Letter From Mino to Pope Francis about Compassion for Animals
Letters From All-Creatures.org and The Mary T. and Frank L. Hoffman Family Foundation

From: Mino
November 18, 2014
 
Dear Pope Francis:
 
In the spirit of the holiday season, I wish you the best. I am a Catholic and was taught by Catholic priests all of my life. I would like you to help me better understand the Church teachings.
 
1) If God is called the most merciful being, why did He create non-human animals, who are sentient beings, to have a barbaric life? They are artificially inseminated, confined to tiny crates, attached to milk devices 24 hours a day, and in the end have their throats slit at a slaughterhouse?
 
2) It is written in Genesis that God created fruit bearing plants as food for humans, and gave humans dominion over animals to protect them from all evil and harm.  Then, why does the Church teach us to eat their flesh?
 
Pope Benedict XVI said that animals are creatures of His will and we must respect them.  As the most powerful of all species, why don’t we protect these defenseless beings rather than exploit them for our greed?
 
3) We are taught to perform good deeds in this life in order to go to heaven after death, so why have we been creating a real hell for animals for so long?
 
Also, it is clear that we do not care about starving people by supporting the importation of grain from third world countries to feed our farmed animals.  Vietnam is one of them.  A majority of the Vietnamese population does not have food on the table while Vietnam is one of the top countries in the world exporting agricultural products.
 
Likewise, we do not care for the workers in the slaughterhouse.  If any of us were required to do a job like theirs to have our own meat, would we be willing to hang a fully aware pig/animal upside down and slit their throat as they are screaming in agony?
 
4) The Church teaches us not to kill a living being (a fetus), yet they teach us it is acceptable to brutally kill animals to satisfy our taste buds.  When we give a green light to kill an innocent being we are desensitized to other living beings.  Massacres in schools, suicide bombers, beheading, and war increasing all over the world are examples.
 
5) Facts in medical fields show that our world now is facing many chronic diseases due to flesh eating, while whole plant based-diets give us a healthy life.  Why does the Church continue to teach us to eat meat when it brings harm to our health?
 
6) Our planet is having more and more deadly natural disasters due to global warming emissions, and raising farmed animals is one of the top causes.  Why does the Church teach us to have an eating habit that destroys our planet, the planet that is not ours, but it is what we borrowed from our children’s generation?

We all celebrate in holiday season, especially the celebration of Jesus’ birth with billions of God’s beautiful innocents brutally killed for our food.  By doing this, are we celebrating live or death?
 
Could you give me some good reasons, or even just one single reason, why we should continue practicing eating flesh while this practice destroys our environment, our God’s creatures, our health (outer body), and ourselves (inner souls?)
 
How can we justify eating flesh when we know each of our bites is full of horrible pain and suffering?
 
Should we instead nourish our compassion alive by eating in such a way that we reduce the suffering of living beings, protect humans’ health, preserve our planet, and reverse the process of global warming?
 
Although I was warned not to write to you because your aides will stop the letter before it reaches your desk, I feel morraly, humanely, ethically obligated to write to you.  I believe that you will read this letter and respond to me, like Jeus let the children come to Him despite the disciples’ barriers.
 
Thank you so much for your time.

Respectfully,
Mino

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