Accessible Plant-Based Holiday Meal Guide

By Megan Grigorian

With the holiday season upon us, CreatureKind has compiled an accessible plant-based meal guide with dishes that stay away from animal products and use ingredients that are widely accessible across the US. These recipes can be used with produce boxes and other items available through local food banks, and/or supplemented with cost-conscious ingredients at populated stores like Dollar General, Dollar Store, or grocery stores (if you have one accessible to you.) For reference, I am writing from Southeastern Virginia–local available produce will vary depending on location. 

Eating in alignment with your values should be accessible to everyone. We hope these ideas might help create a special plant-based meal on a limited budget this season, so your table can continue to include all of God’s beloved creation. If we can be of any help planning meals, please don’t hesitate to reach out. 

Breakfast $5 or less 

Cinnamon Rolls with orange glaze

  • There are some brands of cinnamon rolls that are accidentally vegan or contain less than 2% of dairy products, just check the back for a list of ingredients for dairy or egg ingredients. Cook in a convection or regular oven as directed.

  • While they are cooking, make an orange glaze using 1 cup of powdered sugar and the juice and zest of one orange. Alternatively, you can use about 2 tablespoons of an individual orange juice for the glaze. Mix until smooth and top your cinnamon rolls while they are still warm. This would also make a delicious dessert to go with dinner. Enjoy the warm sweet treat!

Tofu scramble 

  • This is one of the heartiest breakfasts, and can be prepared using really any vegetables you have access to (peppers, onions, or greens all would be tasty). A block of tofu costs around $2.50 and will make enough for four people. You’ll also need a pan, some oil for your cooking, salt and pepper (or whatever seasonings you have on hand). This dish is very forgiving. Here is how I prepare it: 

  1. Press tofu by wrapping it in a towel and putting something heavy on top (like a pan or books, this draws the moisture out so it will get to a nice texture when you cook it). Leave for at least 30 minutes. 

  2. Dice up all your veggies while the tofu presses. 

  3. Coat your pan with whatever oil you like to use for cooking (olive, coconut, vegetable–they will all work) and heat the pan on medium low

  4. Add your onions and peppers and saute until nice and soft. Salt and pepper them. Remember lots of seasoning is the trick to making a good scramble. 

  5.  Crumble up your tofu and get it incorporated with the veggies 

  6.  Season some more,  cook some more, and then add a little more. 

  7. Cook until the tofu reaches a texture that is appealing to you. I like it to be pretty firm, so I saute for about half an hour-45 minutes on low-medium heat. 

  8. Taste for extra seasoning, take off the heat. 

  9. Serve with some bread and vegan butter, or on its own. 

Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal 

Canned pumpkin puree is a popular item at food banks this time of year, and cooked with oats and some cinnamon makes a delicious, filling breakfast. Many dollar stores also carry soy milk now so you can get it at a much lower price point than other grocery stores. Liedl also has a non dairy whipped cream for around $3 that would make a great topping. You can make this on the stove or in the microwave. The recipe below from The Simple Veganista serves 4. 

Ingredients

  • 2 cup old fashioned oats

  • 1 cup pumpkin puree

  • 2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (or cinnamon)

  • 1/2 cup plant milk 

  • 3 cups water

  • pinch of salt 

  • Optional: nondairy whipped cream and vanilla extract

Instructions:

Stovetop: In a saucepan, combine oats, pumpkin puree, pumpkin spice, plant milk, 2 tsp vanilla extract (if available to you, it will be tasty without it) water, and salt. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to simmer, and cook over a gentle boil for 3 – 4 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 2 to 3 minutes.

Microwave: Add ingredients in a large bowl and mix well to combine. Microwave on HIGH for 3 minutes, stopping to stir after 2 minutes. To prevent the oatmeal from boiling over, be sure to use a larger, wider bowl. Let cool a few minutes before serving.

Dinner

Cornbread


Jiffy cornbread mix is less than a dollar, and there are many ways to make it vegan. Prepare as directed by the box, using any of these substitutes for the eggs:  

  • Egg substitutes: 

    • 3 Tbsp. aquafaba (canned chickpea liquid)

    • Unsweetened applesauce. 1/3 cup in 8.5 oz Corn Muffin Mix.

    • Flax Egg: 2 tsp. ground flax seed and 3 Tbsp. warm water (let sit 15 minutes before using)

Collard Greens

This simple and delicious greens recipe is from Rev. Dr. Christopher Carter’s book The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, and Food Justice. You can use the orange juice leftover from breakfast if you made the orange cinnamon rolls.

Ingredients:

  • A bunch of collard greens, chopped

  • 1 tablespoon oil

  • 2 garlic cloves, minced

  • ⅓ cup fresh orange juice

  • salt

  • ⅔ cup raisins (you can get a small package at the Dollar Store)

Directions:
In a large pot over high heat, bring 3 quarts of water to a boil and add 1 tablespoon of salt. Add the collards and cook, uncovered, for 8-10 minutes, until softened. Meanwhile, prepare a large bowl of ice water in which to cool the collards. Remove the collards from the heat, drain, and plunge them into the bowl of cold water to stop cooking and set the color of the greens. Drain by gently pressing the greens in a colander. In a large saute pan, combine the oil and the garlic and raise the heat to medium. Saute for 1 minute. Add the collards, raisins, and ½ teaspoon salt. Saute for 3 minutes, stirring frequently. Add orange juice and cook for an additional 15 seconds or so. Be careful not to overcook, as the greens should be bright green in color. Season with additional salt to taste if needed and serve immediately. This recipe serves 5-6 people.

Candied Sweet Potatoes

This classic side dish is the most time intensive part of the meal, but uses just a few ingredients, most of which you will have on hand if you purchased them for other dishes in the meal. Sweet Potatoes always add a nice pop of color on your plate too. Recipe from AllRecipes.com.  

Ingredients: 

  • 6 sweet potatoes

  • 1 cup packed brown sugar

  • ½ cup vegan butter or margarine 

  • ½ cup water

  • 1 teaspoon salt

Instructions: 

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees 

  2. Place a steamer basket in a large pot and bring 2 inches of water to a boil. Place whole sweet potatoes in the steamer basket and cover. Cook until tender, about 30 minutes. Drain and cool. 

  3. Peel and slice sweet potatoes lengthwise into ½ inch slices. Place in a 9 x 13 inch baking dish. 

  4. Melt brown sugar, butter, water, and salt in a small saucepan over medium heat. When the sauce is bubbly and sugar is dissolved, pour over the potatoes. 

  5. Bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour, occasionally basting the potatoes with the brown sugar sauce. 

Black Bean Loaf

A filling and tasty main dish packed with protein from Natasha Condie at One Green Planet, I recommend the Dollar Store for a small container of soy sauce. It adds a lot of flavor and seasoning. 

Ingredients:

  • 2 cans black beans, rinsed

  • 1.5 cups quick oats

  • 1 red bell pepper, chopped.

  • 1 carrot, chopped or grated.

  • 1 small onion, minced

  • 1 clove garlic, minced

  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce

  • Black pepper, to taste

  • Water for sautéing.

Instructions: 

  • Pre-heat oven to 350°F.

  • In a medium pan, water sauté the onions until translucent then add the garlic, pepper and carrot. Cook for about 5-6 minutes, until softened.

  • In a large bowl, combine the black beans, oats and all seasonings. Add in the veggies that you sautéed and mash with a potato masher or fork until well combine but not mushy, If it isn't moist enough add water and if too moist add oats until it holds together.

  • Spoon "dough" into a parchment paper lined loaf pan and bake for about 30 minutes, until it has developed a nice crust.

  • Serve with side dishes of your choice and enjoy!

Cake in a mug

This is one of my favorite easy desserts. It uses just a few ingredients and comes out moist and delicious each time. You can also customize it based on everyone’s tastes and get kids involved by having them pick out their favorite toppings like sprinkles or other candies. To cook, you’ll just need a mug per person and a microwave. 

Ingredients:

  • 6 tablespoons boxed cake mix, any variety works great 

  • 4 tablespoons water 

  • 2 teaspoons oil 

  • Frosting and sprinkles for topping, optional 

Instructions:

  • Rub cooking oil in the mug to prevent sticking. Mix together cake mix, water, and 2 teaspoons of oil inside. 

  • Microwave for a minute and 15 seconds (give or take 10 seconds). Remove from microwave and allow mug to cool. Add your toppings and enjoy! 

Snacks from the Dollar Store–to munch on during the day, or use for a charcuterie board:

  • They have a variety of assorted mixed nuts that are $1

  • Trail Mix for dried fruit 

  • Spicy Pickles in the refrigerated section 

  • Crackers and hummus 

  • Accidentally vegan cookies and treats–like Oreos

Products to Donate to Food Pantries 

These are foods that food banks look for all year round. Check out the needs in your local community for other ideas if you have the means to donate this year. 

