Food for Thought

"Don't laugh at me, but lately I have been thinking a lot about becoming a vegetarian."

Those were the words I e-mailed to Best Friend this morning when she asked me why I asked her if she eats gelatin. She has been a vegetarian since she was a kid. I always admired her for it but never thought it was for me. Now all of a sudden it's on my mind a lot.

A couple of years ago she was working on something about Christianity and Vegetarianism and she asked me if I knew of any biblical references she could use. All I could find was when God told Noah, "The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything" (Genesis 9:2-3). So I told her "I guess God said it was okay" and figured that was all. She came back to me with a website called JesusVeg.com that argued that in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were vegetarians. Only after the Fall did God let them start killing animals for food.

As you know, my book group recently read The Problem of Pain, in which Lewis addressed the issue of animal suffering. He didn't argue for vegetarianism, but he did say that God didn't intend for animals to prey upon each other. That was a result of the Fall as well. My group leader raised the question, "If we're supposed to be trying to get close to perfection like in the Garden of Eden, should we be vegetarians?" A legitimate question. We just looked at each other like "Yeah, we probably should," but that was the end of it.

Lately it has been resurfacing again and again. The few times that I have eaten meat in the past few days, it's not the same. I don't feel like it's a good thing to do. It's not like I couldn't live without it, and I don't need to be perpetuating violence in the world. I haven't made any definite decisions yet, though.