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to the quiet charismatic
saints of Matthew 25,
one of the many Catholic
Worker communities
http://www.catholicworker.org

CATHOLIC VEGETARIAN SAINTS
St Francis of Assisi, St Clare, St Therese Neumann, St. Martin de
Porres, St John Chrysostom all believed they were following the
example of Jesus in not eating His animals. Trappists, Cistercians,
Benedictines, Franciscans all have had a tradition of vegetarian
diet, to which many still adhere. The pretzel was a Lenten bread,
symbolizing arms folded in prayer, according to George Cornell, AP
religion writer. Lentils were named as such because they were a
Lenten vegetarian alternative to animal flesh. Meatless Fridays were
the last vestige of early Christian abstinence from meat in following
Christ's example. A papal bull once excommunicated anyone who
attended a bullfight because of the
barbaric cruelty in them. This was later amended to excommunicate
only priests who blessed bullfighting.
Genesis 1: 29, Isaiah 65, Daniel 1 Exodus 26: 34 are some of the
thousands of quotes in the Bible on vegetarian diet. The command to
feed the hungry, given by Jesus in His Sermon on the Mount, implies
vegetarianism since the flesh of animals yields 100 to 1000 lbs an
acre, dairy products around 10,000 lbs. an acre, some vegetables,
81,000 lbs. an acre, and fruits from centenarian fruit trees 450,000
or more lbs. an acre. Therefore Genesis fruit trees
yield 450 times what slaughterhouses yield.

Daniel O'Steen, of National Right To Life, felt
he must be consistent in his prolife stance and so
many years ago became a vegetarian. Paul Obis,
founder of Vegetarian Times, is a Catholic who cares
deeply about not hurting others' feelings in
regards to diet. His wife Clare, mother of 6 boys,
created a successful media campaign when Mike Royko
refused to allow her vegetarian gluten ribs in
his cooking contest. Fr. Ron Lengwin of KDKA Radio
in Pittsburgh believes that the apple Adam ate
was the first heart of a butchered animal.
Rep Dennis Kucinich (Democrat Cleveland) is a vegan who has
worked for the rights of blue collar laborers, for the
environment, and for peace. A Youngstown monastery
serves only vegetarian meals, as does a Cleveland one.
Ron Pickarsky, former Catholic brother, now married,
has worked with commercial establishments helping
them to transition http://www.eco-cuisine.com
JB, executive with an Ohio corporation, rings a bell
for the Knights of Columbus in public places, and has in
the past inquired where he could get vegan no feather
sleeping bags to be consistent in his vegetarian diet.
D. Marshall, New York homeless shelter worker, is a vegetarian
who does not proselytize the poor who come in to his
welcoming inn. Catholic colleges such as Georgetown have responded
to the growing number of their vegan students by providing
options. Thomas Merton, author of Seven Story Mountain and Trappist
monk, was a vegetarian, and activist for interfaith cooperation.
For this he may have been murdered. EL, New York environmentalist,
poet,
and mystic, originally became vegetarian
for economic reasons, while one of his
teachers, Fr. Daniel Berrigan, eats no meat.
(Philip Berrigan has been held in extremely
harsh conditions in an Ohio jail by
the Ashcroft Justice Dept.. because of
his continuing civil disobedience in
turning weapons into ploughshares.) CW,
Catholic nurse, was nursing her child one day when
a mosquito landed on her arm. She decided to nurse him
too. One Catholic seminarian experimented with pot
once.. and his perceptions slowed down. The chicken
leg he was gnawing on became the leg of a chicken.
That day he stopped eating meat and stopped smoking pot.
A Catholic secretary for Cleveland Amory's Fund For
Animals became vegan. K Fromer Blanc, Brooklyn nun, is
a vegetarian as are millions of other Catholics. Father Mario
Mazzoleni, now deceased, wrote
on his decision to become vegetarian. His book is translated
by a Notre Dame professor.The temptation to eat meat is chemical in
nature, as the uric acid in meat is more addictive than caffein since
it is trioxypurine or 3 oxypurines while caffein is dioxypurine or 2.

Exodus 26: 34 is a command not to kill. Governor
Jesse Ventura in reference to the death
penalty (for animals too) has said that that command is not
asterisked with exceptions. St Thomas in the Thomasine Gospel
has many references to the fruiteating of Christ. Thomas,
the skeptical apostle, went to Madras India where even today
are millions of Catholic descendants of his preaching.
Cesar Chavez, the saintly activist for the rights of farm workers,
continued the tradition of nonviolence in his labor organizing
as well as his diet. He and Gandhi looked to Leo Tolstoy,
Russian Catholic, who wrote The Kingdom of God is Within You.
Albert of Michigan, a Catholic paraplegic, has
spent much time researching Catholic vegetarianism
in history. He says that the word 'opsarian'
means 'pickled fish' and is the Greek word for
the fish Jesus created, meaning that Jesus did
not materialize freshly suffocated fish but
materialized processed fish. http://www.nofishing.net
Francisco Martin, secretary of the IVU http://www.ivu.org
is a Catholic vegan activist.