  • Pop-top canned fruits and vegetables 

  • Dried fruits

  • Pop-top soups and meals 

  • Pasta meals, box rice, instant potatoes 

  • Whole grain cereals, oatmeals 

  • Peanut butter/jelly

“Did Jesus Eat Fish? Should We Eat Fish Ourselves?” (A Sermonette By Avweroswo Akpojaro)

By Avweroswo Akpojaro

A few days ago, I was talking to a very good friend who happens to be a theology student. We have been friends for many years, and we have always shared ideas about our work and passions. This time, I was sharing my thoughts about farmed animal welfare advocacy from a theological perspective. I told him we should all eat more plant-based foods as Christians because such would ultimately bring glory to God and be better for the earth. He replied that I shouldn’t say everyone should eat plant-based foods. When I asked why, he said because Jesus ate fish.  

During the last CreatureKind seminar that I organized at the Theological College of Northern Nigeria, this same question came up in the discussions. I have observed that it is a common question and frequent objection to eating plant-based meals and practicing animal welfare. Christians in my context often assume that if Jesus ate fish, then eating fish must always be a good thing because our Lord never did anything wrong or committed sin. They say Jesus is the one in whom God is well pleased. He is our perfect example, and we are to walk in His steps in living the Christian life. This way of thinking about Christ is very interesting, and we will consider it in light of the questions before us in this sermon.  

Though biblical scholars could debate the issue, I think it’s safe to assume that Jesus ate fish. This is because Jesus lived in a cultural context where fish were farmed by the people in his community. Some of Jesus’s disciples were even fishermen like Peter, Andrew, and John (Matt. 4:18-22). Jesus performed miracles that involved fish, like when he multiplied the five loaves of bread and two fish to feed the multitudes (Matt. 14:16-21), helped Peter miraculously catch a lot of fish (Luke 5:1-8), and paid his taxes using the coin from a fish’s mouth (Matt. 17:24-27). Jesus also spoke of fish in his parables about the kingdom of God (Matt. 13:47-50). He even cooked and ate fish after his resurrection (Luke 24: 41-43, John 21:9-13). Again, it seems clear that Jesus lived in a culture where fishing activities and eating fish were part of everyday life. Jesus almost surely would have eaten fish because he wasn’t a man divorced from his historical and cultural context.  

 So if Jesus ate fish, should we eat fish too? Some would quickly say, “If Jesus ate fish, so will I. After all, I can’t be holier than Jesus.” For them, it’s a simple matter with a perfect conclusion. There can be nothing wrong with eating fish. Since the Kingdom of God isn’t food and drink but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, what we eat is not the problem at  

all. The scripture also says what we eat cannot defile us in any way (Matt. 15:11). They argue that eating fish or any other food is simply a matter of Christian liberty.  

Well, is the question so easy to answer? If Jesus could eat fish, then am I free to eat fish as well? Indeed, it’s true that a Christian is free to eat fish. It is also true that it’s a matter of Christian liberty. The Christian is free to eat fish or not. For me, that much is granted and not in doubt. But liberty is not the primary issue to consider. I grant that a Christian eating fish is not committing a sinful or damnable act. That’s not the real question before us. The real question is should a Christian eat fish? To answer that, we need to think through our Christian convictions again. 



The idea that since Jesus ate fish, then we should eat fish today does not follow because we don’t do everything Jesus did. Jesus fasted for forty days, and no one says we should do the same. Jesus paid his taxes using a coin in a fish’s mouth, and no one says you should do the same today. Jesus wore tunics, but we don’t today. Jesus rode donkeys, but we don’t do that today. Jesus was simply a man of his time and lived with the knowledge and understanding of his historical context.  

So many Christians think it's perfectly fine to eat fish because Jesus did it, and it’s part of exercising Christian liberty. We tend to forget that the liberty of the Christian is not liberty to do whatever but freedom to do that which would be beneficial — not just for the individual Christian but also for others in our community. Our freedom as believers should be used not only to please ourselves but to benefit others around us. We need to remember this in our actions. The freedom of the Christian is not to do whatever is not expressly prohibited by God but to do that which is most loving to one’s neighbor. It’s a freedom tailored to and guided by love in every situation and historical context.  

Today, we know more about the world and its ecosystems. In Jesus’s day, people didn’t practice industrial fishing, which seeks to drain the seas of all life. They engaged in small-scale fishing — much smaller when compared to what is done today. They weren’t destroying the oceans. They had no synthetic plastics filling up the oceans and destroying marine life. Marine life could still thrive then. Things have changed. Our seas have changed. The waters are now populated by heavy, industrial-scale fishing vessels determined to catch all the fish they can carry for their selfish interests, damning whatever consequences such practices may bring. Fishing today is now harmful to the fish and the whole planet. Fish caught today could be filled with microplastics and other harmful substances. The state of today’s industrial fishing is sad to the point that some people are taken captive to work on fishing vessels.  

Knowing all this information, as Christians, should we close our eyes to these present realities and eat fish simply because Jesus ate fish? Should we care so little about the harm caused by modern industrial fishing? Should we be a part of the often evil multibillion-dollar fishing industry and be careless about the people involved, the destruction of marine life, and the potential destruction of our planet simply because we want fish on our tables and are free to eat it? Is letting go of fish consumption for the greater good of the earth too great a sacrifice for us as Christians? Do we want to follow Jesus? Would Jesus eat fish today knowing that his actions were promoting so much harm to the earth? Is that what love entails? I dare say that following Jesus today is not about eating fish because he did, but seeking to love our neighbors and not eating foods that may harm them.  

So, if Jesus ate fish, can it not be evil? Well, eating fish may not be evil, but if one knows that eating fish would harm one’s neighbor and destroy the planet, then should one eat fish? 

I say no. Following Jesus is loving one’s neighbor, and love seeks the neighbor’s flourishing.

Love: The Way of Animal Liberation

Written by Avweroswo Akpojaro Junior

It may seem quite counterintuitive to begin thinking about the welfare of non-human animals and justice for non-human animals as grounded in the love of God in Christ Jesus. But as I hope to demonstrate, love in the Christian faith is at the heart of animal justice and liberation. As such, there’s no better place to begin this discussion. Love is deeply entrenched in the Christian faith and is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian believer. 

Without love, our claim to be God’s people would be highly questionable and empty. Love characterizes Christian faith and practice. Many Christians would heartily agree with this fact. Disagreements arise, however, in our understanding of what that love looks like in practice. Often, this is where most of the challenges Christians face in their witness exist. Sometimes we see what love entails, and other times we don’t. Whatever the case, one way or another, we don’t see the full implications of living a life of love. So how can we see more clearly what it means to love? We should look no further than God because God is love. Only then can we begin to see that living a life of love implies seeking non-human animal justice and welfare when we look at the love of God in Jesus Christ.

The Love of God

How has God loved God’s creatures? As Christian believers, God’s love is apparent in Jesus Christ. So what does that love look like? It’s plain to see that God’s love in Christ Jesus is unconditional. It does not look at the other to fulfill certain conditions before it loves the other. It does not expect the other to have certain abilities, to be a certain species, to possess certain knowledge, to be strong, or to fulfill any kind of condition at all. God loves unconditionally. This love also actively seeks the welfare and flourishing of the other. It is deeply concerned with the other’s existence. It seeks the other when the other is absent or lost. It leaves the ninety-nine to find that one lost sheep. 

The love of God in Christ does not discriminate in any way based on race, tribe, sex, gender, ability, or disability. It is not ableist, speciesist, sexist, or racist. It extends infinitely, and it is distributed equitably to all God’s creatures, so much so that God’s eyes are always on the sparrow, and God clothes the grasses with more glory than that of Solomon. Nothing and no one is insignificant. This is the love that pursues the liberation and freedom of the other even unto laying its life down for the other. It forgives, seeks the healing of the other, and defends the other with its life. It never gives up on the other. Indeed, God’s love even finds its life by laying it down for the other. It is free love but this love does not bask in the glory of its freedom but willingly seeks the freedom of the other from destructive ways of existing. 

It’s a love that knows no end. It is boundless and all-encompassing. No creature — yes, no creature — escapes the boundless love of God. Such is the love of God that we have in Christ Jesus. Such is how God has loved us. As Christians called to walk in such love, why do we often fail to love as we have been loved? Why doesn’t our love shudder at the sight of the oppression and abuse of any of God’s creatures? Why are our hearts often so cold toward non-human animals?

