What is the purpose of animals? Didn't God give humans dominion over other creatures? Didn't Jesus eat lamb? These are the kinds of questions that Christians who advocate compassion toward other animals regularly face. Yet Christians who have a faith-based commitment to care for other animals through what they eat, what they wear, and how they live with other creatures are often unsure how to address these biblically and theologically based challenges. In A Faith Embracing All Creatures, authors from various denominational, national, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds wrestle with the text, theology, and tradition to explain the roots of their desire to live peaceably with their nonhuman kin. Together, they show that there are no easy answers on "what the Bible says about animals." Instead, there are nuances and complexities, which even those asking these questions may be unaware of. Editors Andy Alexis-Baker and Tripp York have gathered a collection of essays that wrestle with these nuances and tensions in Scripture around nonhuman animals. In so doing, they expand the discussion of nonviolence, peacemaking, and reconciliation to include the oft-forgotten other members of God's good creation.

Open a window each day of Advent onto the natural world.

For Love of Animals is an honest and thoughtful look at our responsibility as Christians with respect to animals. Many Christians misunderstand both history and their own tradition in thinking about animals. They are joined by prominent secular thinkers who blame Christianity for the Western world's failure to seriously consider the moral status of nonhuman animals. This book explains how traditional Christian ideas and principles—like nonviolence, concern for the vulnerable, respect for life, stewardship of God's creation, and rejection of consumerism—require us to treat animals morally. Though this point of view is often thought of as liberal, the book cites several conservatives who are also concerned about animals. Camosy's Christian argument transcends secular politics. The book's starting point for a Christian position on animals—from the creation story in Genesis to Jesus's eating habits in the Gospels—rests in Scripture. It then moves to explore the views of the Church Fathers, the teachings of the Catholic Church, and current discussions in both Catholic and Protestant theology. Ultimately, however, the book is concerned not with abstract ideas, but with how we should live our everyday lives. Should Christians eat meat? Is cooperation with factory farming evil? What sort of medical research on animals is justified? Camosy also asks difficult questions about hunting and pet ownership. This is an ideal resource for those who are interested in thinking about animals from the perspective of Christian ethics and the consistent ethic of life. Discussion questions at the end of each chapter and suggestions for further reading round out the usefulness of this important work.

In this book, Kris Hiuser argues that if we are called to represent God to creation, and creation to God, then this has considerable bearing on understanding what it means to be human, as well as informing human action towards non-human creatures.

The ethical treatment of non-human animals is an increasingly significant issue, directly affecting how people share the planet with other creatures and visualize themselves within the natural world. The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Animal Ethics is a key reference source in this area, looking specifically at the role religion plays in the formation of ethics around these concerns. Featuring thirty-five chapters by a team of international contributors, the handbook is divided into two parts. The first gives an overview of fifteen of the major world religions’ attitudes towards animal ethics and protection. The second features five sections addressing the following topics: Human Interaction with Animals Killing and Exploitation Religious and Secular Law Evil and Theodicy Souls and Afterlife This handbook demonstrates that religious traditions, despite often being anthropocentric, do have much to offer to those seeking a framework for a more enlightened relationship between humans and non-human animals. As such, The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Animal Ethics is essential reading for students and researchers in religious studies, theology, and animal ethics as well as those studying the philosophy of religion and ethics more generally.

The Bible teems with nonhuman life, from its opening pages with God's creation of animals on the same day and out of the same earth as humans to its closing apocalyptic scenes of horses riding out of the sky. Animals are Adam's companions, Noah's shipmates, and Elijah's saviors. They are at the center of ancient Israel's religious life as sacrifices and yet, as Job discovers, beyond human dominion. It is an animal that saves Balaam from certain death by an angel's hand, and an animal that carries Jesus into Jerusalem. The Creator declares all of them good at the beginning, and since the Apostle Paul writes of God's eternal purposes for all things on earth, they are somehow part of a hoped-for eschatological restoration. So why are animals so often ignored in Christian moral discourse? In its theological thinking and faith-motivated praxis, human-centeredness typically results in the complete erasure of the nonhuman. This book argues that this exclusion of animals is problematic for those who see the Bible as authoritative for the religious life. Instead, biblical literature bears witness to a more inclusive understanding of moral duty and faith-motivated largesse that extends also to Eden's other residents.

Animal rights is animal theology. The author argues that historical theology, creatively defined, must reject humanocentricity. He questions the assumption that if theology is to speak on this issue, 'it must only do so on the side of the oppressors.' His theological query investigates not only the abstractions of theory, but also the realities of hunting, animal experimentation, and genetic engineering. He is an important, pioneering, Christian voice speaking for those who cannot speak for themselves.