Animals and plants

[arete]

There is a difference between paganism and Christianity, when it comes to natural beings. In paganism, the Gods have favorite animals and flowers. Showing disrespect to nature and all it's beings angers the Gods. Artemis, for example, has a favorite deer, which, if hurt, Artemis will become angry. In Christianity on the other hand, God said to humans that humans are his favorite and the animals and plants are to take orders from humans. He said to Adam to name the animals and rule them. 

Today in our world, people act like Adam and they seperate animals like beings for exploitation. Should pagans become more active in protecting the animals, and finally people stop animal cruelty? doesn't paganism give great ethics to treat animals and plants with respect?

[Uneryx]

There is a difference between paganism and Christianity, when it comes to natural beings. In paganism, the Gods have favorite animals and flowers. Showing disrespect to nature and all it's beings angers the Gods. Artemis, for example, has a favorite deer, which, if hurt, Artemis will become angry. In Christianity on the other hand, God said to humans that humans are his favorite and the animals and plants are to take orders from humans. He said to Adam to name the animals and rule them. 

Today in our world, people act like Adam and they seperate animals like beings for exploitation. Should pagans become more active in protecting the animals, and finally people stop animal cruelty? doesn't paganism give great ethics to treat animals and plants with respect?

Lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater here. There are a lot of christians who consider themselves ecologically conscious, following less the doctrine that Adam rules the animals and more the doctrine where God bade them to be "good stewards" of the earth and take care of it.

They are a minority, but "Green" Christians exist, and are valuable allies. And I'd say most people here on TC are already doing what they can to be responsible for the earth.

The sad reality, however, is that the burden of change is being put upon individuals when it is corporations who are doing the vast majority of environmental harm. I can live waste free, never eat factory-farmed meat, have an energy-efficient home and only buy fair trade, but it will be a drop in the pond against the engines of consumerism.  Banning straws from Starbucks is an easy pill to swallow because injured sea turtles make people sad/angry, but it's not going to DO much as far as stalling climate change.  Efforts, in my opinion, should be put on pressing for government regulation, large-scale green initiatives, protecting and rehabilitating endangered/threatened species, and research towards sustainable practices. And frankly, businesses will only start doing this when someone more powerful than them (ie, a government regulatory body) MAKES them.

[PerditaPickle]

Lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater here. There are a lot of christians who consider themselves ecologically conscious, following less the doctrine that Adam rules the animals and more the doctrine where God bade them to be "good stewards" of the earth and take care of it.

They are a minority, but "Green" Christians exist, and are valuable allies. And I'd say most people here on TC are already doing what they can to be responsible for the earth.

The sad reality, however, is that the burden of change is being put upon individuals when it is corporations who are doing the vast majority of environmental harm. I can live waste free, never eat factory-farmed meat, have an energy-efficient home and only buy fair trade, but it will be a drop in the pond against the engines of consumerism.  Banning straws from Starbucks is an easy pill to swallow because injured sea turtles make people sad/angry, but it's not going to DO much as far as stalling climate change.  Efforts, in my opinion, should be put on pressing for government regulation, large-scale green initiatives, protecting and rehabilitating endangered/threatened species, and research towards sustainable practices. And frankly, businesses will only start doing this when someone more powerful than them (ie, a government regulatory body) MAKES them.

Very well said.

[Zlote Jablko]

There is a difference between paganism and Christianity, when it comes to natural beings. In paganism, the Gods have favorite animals and flowers. Showing disrespect to nature and all it's beings angers the Gods. Artemis, for example, has a favorite deer, which, if hurt, Artemis will become angry. In Christianity on the other hand, God said to humans that humans are his favorite and the animals and plants are to take orders from humans. He said to Adam to name the animals and rule them. 

Today in our world, people act like Adam and they seperate animals like beings for exploitation. Should pagans become more active in protecting the animals, and finally people stop animal cruelty? doesn't paganism give great ethics to treat animals and plants with respect?

Our ancestors venerated and exploited nature. As humans have long done.

The main difference that our ancestors would recognize is that our exploitation has become very unsustainable. We’ve always had some trouble with that, but in the post-industrial era the discrepancy between our appetites and what is sustainable has ballooned.

Of course nature should be valued. I don’t know how to explain that to people though. I do know how to explain that our current mode of food production relies on a finite amount of phosphate for fertilizer. In theory, we could run out of it in the coming centuries.

I do personally love forests. East European lore talks about forest mother figures like the Jezinkas or Mama Paduri. Supposedly the latter, in Romania, drives intruders mad in order to protect her woods. My heroine.