Our Failure to Love as We Have Been Loved

The challenge isn’t that we don’t love but seldom love as God has loved us. Why is this so? There could be many reasons for this, but concerning animal liberation, one of the reasons is that we don’t consider non-human animals as equal objects of the love of God. Ironically, the creature who celebrates receiving so much of God’s love is the same creature who reflects so little of it. It’s not difficult for me to imagine that many chickens and pigs feel the irony, too. Humans often become like that servant whose master forgave so much but then could not forgive others. We don’t give what we have received. We have been loved without condition, but we think non-human animals and certain persons need to fulfill conditions to earn love. We have been forgiven much, but in return, we release so much hate and animosity toward God’s beloved creatures. We become the very opposite of what humans are meant to be. Ultimately, we fail to love as we have been loved because we only look at ourselves. We misinterpret God’s love by thinking God loves only us. We think we are so special. We fail to see beyond ourselves. We place ourselves at the center of God’s love. 

Our failure to not actively seek the liberation and flourishing of non-human animals is a failure to love as God has loved us. Why do we brutalize and render helpless God’s creatures? Why do we oppress them with little or no remorse? Why is it that when it comes to animals, we do not remember the words of the Lord — that if we did not show love to one of the least of these, we did not show love to our Lord? Humans must remember that our Lord became one of the weakest. Like a lamb, Christ was slaughtered. Our Lord identified with one of the poorest and most oppressed creatures to liberate them. Such is God’s love. It identifies with the downtrodden. 

So why do we fail to seek the liberation of non-human animals? Why do we prey on their weakness, disability, and ignorance? Why do we not rejoice in their thriving? Why are we careless? I dare say that it is because we often forget how we have been loved by God. We forget that God unconditionally loved us in our weakest and most vulnerable, and we are to do the same to all of God’s creatures. This forgetfulness is often the source of Western Christianity’s setting of all sorts of conditions for love like gender binaries, intellectual rationality, hierarchies, ableism, etc. The great error is that we love those people and creatures that most resemble us, and this causes apathy toward other creatures. That is not how God has loved us. Resemblance is not a criterion for love. We need to love creatures for their differences from us. Our love is not meant to be limited to the human animal because God’s love isn’t limited to the human animal.

Love and Liberation

Seeing how much we have been loved in Christ Jesus, it should be obvious that the welfare of non-human animals for the Christian is not peripheral to the faith of the Christian. Such love is at the heart of living out our faith because humans are called to love as we have been loved. Many times, Christian communities view advocates of animal justice and liberation as strange or abnormal. Yet, advocates are the ones who should think that non-advocates are acting strangely because non-advocates are not following the logic of God’s love in Christ Jesus. Advocates of non-human animals see how a lifestyle of loving, regardless of species distinction, follows the ancient African traditions of being in harmony with creation and fellow creatures. All beings were recognized and appreciated by the human community. 

Our Lord Jesus Christ did not lay down his life just to redeem humans but all of God’s creation (Colossians 1:20). This means God’s love is a liberating love that seeks the good of the other, no matter the species. Christians need to mirror such love to all of God’s creatures. As humans were created in God’s image, the image of God that we are to reflect is the image of God’s love which lays down its life for the good of the other. Animal liberation and justice should not be, in any way, alien to us. It should be the air we breathe because animal justice is an act of love as is seeking the liberation and flourishing of non-human animals. It is the way we are called to live. All of God’s creatures should be allowed to be fruitful and multiply while thriving joyfully and being the creatures God made them to be. We all love to be loved, so let us do unto the non-human animals what we want to be done to us.

Conclusion 

No creature is left out of the great love of God. The matter of animal justice for the Christian is a matter of love which is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian. As such, animal justice is at the heart of the outworking of the Christian life. As Christians, let us learn to love God’s creatures as we have been loved by God to the best of our abilities. We aren’t infinite in power and love like God is, but we can definitely love with our limited abilities in limitless ways.

A Holy Week Sermon - 2023

This sermon was given by Senior Fellow Bianca Rati at the 2023 CreatureKind Holy Week service. You can watch the whole service here.

Hello everyone, good morning, good afternoon, or good evening wherever you are!

I would first like to thank CreatureKind for inviting me to speak on such a special occasion as Holy Week. Easter has always been my favorite holiday. I’m very honored.

Hours before his death, Jesus sat at the table with his friends and had dinner with them. I invite you to read with me a portion of their talk in Luke 22:19-20:

And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me." In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.”

I've been thinking a lot about bodies lately. The reason for this is because this is the theme for a year-long investigation in the podcast that I produce. And the body is a very difficult topic. At first glance, it looks like it will be easy. After all, everyone has a body, and it is our interaction interface in the world. But the truth is that body is not just our shell. It's who we are.

I believe that Easter is perhaps the Christian holiday that we think about the body the most. There's a song by The Many that hasn't gotten out of my head for the last few weeks. It’s called “Broken Body of Christ.” I kept thinking a lot about this body — broken, wronged, violated.

Another memory that wouldn't leave my mind was a 2020 Carnival parade, from a samba school in Rio de Janeiro, called Mangueira. Amidst a growing trend in fundamentalist evangelicalism, the samba school decided to imagine who Jesus would be if he were born in Brazil. One of the most striking images in the parade is this allegory of Jesus as a Black boy killed by police violence. In the samba, Jesus sings:

Did everyone understand my message?

Because, again, they have studded my body

The Prophets of Intolerance

Not knowing that hope

Glows brighter in the dark

There is no future without sharing

And there is no messiah with a gun in his hand

Curiously or not, Easter is also the Christian holiday in which the figure of an animal is very present, with the lamb as an allegory of Jesus. We recognize and relate the suffering of the body of this non-human animal to the suffering of the Body of Jesus. And as I continued to think about Christ's broken body, I continued to remember [animal] bodies that are being broken by injustice.

I said that Easter has always been my favorite holiday. But it was just in recent years that I have realized how much I was taught this story with a very individualistic interpretation. I was taught that Jesus died for my sins, that I helped kill Jesus, that I need to repent and change, that Jesus triumphed over death as a superhero for me. And I've always been bothered by Jesus's passivity in the face of death — or at least that's what it looked like — that he was passive in that situation. But Jesus was not passive. He was a framed prisoner sentenced to die by an imperialist and fundamentalist State.

The supposed “passivity” of Jesus's death shows us what injustice looks like. What injustice does to our bodies. God decided to have a body, and when They incarnated, They experienced what beings who inhabit marginalized places and bodies — that are being broken by the systems of white supremacy, capitalism, colonialism, racism, fundamentalism, misogyny, LGBTQIA-phobia, and speciesism — experience.

The truth is, we Christians are in the business of broken bodies. We are not pursuing individual greatness, we are pursuing collective justice. Real and lasting liberation is not the memory of a glorious past but a task carried out by broken bodies that build the future. This calling for justice inhabited the body of God incarnate on the cross and resurrection, and today inhabits the body of Christ as Their Church.

In the conversation that Jesus had with his friends at dinner, he said to them, “Pay attention to my body.” Individualistic interpretations of the Easter story prevent us from perceiving how [such injustice] is repeated in marginalized bodies today. These [individualistic] interpretations fill us with guilt and shame, but they don't propel us to challenge the systems that allow for their repetition.

The tradition of the Eucharist is a ritual to not only remember what injustice does to our bodies but also that in our communities we are collectively linked to the bodies of each other. That the food, the values, and the beliefs we share connect us deeply. To the point that there is no option if not to care for each other.

And that's why Jesus's resurrection should not be about individualistic triumph, but rather a demonstration of life prevailing in our broken bodies through a caring community of friends. For example, when the group of women who supported the ministry of Jesus decided, even in the midst of grief, to take care of the dead body of their friend one more time, they discovered before any men that he was alive. And then, when the men didn’t believe the women, Jesus appeared and showcased his disabled body, [teaching] the men to believe the women’s words. This group of friends, this chosen family, that were broken by injustice, they [did] lament, grief, eat, talk, rebuild, and believe together.

Because life shines the light of hope between the cracks in our broken bodies, I invite you to embrace our broken bodies. I invite you to continue to stand for broken bodies. I pray that as a community of friends who follow Jesus, we always keep that in mind.

Thank you for listening.

Living water for every living creature

Written by: Beatriz Teixeira

“On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’” John 7:37-38, NIV.

