countrymen, but to anyone -- or any thing -- with self-interest; anything capable of pain or suffering, of happiness, fear or despair?

I wouldn't expect a priest who saw no moral discontinuity between his wife and a cow, to eat that cow.

"In the end, only kindness matters" -- Jewel.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I'm not particularly keen on forcing my way of life down the throats of others. To me, THAT is unethical.
This sounds like the same majority sentiment heard during the abolitionist controversy, the womens' suffrage controversy, the civil rights controversy. It was exactly the complaint voiced by the Southerners against the freedom riders of the '60s.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke.

We're all our brothers' keepers.
 
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stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
I'm afraid that's probably not going to happen
No miracles today, yet

Gee, and all this time I thought vegan/vegetarianism
I was warned a meat-eater might react irrational when touching their meat

--Genesis 1:26-28 (Amplified Bible)
Genesis 1:29 [you just missed God's answer by 1 verse]
29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.


That's common sense?
I talk about the subtle effect of the food, very clearly. Irrational again?

But in either case, you still don't absorb the emotions of the animal
I hope so for you [indian wisdom says different]

And why would you expect a murderous roar, when nothing but a little education is required?
Good on you. You proof that it's not the food alone that has effect on what we become. Mind over matter can purify everyting.

But ask a pig or a cow the same thing, and they never seem to have anything to say about it
Irrational again: Of course they say nothing if you let the butcher do the killing

Yes, so we are back to: Oke to eat meat, vegetarian/vegan. God won't judge. Just different karma/effect, unless in "no mind" state.

Remembering your educational lesson: Space/time stuff. Nothing matters. All exist in all times. But tough one [like advaitha teaching].

Love:heartbeat:, Peace:peace: and Blessings:innocent: my brother
 
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Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
There are people still living in countries where you see the live animal and it's butchered for you when you buy it or you butcher it yourself at home after. So I'm not sure if this works or it would have ended long ago.
I suspect people just become more callous to it, more indifferent to suffering.
 

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
This sounds like the same majority sentiment heard during the abolitionist controversy, the womens' suffrage controversy, the civil rights controversy. It was exactly the complaint voiced by the Southerners against the freedom riders of the '60s.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. Edmund Burke."

We're all our brothers. keepers.
If you say so. <yawn>


Edit: Further to the above I find your comparisons to political uprisings is a bit tenuous. All of your examples are about things/institutions created by humans in relatively recent times. The uprisings are a somewhat natural response to those shabby practices and behaviors. Meat eating, on the other hand, has been around since life began on the planet. One could say that it is a hard-wired thing. Veganism is a relatively new phenomena and is a personal choice amid a vast array of food choices, all of which are in abundance. Vegetarianism, as far as I am aware, comes largely from the Indian sub-continent and began to spread to the rest of the world after the rediscovery of India in the 60's and 70's.

Neither has yet to take the world by storm, though many, including myself, always make sure to prominently feature vegetables in our dishes as a result. Even paying close attention to nutrition and living on a balanced diet though, I have no intention of scrapping meat from my culinary marvels anytime soon. I'm not saying being vegetarian or vegan is a bad thing. It's just not something that is going to see a seismic shift in attitudes and behaviors anytime soon. By soon I mean, for hundreds of years, if ever at any point in the future.
 
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blü 2

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Your body does not need a hamburger.
More accurately, a healthy vegetarian diet is possible; but it isn't necessary. You may be familiar with the hypothesis that we owe our big brains to the discovery of fire, which allowed much more efficient ingestion of meat when cooked. We're omnivores for good evolutionary reasons.

Humane treatment of the animals we use and eat is a modern tendency which I fully support. Battery hens and locked-in pigs are shameful examples, but not the only ones.

But that problem should be, and is being, addressed in the First World. It doesn't dictate vegetarianism as a solution; that's simply one option and involves the paradox that if we don't eat those animals, they'll simply cease to exist except occasionally in zoos.

I eat much less meat and much more rice and pasta than my parents did, and our daughter, but not our sons, is vegetarian. Me, I have no intention to stop eating meat.
 

savagewind

Veteran Member
Premium Member
There are quite a few people I wish would not do what they want. And the majority of meat eaters could easily be "cured" if they were shown how their "meat" is really done and what else they put into it. I.e. they would not want it.
Not all meat comes from animals who have been raised without care. I think that in most places a person can find locally raised animal meat which has been produced with kindness and good sense. It will cost more, but the cost is worth it because it is much better than mass produced stuff. Also, I'd like to say that most people do not eat so much meat that if they didn't, it would make a difference in how most meat is produced so I think that they should be able to continue eating it with a good conscience. Some people think that they need to or want to eat meat every day. All those people are to blame for the evil mass production of meat in a bad way, imo. McDonald's, for instance.
 

Axe Elf

Prophet
29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

You can have my share of the poison oak.

Good thing the lions and other carnivores were smart enough to figure out that God gave them the wrong kind of teeth in their mouths too--and went ahead and ate the otherwise over-multiplying insects and small mammals anyway. If they hadn't, there soon would be little vegetation left to consume.
 

stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
poison oak
Very good, you are right. Don't eat everything what God gives you. Definitely don't take the Bible literally. Always use your common sense.

Now the lions. I am not sure how long ago it was that God gave Genesis 1:29. I do know that people were complaining about the food of Genesis, and that God had no other choice then to give them the second best option, somewhere in Leviticus maybe.

If God is perfect then the lions would have the right teeth in the time when God gave diet of Genesis 1:29

Because God's creation didn't follow His instructions and didn't stick to Genesis diet, of course their teeth changed during the evolution.

Nowadays there are plenty of people who perfectly manage to eat vegan. No need to mock Genesis diet. You just like to have your stake. God gave you the freedom to choose whatever you want. Others also have this choice.

At least it's good to know that you don't take genesis literally. So all other quotes from the Bible are also up for debate.
 

Axe Elf

Prophet
Now the lions. I am not sure how long ago it was that God gave Genesis 1:29. I do know that people were complaining about the food of Genesis, and that God had no other choice then to give them the second best option, somewhere in Leviticus maybe.

If God is perfect then the lions would have the right teeth in the time when God gave diet of Genesis 1:29

Because God's creation didn't follow His instructions and didn't stick to Genesis diet, of course their teeth changed during the evolution.

Ok, I'm going to have to call bu... er... nonsense on this until you can show me the fossilized remains of a lion that has teeth like a cow before the evolutionary transition to meat-eating. The funny thing is how matter-of-factly you state this; like it's a real thing, and not just something you made up (or maybe got from Answers In Genesis?)

Nowadays there are plenty of people who perfectly manage to eat vegan. No need to mock Genesis diet. You just like to have your stake. God gave you the freedom to choose whatever you want. Others also have this choice.

Of course you can make that choice. You can make the choice to eat nothing but Tide Pods if you want. You can even adopt such observances in honor of God, if you like--just don't say that's what God WANTED when he gave you the wrong kind of teeth to be exclusively vegetarian. Recognize it for what it is--something YOU want to do, possibly even to honor God.
 

Shushersbedamned

Well-Known Member
Not all meat comes from animals who have been raised without care. I think that in most places a person can find locally raised animal meat which has been produced with kindness and good sense.
I'm
Sorry. I' trying to control giggles. ..."animal meat which is produced with kindness and good sense."

Oh my.. holy ****
 

Shushersbedamned

Well-Known Member
Humane treatment of the animals we use and eat is a modern tendency which I fully support. Battery hens and locked-in pigs are shameful examples, but not the only ones.
If you're one of those poorly.educated people who thinks that the other 'free' chickens and cows are living a good life.
 
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