Colman McCarthy, former Trappist and syndicated
columnist, lectures around the world on peace studies
and has long been mostly fruitarian.

Many members of the Catholic Worker community
as their founder Dorothy Day follow vegetarian diet
in Matthew 25 and many other homes.
Dr. Virginia Bourquardez, who once
hitchhiked for the first time at the age
of 77 when her ride dematerialized,
worked her entire life for animals,
and became a vegetarian in her 70's.
Christian vegetarian sites
http://www.egroups.com/messages/catholicveg
http://www.jesusveg.com
http://www.compassionatespirit.com
http://www.all-creatures.org
http://www.hacres.com
http://www.egroups.com/messages/salvarmy/2
Others
http://www.pcrm.org http://www.notmilk.com
http://www.madcowboy.com http://www.ivu.org
http://www.acorn.net/fruitarian
http://www.meatout.com http://www.wfad.org
http://www.animalsagenda.org
http://www.peta.net
http://www.hsus.org
http://www.neavs.org http://www.aavs.org
http://www.navs.org
http://groups.msn.com/bioterror
http://www.egroups.com/messages/catholicveg/118
http://groups.msn.com/stopmowing
Fr. Mario Mazzoleni on his decision to become vegetarian
(after 3 years as a strict vegetarian, Fr. Mario Mazzoleni speaks of
a desire for meat. * see above
the addictive trioxypurine in meat)
I would be a hypocrite if I led the reader to believe that I was
strong enough to be perfectly faithful to my Lenten resolution. ..I
hadn't yet
completely resolved my desire for meat - and so the repressed desire
was floating to the surface. It is a fact that the minute I would sit
down to meditate, the most succulent meals would pass in front of my
mind, full of fragrant roasted chickens and various
sausages. What to do? If I was going to ruin all my meditations for a
roast chicken, it would be better to eliminate the problem by facing
it head on. And so after 3 years of strict vegetarianism, I decided
to get rid of the desire once and for all by satiating myself with a
meat dinner. After all, I told myself to quiet my sense of guilt, "It
isn't a crime to eat meat, and I can't say that because I'm
vegetarian I'm better than many people who are carnivorous."
It was almost a traumatic experience. I remembered an analogous
experience of Gandhi's that he recounted in his autobiography.
Convinced by a friend that India could be liberated only by the grit
of someone who ate meat, he hid himself on a river bank to consume
some barbecued baby goat meat, and the next night he could feel
bleating in his chest. Instead of enjoying the coveted snack in
peace, the minute this little faithbreaker set his teeth into the
cruel repast* (* a reference to Dante's Inferno.. in which
meat is described as a cruel repast in XXXIII.1)
he was himself bitten by remorse and anxiety. I kept seeing the
animal alive in front of me, and this inhibited the desire that was
so
enticing when it was simply mental.
I immediately noticed some other effects, physical as well as psychic.
My intestines held that food much longer than they kept vegetables,
and my sense of smell, made sensitive by several years of
vegetarianism,
was able to detect the odor of the cooked animal on my skin. It was a
disagreeable sensation. As for my psyche, I noticed that my mind,
which during my 3 year "Lent" was no longer seriously agitated by
unwanted thoughts, suffered a set back from that carne-vale (meat
festival); polluting throughts started to enter again in triumph. It
was a lesson. As always it is experience more than words that has the
greater power of persuasion. The decision to adopt a vegetarian diet
was motivated also by a religious
factor. I knew that I was going to a sacred place.
quoted from Don Mario Mazzoleni's book, published by Leela Press of
Faber, Virginia USA

Genesis 1: 29 Behold I have given you herbyielding seed.
To you it shall be for meat. (The fruitarian Garden of Eden)
Methusaleh.. the oldest man in the Bible, achieved 969
orbits of the sun.
Exodus: 26: 34 Thou Shalt Not Kill (not asterisked with
exceptions)
Jesus: Ye are whited sepulchres (Greek sarcophagi
sarx flesh phagi eater)
Jesus threw out the butchers from the temple.
Daniel was a vegetarian in the lions' den and therefore
was not harmed. Daniel was in jail 10 days and his
condition as a vegetarian was better than those who
were not.
Paul: If your flesheating offends your brother, forego it.
Jesus: Feed the hungry (450 times as many people per acre
can be fed tree products in comparison to slaughterhouse
products)
Many Catholics are praying that the Holy
Father who takes such a strong stand
in preventing the violence of war
and execution, will withdraw his
endorsement of the cruelty of lab research.
Many Catholic churches have blessing of the animals
ceremonies as they counteract what they consider
the erroneous teaching of Thomas Aquinas that
animals do not have souls. Yes they do, say millions
upon millions.