I was born in a region located in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest biome, in the state of São Paulo. I have lived there most of my life, and although São Paulo is probably most known for its industrialization, I have grown up loving its nature—the preserved parks, the beaches where the forest touches the sea, the mangroves, and even the green areas within the cities. The Atlantic Forest is abundant with water, and I have always felt connected to this element. Water is vital for any living being, and all mammals start life surrounded by water in the womb. Beyond that though, my feeling of connection to water — anterior and beyond awareness — has made many things in life more understandable to me, including within the Christian faith

That’s why the above passage of John’s gospel has stuck with me for years now. It somehow summarizes the relationship I believe Jesus establishes with us, God’s creatures. God is the one by whom we are sustained, through whom we live, dive in, and refresh ourselves, with whom we grow fruits, and by whom we enjoy life. And we who follow Jesus come to be channels of this living water, which I am going to discuss here. 

I’m no biblical scholar, and I don’t mean to give a complete and exhaustive analysis of this text, but I do intend to tell how my experience of becoming an intersectional environmentalist and animal advocate have been shaped by my faith, hoping that it resonates with other people.

 I believe personal identity is like a person’s relationship to water: we experience and grow into our identities even before we are aware of them or even before we can name who we are. Years before I formally learned that socio-economic class is an important distinction for life in a capitalist society, I was aware that I was privileged to have access to basic rights and necessities that others are not guaranteed—such as food, education, and a family that cared for me. Even before I knew the concepts of patriarchy or feminism, I felt wronged by how I was expected to behave as a girl—one who was assigned female at birth. All of these simple early perceptions—which came from my family, education, books, and experiences, and my early readings of the Gospels and other Christian ideas—gave me a strong sense of justice.

Also, I wondered what “having rivers of living water flowing from within me” should mean for bringing life to this world. And I’m not thinking about the birthing process. Rather, I mean daily acts that spread life-giving love, peace, and goodwill to humans, fellow creatures, and the earth. Considering the vital importance and multiple meanings of water, being a Christian should mean something more than caring for my own salvation or convincing other people to believe the same way I do.  

Believing I’m a channel of living water has guided many of my life decisions and changes in my understanding. Although I have always questioned ideologies that are common in traditional Christian spaces in Brazil, it took time to recognize my place as a Christian who is also feminist, antiracist, antiableist, affirming, intersectional environmentalist, and most recently, advocate for animals farmed for food, just as it took time to recognize my identity and my personal relationship to these issues. Actually, I can say that the learning process is ongoing. The fact that we are creatures who live because of water, soil, non-human animals, and other natural elements, while we also impact nature is hidden and challenged by ways of life in capitalist societies. 

An important moment in my journey was learning about the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, after George Floyd’s murder. By that time, Leah Thomas, a Black environmentalist from the United States, had started the platform Intersectional Environmentalist to raise awareness of the intersections between Black racial identity and environmentalism. The platform and the concepts communicated there helped me start to further explore and study things about which I had only abstract or general perceptions. An important quote from Leah has stuck with me: 

We can’t save the planet without uplifting the voice of its people, especially those most often unheard. We should care about the protection of people as much as we care about the protection of our planet—to me, these fights are the same. As a society, we often forget that humans are part of our global ecosystem and that we don’t exist separately from nature; we coexist with it each and every day.1

Leah Thomas is noting that the well-being of marginalized humans, like Black U.S. Americans, is often neglected in conversations about improving the well-being of natural environments and their non-human inhabitants. However, throughout my life, I absorbed the belief that human beings are more valuable than other animals and their habitats. For example, even with all of my just intentions and environmentalist inclinations, I have eaten animals, desired their flesh, and haven’t thought a lot about where my food came from or why I ate what I ate. Despite my desired connection to nature, when I thought about “having rivers of living water flowing from me,” I didn’t think that this water also flowed from non-human animals. My ideas of justice and love were very anthropocentric.

As I became more aware of environmental issues that directly impact food, I started thinking of going vegan, but I still had a speciesist view of non-human animals. I perceived humans as more valuable because of our cognitive capacities of creating cultures, civilizations, and art, and for being the stewards of creation. Even caring for non-human lives may be speciesist if we believe we have the ultimate power to condemn it or save it.

There’s a saying about women being like water, because we grow as we unite like streams and rivers grow as they reach the ocean. Well, I believe it’s true not only for women, but for all people who seek liberation for themselves and others. A river doesn’t end in itself, it’s part of a cycle and of a hydrographic basin. That’s why, since 2020, I have been progressively more involved in activism, and I have found wonderful groups of people with whom to fight for justice. However, it’s frequently difficult to find Christians who are committed to the issues I care about in my context. That’s why I decided to apply for the CreatureKind Fellowship Program. Although I still did not have a lot of connections with food issues, it seemed like a unique opportunity to learn with people who shared my faith and passions. And so it has been.

A few months ago, I decided to stop eating animals and go vegan. I’d like to share the living water with our fellow creatures rather than taking it from them. It has been a new challenge and a new way of putting my faith into practice, not only aligning my values to what I eat but also believing and acting for the liberation of non-human animals. Now, being Christian and an advocate for farmed animals also means practicing veganism by not consuming animal products and being politically engaged. More than the general challenges brought by a society with a strong animal product and dairy culture, it has also meant starting conversations with other Christians in my context who have never thought about these issues and are often resistant to discussing them. However, I consider that building communities is also part of my commitment as a Christian animal advocate. As Leah Thomas pointed out, the fights for people and the planet are the same, and I’d like to more explicitly add non-human animals to this scenario. 

I believe diversity is present not only among non-human species and not only among human identities but all over the world, including in all the manifestations of water. I believe this living water is for every creature. I believe it may flow from all of us.

1. Leah Thomas, The Intersectional Environmentalist (New York: Voracious, 2022), 13.↩

Cows are People, Too

Written by: Rev. Matthew Webber
I looked across the pastures on a frosty morning, just on the outskirts of town, and watched the steam rising off of the cattle as they grazed in an attempt to keep warm. I had no claim to these creatures as they were someone else’s herd, but they were familiar to me, having driven past them every day. Just minutes prior, I had kissed my dog on the head, telling him “Goodbye,” for the morning as I headed off to the church where I pastored and would go about my Monday tasks, preparing for the upcoming Sunday’s sermon. It would turn out, however, that the particularly chilly drive into the office that day would alter my entire outlook on life, as well as my vocational trajectory.

For several weeks, while sitting at my desk, I pondered the juxtaposition of my beloved Golden Retriever and the cattle I drove by every morning. Always wrestling with theological and ethical theories and how best to put them into practice, I struggled to find a means by which I could justify my behavior as a believer, as an espoused animal lover, and (at the time) a meat eater. Moreover, I was left asking myself, “What does it mean for me, as a part of the Church-at-large, to be in ministry centering the welfare of animals farmed for food?” Before long, I found myself back in graduate school, having stepped away from active pastoral ministry in the local church, in the hope of answering this question.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, a lesson that impacted me greatly came from Bernard Rollin who was a champion for the ethical treatment of nonhuman animals for most of his life. As a professor, Rollin worked extensively with ranchers worldwide and would repeatedly claim that he never taught the ranchers anything. Instead, he would ask the ranchers questions about nonhuman animals and their proper treatment, which allowed the ranchers to say what they knew. For many, this exercise helped overcome any cognitive dissonance that arose over time. The lesson for me was that individuals don’t need to be taught how to treat nonhuman animals; they simply need to remember something they have long since forgotten.

Suddenly, I was whisked back in my memory to the time on my grandpa’s farm when I was helping paint the barn. I say, “helping,” but surely the fact that I could only reach a few feet above the ground and that more paint ended up on me than on the barn conveys a very liberal sense of the term. Still, what I remember most is that I was terrified of these massive creatures who were curious about people near their barn. My grandfather told me that the cattle were more afraid of me than I was of them—although, I’m not sure that was actually true given my size compared to theirs. I kept an eye on them, and they kept a keen eye focused on me.

I, of course, survived the ordeal. And while this was not my first face-to-face encounter with cattle, it was the first time without a fence or something between us. It made me think, though, what it meant for these creatures to be more afraid of me than I was of them. What had I done to them to make them so fearful? As an adult, recalling this farmyard chore, the memory elicited thoughts of what it means to be fearful and the similarities between human and nonhuman emotions. These thoughts, combined with the memories of cattle on a cold Colorado morning, raised the question of why we might see cattle differently than we see a beloved dog. Is it due to species differences? Is it due to society? Perhaps it is due to proximity? Seeing the cattle through the windshield of my pickup was different from seeing the dog with whom I shared a home. Moreover, I came to understand that I still bear a responsibility for those around me, no matter who they are and regardless of their species.
I was introduced to Emanuel Levinas, a Jewish philosopher born in Lithuania, via a footnote in an article about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and ethics. With my interest piqued, I sought to wrap my mind around the concept of “the other” and what is humanity’s responsibility for or toward the “other” in one’s midst.1 Levinas’s use of the term “other” is not meant in a derogatory way, but rather designates any and every person who is not oneself. Thus, the “other” is every person who is “other than oneself.” Emphasizing the “other” rather than oneself is a stark contrast to the idea that we each have an “individual right” to be treated a certain way, saying instead that we each have a responsibility to the “other” in the world. And while there is some discussion about whether or not Levinas intended for his ethical theories to be applied to humans alone, the theory can teach us—or perhaps even remind us—that the “others” in our world do include nonhuman animals as well as our fellow humans. It may even be said that when individuals are responsible for and to those who are “other than” themselves, such behavior inevitably includes both human and nonhuman elements.

