Birds and beasts

Last Sunday afternoon, a ‘Blessing of Animals’ was held at the Munlochy by St John’s Church Arpafeelie. It marked St Francis’ Day on 4^th October – St Francis (1181-1226) had a particular affinity with God’s creatures. And an article in the October issue of Life and Work, the Church of Scotland magazine reports that Animal Blessing services are becoming increasingly popular in Kirks around the country.

It’s a timely reminder of what Christians believe about animals – that God is their creator too, that God has breathed life into them one by one, and rejoices in them. In the Creation story Adam names not just each species, but each individual beast. The whales are God’s playmates, the Bible suggests. According to Jesus, each creature, even the most insignificant sparrow is known to God. And each animal, as we pet owners know, has its own character and personality.

This truth calls us not to a warm sentimental focus on small cute creatures on which we can project human characteristics, but an admiration for all beasts, their distinctiveness, power and fitness for their environment.

And we as human beings – infinitely more precious to God than birds and animals - are given responsibility for their care and protection. We are not doing particularly well at this: species are threatened with extinction; we hear of horrific examples of cruelty to animals by individuals and through factory farming processes.

Now you might argue that with the tragedies of Ebola in Africa, and inhumane fanaticism in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere we have more urgent things to concern us than the wellbeing of animals. There’s only a certain amount of anguish we can bear before, in self-protection, we shut ourselves off from things we’d rather not know.

Which is why an animal blessing service, in which priest or minister thanks God for each animal (not just ‘a dog’ or ‘a cat’, but this particular dog, this particular cat), for their uniqueness, and for what they mean to the humans they accompany through life confronts us with our responsibilities. If we are genuinely compassionate people, it seems to me, we will be compassionate in all our relationships, including those with non-human creatures.

My question is this: how can our animal-loving God bear to be present in a world where not only do humans destroy one another in war and terrorism, but where the survival of the whole animal kingdom depends on a food-chain sustained by hunting and killing more vulnerable species? And why did God seem to endorse an Old Testament style of worship involving the regular slaughtering of thousands of animals?

The Victorian poet Alfred Tennyson puts it well. ‘We trusted God was love indeed,’ he wrote, ‘and love Creation’s final law.’ But, he added ‘Nature red in tooth and claw with ravine shrieks against this creed.’

Deep questions, with no easy answers. But the Bible is clear on one point: the way things are is not as they should be, nor as they will be. The Bible envisages a future where there is no death, no predation, where the lion and the lamb lie down together. What this means in literal or symbolic terms we can’t know, but we believe God promises us a radically different way of being, an infinitely better future.

As Christians we have rightly emphasised the fact that God rescues individuals – liberating, forgiving, transforming, bringing hope. But in fact the salvation God offers is holistic – not only will humans be reborn into a new dimension of hope where death, darkness and pain are strangers, but also the whole universe, and every living creature. This is the bigness of the Christian gospel – God through Christ is making all things new.

Pain and joy co-exist in the divine heart. God cradles the broken universe in God’s arms as the priest holds a kitten, and whispers over it words of blessing.

But the promised dimension of hope keeps breaking into the here-and-now, not least through our actions as Christians in expressing God’s values and showing compassion.

So there’s the question of our food. Is it right, given that we regard death as an aberration, and are working to realise in the present the values of a promised future, is it right that we should feed ourselves at the expense of the life of another of God’s creatures?

If God is aware of each individual sparrow, Jesus taught, how much more must God care for us, in all our struggles and questioning as we journey in sorrow and in joy through an imperfect world.

As animals were brought to the priest for blessing on Sunday, so we are invited to come into God’s presence and in coming are blessed, and convinced that despite all appearances at times, love is ‘Creation’s final law.’

(Christian Viewpoint column from the Highland News dated 9th October 2015)