Until recent years, I held fixed ideas about animals. In my worldview they simply belonged to a lower species of being and existed to serve the needs of humans, not their own. Unlike us, they were destined for extinction when they died and investing any human emotion in them was merely sentimental.
I also considered animals to be entirely programmed by nature so that they could not act with any spontaneity. They had been wound up like clocks to run at someone else’s behest and they had no freedom to vary the pattern. The main thing they did all day was to look for food.
Of course, it was not ethical to harm animals or subject them to pain for one’s entertainment. But the immorality of this action came, not because of the hurt that animals suffered but rather because such actions did harm to us human beings. It was beneath our own dignity to act like that.
In themselves, animals had no rights because their purpose was to submit to humans. Thus I regarded scruples about eating animal meat as unrealistic. That does not mean I wanted to be there when animals were slaughtered but I considered them to be at the disposal of hungry people.
More positively, animals in my view displayed God’s creative powers. Their beauty meant much to me and I cringed at the prospect of some species becoming extinct. I loved to see the great beasts and as a child welcomed the arrival of the Ringling Brothers circus when it came to Boston. My favorite wild animal was the tiger with its fearful speed and power.
At this point in history, however, much in my way of looking at animals has become old-fashioned and passé. Modern thought rejects the idea of them being merely our possessions. More and more people now see animals as belonging to themselves. The animal rights movement tries to assure that in law they will have prerogatives that cannot be infringed on by humans.
No doubt I have been influenced in my change of views by a decade’s experience living with a cat. Phileas J. Fogg, our house pet, has taught me to look upon his kind with different eyes. Like millions of other Americans, I have come to feel a kinship with an animal that has proven instructive. We have a relationship that is personal on my side and that has a certain undefined other quality on his.
New questions have risen in my mind, and previously unrecognized issues that need thoughtful response. Does my Christian tradition, as I used to understand it, give enough respect to animals? Are there approaches different from the ones I inherited that can help shape a spirituality based on reverence for non-human creatures?
By and large, the mainline Christian tradition has neglected animals. The classic theologians have held what the Oxford University scholar Andrew Linzey calls a “dismissive” attitude on the subject.
But the same scholar has identified secondary Christian traditions that provide a foundation for appreciating animals spiritually.
Following the lead given by the New Testament, from the early centuries many Christians believed that the saving work of Jesus extended beyond human beings to all of creation. That means animals, too, are touched by Christ’s redemption.
Christian writings not accepted as part of the Bible recommend two qualities that might shape a Christian’s attitude toward animals: kinship and peaceableness. These spiritual virtues stand out in the lives of some saints.
St. Francis of Assisi, of course, became the most famous, if only for his habit of calling other beings brother and sister in recognition of their status as fellow creatures of God.
The modern theology of animals says that “the value and worth of other creatures cannot be determined solely by their utility to us.” This radical statement overturns what I used to think.
Some thinkers are now trying to reinterpret human power over creation. Granted, God’s command in Genesis, “have dominion over every living thing that moves upon the earth,” seems to give humans complete sway. But if you accept the Christian view that lordship equals service, those same words can be urging us to act as servants to all creatures, especially animals.
Perhaps, as Andrew Linzey suggests, our best approach to animals could be through “moral generosity.” That would be a way of bringing together some Christian traditions with the modern mentality that regards animals as deserving protection and love.
Richard Griffin