Briefly, and by no means exhaustively, the one who is “other than” me is not lesser than me, nor do I have any power to control or force my will on anyone. What I am called to witness is that, by simply existing, the “other” calls me to recognize the life that is within them and, as such, obey the commandment to preserve that individual’s life—i.e., “do not kill.” Rather than merely refrain from killing, though, I am called to ensure that this individual can live out their life, which means I am responsible for ensuring that the lives of “others” around me—which is everyone and anyone who is not me—continue being lived. Thus, I am responsible for ensuring the “other” does not starve, freeze, or be killed by anyone else, nor should they be exploited, abused, or oppressed.

Where Levinas says “other,” we can substitute the word “neighbor,” and consider the answers offered in the Gospels to the question, “Who is my neighbor?”2 Jesus—who was apt to remind individuals what they already knew about how to treat one another (Matthew 22:36-40; Mark 12:28-34; and Luke 10:25-28)—used the example of someone considered “other” in his example of how to act appropriately toward one’s “neighbor.” The term “neighbor” need not impose limits by connoting a sense of proximity. Included in the answer are some who remain unseen or marginalized by many in the world today. Hidden away behind giant walls or within hospital rooms while the world outside continues to unfold day after day. Who is the unseen in our world? Perhaps included in the unseen are workers who are integral in the continued lives of countless millions, yet they are seldom acknowledged by those who depend on the unseen “other.” Take, for instance, those who work on the floors of abattoirs. Are not these individuals our neighbors for whom we are called to care and ensure they can live healthy lives?
One of the most striking aspects of Levinas’s ethic of the “other” is that we are not only responsible for those in close proximity to ourselves but also to and for those we never encountered in person or even in thought. Despite referring to “the face” of the “other,” Levinas’s ethic describes one’s obligation to every “other” in the world, no matter who or where they might be. Moreover, it is the “other” who, regardless of who or where they might be, plays a significant role in defining the individual. In other words, the “others” in our world, whether seen or unseen, make me who I am. These “others” instruct me, without ever saying a word, by their very existence. What do they instruct me to do? They instruct me to ensure that they live and continue to live their lives. This claim is important, but I would also add that we must ensure that the “others” continue to live their lives humanely and without oppression. This is our obligation to the seen and unseen “other.” This is our responsibility to and for the seen and unseen neighbor.

Within this responsibility for the seen and unseen “other,” one can extend the call to ensure humane lives continue for the unseen nonhuman animals with whom we share the world. Surely these are unseen neighbors, whether they are unseen because humans turn away from the oppressive confines of industrial agriculture or because the closest many come to nonhuman animals is in the supermarket where labels add to the distance via the absent referent of calling porcine bodies “pork” or “bacon.” Reading Levinas next to the Gospels (Matthew 5:44; Mark 12:31-33; and Luke 10:27-29), I see much room for continued discussion of how we are to treat those in our midst but also those far away or hidden away, regardless of species.

This is a long answer to my question regarding ministry and farmed animals. My memories of cattle, as well as the fact that they feel fear and have eyes that convey much to even the smallest and most paint-covered observer, serve to remind me further that these “others” in bovine bodies call out to me, asking me to ensure their lives continue and may bear fruit. Rooted in the Gospels and with a little help from Levinas, I hope to further develop and extend this ethical responsibility for the “other” to include all of Creation.

In closing, I am grateful for the insights offered by Levinas. His was a voice I had not heard before 2019. Additionally, through CreatureKind, I am discovering new epistemologies and sources to better understand what it means to care for and take responsibility for one’s “neighbor” who is “other” than oneself. While I am still in the very early stages of discovery, wise minds have pointed me to the teachings of Indigenous peoples in the US North American context, who, rather than holding a view that people are entitled to certain aspects of life, we are instead called to be responsible for and to the others and for the world we share.
1. For further reading on Emmanuel Levinas and his ethical theory, see his works Emanuel Levinas, Totality and Infinity and Otherwise than Being: An Essay on Exteriority, (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press). ↩
2. Michael Fagenblat, Covenant of Creatures: Levinas’s Philosophy of Judaism, (Stanford: Stanford University Press), pg. 2.↩

Eating at the Service of Life

By: Liesl Stewart

Art by Zach Stewart

In my previous blog post, I used a conversation I overheard about the high cost of pot roast to write about the corporatization of our food systems–and specifically animal agriculture–in the US and the world. As corporations use industrial production methods to farm animals, Creation pays heavy costs. The earth, the environment and climate, plants, and animals (human and nonhuman) all suffer in the name of profit. I will talk more about these costs, but let me first talk about seeds and life.

According to the Gospels, Jesus sometimes told parables about seeds to explain the ways of his governance. I’m a gardener, so I do love these seed parables. For a few years now I’ve chewed over one particular parable in Mark’s Gospel:

He also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head.” (4:26-28 NRSV)

I find grace in this parable. The seed sprouts and grows, even when the farmer isn’t attentive to it. Yes, they scattered the seed, maybe even poured water over them; but the farmer couldn’t make the seeds themselves grow. The farmer’s work is to serve the life within the seeds, to help with the external factors that make the seeds flourish–watering, pruning, mulching, and feeding. The farmer even gets to rest from their work as part of the growing cycle.

The grace for me is the expansiveness of life formed within each tiny seed. A blueprint for growth is embedded in the seed’s matter, and a mysterious life force creates new, differentiated cells as if out of nothing. The seed grows to become the glorious plant it was created to be. Life pulses forth with vibrant color and splendor in God’s created order, and it is our humble, but sacred, work as human animals to serve this life. 

But we know the parabolic farmer could have gone to the fields and uprooted the seedlings. They had the power to bring death to those plants. And if we extrapolate this parable to the present era, human animals collectively have the power to affect weather patterns that bring death to the plants.

Today, our dominant global food systems don’t serve life. In his excellent book, The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith & Food Justice, Professor of Christian Theology and Ethics Christopher Carter delineates the ways the US and global food systems are built on the ideologies and business models of coloniality and white supremacy, which bring death to Creation.1 To serve corporate greed, human and nonhuman animals are treated as “less than.” This food system is rooted in the beliefs that some people are worth less than others, and that, as people, nonhuman animals and the earth are ours to exploit.

In his book, Carter makes a clear call to reject this corporatized system and unhitch ourselves from food institutions dealing death to Creation, and instead to “create ‘food institutions’ that are at the service of life.”2

At the service of life. 

I find this phrase so helpful when I think about the kinds of food institutions I want to support. I’ve been learning about food systems, and I believe it’s clear the prevailing corporatized food system doesn’t serve life.  

Let’s look at the costs of corporatized farming, costs that don’t serve life:

The corporatization of a country’s farming comes at a terrible cost to the people working in food production systems. It isn’t a coincidence that, in the U.S., meat corporations recruit our society’s most vulnerable people as employees. The system relies on the exploitation of people—disproportionately BIPOC and immigrants—who are desperate for any income, and therefore are willing to work for low wages under harsh and dangerous working conditions, without job security. 

The corporatization of a country’s farming comes at a terrible cost to the animals that are farmed. Every nonhuman animal that is farmed is a sentient being able to suffer. When animals are valued only as units of profit, the standards for kind or even acceptable treatment drop lower than the poop-covered cement floors they spend their days on. For their whole miserable lives—from inception to slaughter—these animals are owned by corporations, and their quality of life counts for nothing against their potential to bring profit.

The corporatization of a country’s farming comes at a terrible cost to our climate. We are facing catastrophic climate change if greenhouse gas emissions aren’t reduced. Animal agriculture accounts for 14.5%-18% of human-caused emissions. To meet increasing demands for meat,  forests are being cleared to grow feed crops, causing stored carbon to be released into the atmosphere. There are differing opinions about whether meat can ever be produced sustainably (or with the welfare of animals farmed for food in mind) for the global population; but it’s certain that if we are going to avoid catastrophic climate change, we need to substantially reduce our consumption of animal-based foods produced in industrialized farming systems.

The corporatization of a country’s farming comes at a terrible cost to public health and the environment. It’s impossible to have thousands of animals living and dying in confined spaces without harmful consequences for public health (antibiotic resistance, the spread of zoonotic diseases and pathogens, etc.) and the environment (pollution, contaminants, and chronic illness). In addition, it costs ordinary people a lot of money to address the harm caused by these corporations. These externalized costs never show up in the companies’ accounting books; they are paid for by the public—either directly or through taxes.

Back to that conversation about the high cost of pot roast. The cost of the meat produced in industrialized farming systems is far bigger than the prices we pay at the cash register. These terrible costs don’t serve life. 

Many of us want to rethink the foods we eat and the sources of our food, which could lead to a repositioning in response. We can start by paying attention to where we source our food. There are many localized food networks offering good alternatives to the corporate food system. 

If we eat animal-based foods, we can choose to eat much less, and commit to sourcing from small farms that are known to farm at the service of life. (They need our support!) For those who wish to reduce consumption of animal products, CreatureKind offers guidance with DefaultVeg, a program that helps reframe what constitutes a good meal.1 Or one could consider eating a wholly plant-based diet. There have always been indigenous people eating plant-based diets who are guiding the way for others. Now, many people who have been raised within corporatized food systems are breaking away and choosing plant-based diets.

Changing eating and food shopping habits can feel overwhelming, but good, lasting changes don’t have to be dramatic or abrupt. I can speak from my own experience: over the past sixteen years, my family has been on a food journey that has transformed the way we eat. It has been a gracious journey of many small changes made over time. Through participation in a food buying collective, we thoughtfully and intentionally changed the foods we buy, from whom we buy, and our purchasing rhythms. 

The grace has also been that we haven’t journeyed alone. There’s still much to learn, and we have been strengthened by joining our efforts with other people seeking to eat in the service of life.

1. This book is well worth reading to understand our food system’s historical and current contexts. Christopher Carter, The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, and Food Justice (University of Illinois Press, Champaign, 2021). ↩
2. Christopher Carter, The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, and Food Justice (University of Illinois Press, Champaign, 2021), Introduction, Chapters 1 & 2, Rakuten Kobo.↩
3. Around the world more people are eating more meat each year, and that increase is mostly produced through industrialized systems. In 2018 the average person in the USA ate a record 220 pounds of meat. (Eleanor Cummins, “America’s obsession with meat, explained. Here’s the beef,” Popular Science, Oct 28, 2019, https://www.popsci.com/why-americans-eat-so-much-meat/)↩
4. Advocates for regenerative farming methods argue that when farmed animals are allowed to graze and forage naturally on managed pastures, water, carbon and nutrients are sequestered in the soil. They argue that in this way regenerative systems improve ecosystem resilience and mitigate climate change. ↩
5. What is DefaultVeg? DefaultVeg is simple. By making plant-based food the default, we make the choice at every meal to help animals, the environment, and other people (including farm and meatpacking plant workers all over the world). At church or other group events, we give people the choice to opt in for meals with animal products if necessary, instead of having to opt out of them. A DefaultVeg approach is simple, inclusive, and cost-effective.↩

“Be still and know…” A Lenten Reflection

As I write, I am preparing for the season of Lent.

Lent this year has come at exactly the right time. Oh, how we need God’s invitation: “Be still and know that I Am God.” (Ps 46:10) It’s all too easy to be dismayed by events in the world, both near and far away. For many of us, anxiety is a sickly layer on our skin, and the air feels thick with fear

The season of Lent, when we remember Jesus’s forty days in the wilderness, invites us to make space to actively pay attention, listen, look, and wait for God’s kind and loving Presence as we prepare to celebrate Easter. Lent invites us to be honest about our own pain, disappointment, or apathy, as well as “to bear witness to the suffering of the world.” 1 It invites us to lay aside things that we turn to for distraction instead of looking to God. It invites us to repent and return to God from the unhealthy places to which we’ve wandered away. It also invites us to align our hearts and actions with the Kin-dom values that Jesus taught and demonstrated as He bid His disciples, “Follow Me”.

Lent is a deeply personal journey I undertake every year. It can be both restful and hard. I will miss the comforts I’ve decided to forgo, but I look forward to the lovely practices I’ll begin for my own soul’s delight. I’m weary, so I expect it will be a difficult daily choice to expand the times that I will make to be more present with God in silence and prayer. 

This reflective work looks both inward and outward because I know I exist within widening concentric circles of community that start close and eventually span the globe. I share this earth with my close family and friends, and with billions of neighbors—human and animal creatures—with whom my own well-being is intrinsically tied. So, Lent for me also must acknowledge the places where this interconnectedness and mutual dependency are troubled.

Therefore, as I examine my ways during this Lenten season, I will pay attention to my social location and participation within the systems that affect my fellow earth-sharers. We live within many complex systems built on injustices of every kind, rotten to the bone. This year I am particularly focused upon the food system, examining ways my participation might need to be reimagined and changed.

Globally, the dominant systems that regulate the production, supply, and consumption of food are rooted in oppression and violence to human and animal creatures, the Earth, and the environment. Increasingly, food systems are industrializing their production methods, and they are consolidating into fewer corporations that process, distribute, and sell the food we eat, especially in wealthier countries (the countries of the Global North). In South Africa, where I live, four supermarket corporations now dominate the food system, exerting power over food access and prices. 

Globally, food corporations control many of the pathways where food travels, from farms to our plates, telling us what we can eat so that they can maximize their profits. The animals as well as the people laboring to produce or process our food are exploited under regulations that are grossly inadequate. Their well-being is of little value as they live and work under awful conditions. The earth is badly treated for short-term profits, and our environment is being harmed. 

In the ways that crop farming has been intensified by using economies of scale to produce the highest yields, the same has applied to animal farming. Corporations have moved into the business of farming animals, in many places replacing smaller family farms. This is happening in many countries.

By treating animals as production units, large numbers of animals live packed into Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs), commonly known as factory farms. Factory farming doesn’t look much like farming. The animals are bred and fed to grow as rapidly as possible so that profits can bank more quickly. In their shortened lives, they can’t behave naturally according to their species. After they are transported to slaughterhouses, the stressed animals are killed on production lines that often move so rapidly that the animals don’t always die quickly, and the safety of the workers is very much at risk. 

CAFOs are terrible news for the animals and workers involved, but we don’t see this when we buy our meat, dairy, and egg products from the supermarket. The suffering and horror are hidden by the plastic wrap and marketing labels showing pictures of happy animals and idyllic farms.

We don’t see the evils because CAFOs are located on enclosed lands in rural communities. In the USA and to some extent globally, CAFOs are largely placed in economically vulnerable communities that are over-represented by People of Color. When many animals are confined to live densely packed together, there are risks for public health and for the environment, especially in surrounding areas. These communities have to live with the stench, the environmental damage, and the pathogens that leach from the CAFOs, infecting their air and water sources.

Intensified farming is relatively new to the world. It has only gained momentum over the past seventy years. But the system is already so entrenched that many of us don’t notice what is happening right under our noses as we fry our bacon and eat our cheesy omelets. It all seems too normal! Because we are disconnected from the sources of our food we don’t know what is happening to bring it to our kitchens. 

This season of Lent can be a time to pay attention to our food systems. It can be the opportunity to look beyond the packaging and begin naming the evils done to produce our food. It can be a chance to seek more connection with food sources, even if that’s done in very small steps. 

Lent is a good season to pay special attention to what is happening in God’s Kin-dom, and to bear witness to the suffering of fellow earth-sharers. It’s a sacred window to be still and allow ourselves to be shaped by our nurturing, loving God. 

The Ugandan theologian Emmanuel Katongole writes:

The salvation promised by God to God’s people, to which the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus is a witness, is not merely spiritual: it is a concrete social, material, political, and economic reality that is ushered into existence by God’s revelation in history. The failure of Christian social imagination is a failure to imagine and live in this new reality, which in 2 Corinthians 5:17 St Paul refers to as God’s “new creation.”2

With God’s present help, during Lent we can both lament the oppressive systems of our world, and we can seek social imagination for systems and participation that reflect God’s love for all of Creation.

“Be still and know that I Am God.”

1. Cole Arthur Riley (@blackliturgies), Instagram graphic, February 26, 2022, https://www.instagram.com/p/Cac1leHOnoM/?utm_medium=copy_link. ↩
2. Emmanuel Katongole, The Sacrifice of Africa: A Political Theology for Africa (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 2011), 11.↩

Deepening our Creation Imaginations

By Jayda Kechour

I have chosen to share what I have learned from three of our readings through CreatureKind. The first reading is a book by Randy Woodley, Shalom and the Community of Creation: An Indigenous Vision. Woodley’s book stirs within me a call to pursue a life of shalom. His book reminds me that if one part of creation is suffering then we are not living in complete harmony and wholeness. Woodley calls readers to be a part of the healing and reconciliation process on earth with all creatures by looking at the ministry of Jesus which is congruent with the Harmony Way through Indigenous perspectives. The second reading is a book by Sunaura Taylor named Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation. Taylor clearly reveals how all living beings, those disabled and those not, suffer from systems created by humans that are disabling and oppressing through ableism. Taylor has helped shape my disability theology and has convinced me that disability and animal liberation must go hand in hand. Lastly, the third reading is a book by Melanie L. Harris titled Ecowomanism: African American Women and Earth-Honoring Faiths. Harris teaches the importance of environmental justice perspectives by women of color particularly women of African descent. I have learned how necessary ecowomanist perspectives are in understanding earth justice and liberation for all creatures. These three readings have deepened my faith and have inspired me to reshape my role with creation care and justice as a follower of Jesus. 

Ministrocentric

We are one part of creation. In Randy Woodley’s book Shalom and the Community of Creation: An Indigenous Vision, Woodley shares that Indigenous views reveal that life is both biocentric and anthropogenic. Indigenous views show that humans uniquely relate to the rest of creation. This view is described as ministrocentric which means that life is centered on serving creation, maintaining harmony, assuring reciprocity, conducting ceremonies of mediation, and more, to maintain harmony and restore harmony whenever it is broken. A ministrocentric life is one of restoring harmony through gratitude, reciprocity and ceremony between our Creator, humans, and all other members of creation.1 This view is sacred and meaningful. How can Christians live out the role of maintaining and restoring harmony? I learned through Woodley that living a shalom life means we must be intentional about bringing balance and harmony to creation. I extend Woodley’s offer and invite us to imitate Jesus’s ministry of shalom. Woodley explains the heart of shalom:
A society concerned with shalom will care for the most marginalized among them. God has a special concern for the poor and needy, because how we treat them reveals our hearts, regardless of the rhetoric we employ to make ourselves sound just. Jeremiah 22:16 (NLT) equates the social task of caring to revealing a genuine relationship with God: '[King Josiah] gave justice and help to the poor and needy, and everything went well for him. ‘Isn’t that what it means to know me?’ says the LORD.2

First, “a society concerned with shalom will care for the most marginalized among them.” Are we caring for those most marginalized? I ask, “how do I benefit unknowingly or knowingly from an unjust system while others experience harm?” Caring for justice and sharing compassion to others is to know God better. 

Nonhuman Creature Justice

During high school I began to realize how my food choices were being made at the expense of the captivity, torment, and suffering of nonhuman creatures. Sunaura Taylor elaborates in her book Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation that the disability farmed animals experience is inseparable from the environment humans create.

The mother pig is made utterly immobile not by physical difference or disease but by the metal bars of her gestation crate. The hen suffers from pain, but whether that pain is due to a broken leg, overcrowding, complete darkness, or the death of her cagemate is impossible to know. The dairy cow is euthanized not because she cannot walk but because she has become a symbol of contamination.3
It was easy for me to go to the grocery store and buy packages of cheap meat without knowing details about the lives behind these containers. I learned that cows, pigs, and chickens are part of our most marginalized neighbors in creation. I had been benefiting from a shattering system, one contrary to peace and harmony. God created nonhuman creatures to flourish, roam, and have an abundance of clean air, fresh water, and nutritious food from the earth. The more I learned about the pain and death that nonhuman creatures experience on a massive scale every single day, the more I wanted to be vegan. As a beloved child of Abba, 4 I want to live a life that supports creation like our Creator does. I have yet to experience a church setting that addresses environmental sin or how God’s plants and nonhuman creatures are not being loved well by humans. If we pursue a life of shalom as followers of Jesus, we must soften our ears and listen to the marginalized. Taylor writes, “We choose to ignore cries from nonhuman creatures.”5 Indian author and political activist Arundhati Roy poignantly writes, “There’s really no such thing as the ‘voiceless.’ There are only the deliberately silenced, or the preferably unheard.”6
For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.7 Human imaginations are powerful gifts from the Creator. They allow us to consider realities that commonly provide for human consumption, yet would not be witnessed by most humans on a daily basis, such as the cries of nonhuman creatures in horrifying food production settings. They speak to us every day when they cry out in pain or try to move away from our prods, electrodes, knives, and stun guns. Animals tell us constantly that they want out of their cages, and that they want to be reunited with their families, or that they don’t want to walk down the kill chute. Animals express themselves all the time, and many of us know it. If we didn’t, factory farms and slaughterhouses would not be designed to constrain any choices an animal might have.8

Disability Justice

Through her book Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, Sunaura Taylor has helped me understand that all bodies are subjected to the oppression of ableism.

All animals–both those we human beings would call disabled and those we would not–are devalued and abused for many of the same basic reasons disabled people are. They are understood as incapable, as lacking in the various abilities and capacities that have long been held to make human lives uniquely valuable and meaningful. They are, in other words oppressed by ableism. 9
Taylor discusses ableism and animals and she highlights an important argument. Taylor argues that beings with neurotypical human capacities must not be inherently more valuable than those without.10 Cathryn Bailey, a feminist scholar furthers the conversation and says, “the problem is not reason itself but rather the ways in which reason has been held up as separate from and more valuable than emotion, feeling, and other ways of knowing and being.”11 As a human, and a follower of Jesus, how can I care and love living beings just for their being? I argue we need to expand our imaginations about who we are as humans in creation and how mysterious and wonderful our neighbors are. “We are just beginning to comprehend the vast array of abilities found on this planet, and human abilities are but a small fraction of them.”12 Our imaginations must be tied to shalom. In other words, shalom is to view everything as sacred because our Creator cares for all. Each day creation invites us to humbly appreciate the intricacies of every living being and teaches us that everything connects us to our Creator. How can we view and treat nonhuman farmed creatures and humans with and without disabilities as sacred? How can our food systems be environments of flourishing rather than disabling for humans and nonhumans? Are we willing to stop supporting factory farms where countless lives of nonhuman creatures are massacred and disabled? Are we willing to follow Jesus and allow these creatures to be in a thriving environment? I hope so.

Ecowomanism

Ecowomanism: African American Women and Earth-Honoring Faiths by Melanie L. Harris is 

critical reflection, contemplation, and praxis-oriented study of environmental justice from the perspectives of women of color and particularly women of African descent. It links a social justice agenda with ecojustice, recognizing the parallel oppressions that women of color have often survived when confronting racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, and similar oppressions that the earth is facing through environmental degradation.13

I am thankful for Harris’s wisdom because I feel that I and communities of faith where I belong/frequent/participate in would benefit from her reflection on climate justice.

At the same time that conceptualizing the unique connections women have with the planet as mother, or the feminization of the planet, can serve as a connecting point to the lives of women, there is also an eerie familiarity to the structural nature of violence that the earth has faced (ecoviolence) and the structural forms of violence that black women have faced historically. 14

Structural violence that Black women have endured are interwoven to the violence of mother earth. Reading the voices of African and African American women in Harris’ book resonates within me the necessity to include ecowomanist methodologies so we can not only learn their histories and traditions but also follow their leadership which is transformative and centers earth justice. Christians are called to “act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God,” therefore, ecowomanism can lead us with deeper connection with justice issues that impact our planet and people on its margins. From them we can become more aware of environmental changes and implement climate smart practices for our collective future. I argue that one of the urgent needs of the Western American churches is to understand justice issues such as environmental justice, climate justice, and food and land sovereignty as connected to animal liberation, disability inclusion, and Black and Indigenous lives, to name a few. Christians can take part in the incarnational hope of Jesus and ecowomanist lessons are pivotal to this ministry.

Revelations

As I reflect on how I have grown through CreatureKind, I recognize new perspectives, dreams, ideas, and voices within me that have been strengthened. The books we read are achingly compelling. I feel a forceful tug from our readings, which constantly pushes me to reshape and rebuild my role in creation. I am beginning to unpeel layers of systems that exploit and disable living beings. I feel like I am holding the cheeks of stories interwoven on pages that are shattering-liberating-and yet, I feel as if I am only gazing at the ripples of chilling waters into which I have not yet had to plunge. I am learning more that I am easily disheartened and overwhelmed by the world and environmental perils, the state of mother earth and where we are heading. Yet, there is hope. Earth is active, breathing; she is well-alive. As Chris Doran illuminates in his book, Hope in the Age of Climate Change, expectational hope for all of creation to be reconciled with God one day means that we are to actively bring hope alive on earth now.15What an invitation and a daring honor. How can Christians help create a life for nonhuman creatures, such as farmed animals, to live in a way that is even a pale reflection of the hope still to come? We must dig deeper in church settings and address despairing structural systems so that we can support or create new ones that are more justiceoriented. Our imagination for creation needs to grow deeper. Through CreatureKind, I have learned words such as ministrocentric, ableism, and ecowomanism, as well as perspectives from authors who are Indigenous, Black female, and disabled. I anticipate learning more rich insight about climate and ocean justice in our following readings. Specifically, I feel more connected to my Godgiven dream through CreatureKind than I ever have before. The more I learn from CreatureKind’s mission to care for animal welfare in faith communities, I learn about my authentic design in Christ. I am created to love my neighbors well and help bring hope and reconciliation on earth for all creation to flourish. My dream is this:

Route to Roots / Jayda’s Farm

The soil is rich with microorganisms. Rescued cows, pigs, and chickens find shelter and roam freely on the land. The hungry people are enjoying a rich vegan meal outside in the grass on wooden tables with colorful cushions. The dishes are cooked by the community with ingredients straight from the growing garden as an act of sovereignty and resistance. There is praise and dancing. Nonhuman creatures are thriving eating alongside human creatures, as we all abundantly feast from the bounty of the earth. Peoples, once displaced from the land are safe from environmental harm and other violence, feasting as one. We are thankful. We pray and thank our Creator for the gift of earth’s precious food. This land is home for all to return to the route of our roots. We are all soil creatures, loved by our Creator.

How are your Godlysized dreams serving the whole community of creation?

1. Woodley, Randy. Shalom and the Community of Creation: An Indigenous Vision (Prophetic Christianity Series (PC)), 2012. 61↩
2. Woodley, Shalom and the Community of Creation: An Indigenous Vision, 25.]↩
3. Taylor Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, New York: (The New Press, 2016), 38.↩
4. God as Father↩
5. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 62.↩
6. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 62.↩
7. Romans 8:19-23, NIV.↩
8. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 63.↩
9. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 21.↩
10. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 70.↩
11. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 71↩
12. Sunaura, Beasts of Burden: Animal and Disability Liberation, 79.↩
13. Melanie L. Harris, Ecowomanism: African American Women and Earth-Honoring Faiths, New York: (Orbis Books, 2017), (Kindle Location 2619). Kindle Edition. ↩
14. Harris, Ecowomanism: African American Women and Earth-Honoring Faiths, 2630↩
15. Chris Doran, Hope in the Age of Climate Change: Creation Care This Side of the Resurrection, Oregon: (Cascade Books, 2017).↩

Representing God to Creation

by Liesl Stewart

Artist: Zach Stewart

As we’ve collectively lived the trauma of this global pandemic, I’ve often pondered how fragile our lives truly are. For many of us, our lives have been painfully impacted and disrupted by the spread of a virus we can’t even see without a microscope.

The second chapter of Genesis tells the story of God creating humankind from the dust, giving our species life that we carry fragilely within our bodies of ‘clay’. Additionally, the story describes animal creatures as made from the ‘ground,’ also dependent on God. This creaturely dependence upon God is affirmed throughout the rest of the Christian scripture. The writer and speaker Nekeisha Alexis-Baker beautifully summarizes that the overarching witness of the Bible “testifies to the shared essence of human and nonhuman animal beings as ones who are made of dust, who return to dust, and whom God animates with a common breath.”1

Our shared beginning as mud cakes formed from this earth should remind us to live humbly with each other. We are mutually dependent on our Creator in our shared fragility.

As we live our days within God’s unfolding story, are we mindful that we are but dust? Do we live humbly with our fellow human and nonhuman creatures?

Newscasts bear daily witness to hostility and abuse between humans. Equally, it’s clear that animals generally don’t fare well at the hands of humans. Sadly, for too many wild species, we are cataloging their extinction due to loss of habitats because people and governments have failed to share the earth in the ways that First Nations and indigenous people have modeled for centuries. By magnitude, the worst cases of nonhuman animal treatment are for the sake of food production, with human laborers suffering as well.

For the past 28 years, I’ve lived in South Africa, a country I married into. Centuries of colonialism and the years of Apartheid rule entrenched violence within our dominant food system. The government used laws formed in white supremacy to work violence against People of Color by robbing them of their farmland.

Violence continues to permeate the food system. Many farm laborers are exploited with the very low wages they are paid by large, mostly white-owned farms. A few supermarkets and large food companies dominate food sales, and they make nutritious food inaccessible to many people by setting high prices. The land itself is exploited by the industrial farming methods used by large-scale farms.

The violence within the food system extends to the treatment of farmed animals. Increasingly, animals are treated as if their only worth is as meat, or for the eggs and milk they produce; whether they live decent chicken lives, or pig lives, or cow lives doesn’t factor. They are treated as units on a factory conveyor belt, not as created beings who can feel and suffer.

While the evils of Apartheid cannot be overstated, South Africa reflects the global trends for producing and distributing large amounts of food with the most efficiency, for the most convenience, at the highest profit. ‘Big Agriculture’ has replaced more localized food systems, creating wealth for a few multinational corporations. People are valued only as they serve the system, either as expendable laborers, or as consumers. Within this mix, too many people are food insecure, excluded from having enough nutritious food to sustain good health. The land is over-farmed to produce high yields. “The result is degraded and destroyed habitats, miserable animals, insecure and abused workers, unjust trade agreements, and lonely eaters.”2 Our global food systems perpetuate violence.

When it comes to meat and other animal products, the USA and other countries in the minority world have perfected factory farming efficiencies. Sadly, the rest of the world has taken their example, and now most of the world’s farmed animals are forced to live terrible lives and die terrible deaths in factory farms.

Putting the focus on animal creatures, what exactly is our human responsibility to the rest of Creation?

In Gen 1:26, God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule” —or dominate —“over every living creature.” For many years I lived uncomfortably with this God-given mandate to exercise dominion over our fellow earthlings. It felt violent to me, and I could see the unbearable evidence of humankind wielding violence against the earth and environment, against animal creatures, against each other. Alas, the Hebrew word in the text —radah —does mean ‘to rule’ or ‘to dominate.’ So, we can’t simply wish away that portion of our sacred text.

I now understand that this mandate to rule wasn’t God’s sanction to abuse or exploit Creation. We mishandle the text when we focus only on the dominion directive, but not on the preceding words: “Let us make human beings in Our image, in Our likeness, so that…”

Pause for one moment and breathe in this astounding truth: God’s image is formed into every person who has and ever shall live!

We are image-bearers of the Creator of the heavens and the earth, and we carry this image so that we will reflect God’s likeness as we live. With our dominion, we are meant to represent God to God’s own Creation. This is a special responsibility that we carry as humankind, and we sow devastation when we forget Whom we represent.

Our relationships with living creatures are meant to embody the merciful, protective ways of God. Dr. Tiana Bosman, a South African Hebrew language scholar, explains that human dominion should be understood as servitude, emulating Jesus’s ways of servant leadership to bring reconciliation to the world.3 We imitate Jesus, “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant.” (Phil 2:6,7) The scholar Carol Adams asks, “What kind of God do we as God’s representatives on earth make known through our treatment and killing of animals? If dominion is a good thing granted by God, why don’t we own up to what the dominion we assert for ourselves actually involves?”4

But we have forgotten in Whose image we are made. We have forgotten our fragility. We have stepped far from serving all Creation with humility.

Let’s be mindful of Whom we represent to the rest of Creation. Let’s carry this responsibility with holy awe, even if it means we will need to change our food sources and eating behaviors.

1. Nekeisha Alexis-Baker, “Doesn’t the Bible Say that Humans Are More Important than Animals?” in A Faith Embracing All Creatures: Commonly Asked Questions about Christian Care for Animals, eds. Tripp York and Andy Alexis-Baker (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2012), 50.↩
2. Norman Wirzba, Food and Faith: A Theology of Eating (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 12.↩
3. Dr. Tiana Bosman is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Religion and Theology at the University of the Western Cape (South Africa). These thoughts were shared with me in conversation. They came from her preparation to present the paper “Rulers or servants?: A re-reading of Psalm 8 concerning the place of mankind in the Age of the Anthropocene” at the Planetary Entanglement: Theology and the Anthropocene conference (October 2021), a collaboration between two South African and one Dutch university.↩
4. Carol J. Adams, “What About Dominion in Genesis?” in A Faith Embracing All Creatures: Commonly Asked Questions about Christian Care for Animals, eds. Tripp York and Andy Alexis-Baker (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2012), 10.↩