Reinterpreting man鈥檚 dominion over other animals
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Mainstream Christian thinking about animals is rooted in the Book of Genesis, where God is said to have granted man dominion over all the animals. St. Thomas Aquinas interpreted that verse as implying that it simply does not matter how man behaves toward animals; the only reason why we should not inflict whatever cruelties we like on animals is that doing so may lead to cruelty to humans.
A few Christian thinkers have sought to reinterpret 鈥渄ominion鈥 as 鈥渟tewardship,鈥 suggesting that God entrusted humanity to care for his creation. But it remained a minority view, favored by environmentalists and animal protectionists, and Aquinas鈥檚 interpretation remained the prevailing Catholic doctrine until the late twentieth century.
Pope Francis has now come down decisively against the mainstream view, saying that Christians 鈥渉ave at times incorrectly interpreted the Scriptures,鈥 and insisting that 鈥渨e must forcefully reject the notion that our being created in God鈥檚 image and given dominion over the earth justifies absolute domination over other creatures.鈥 Our 鈥渄ominion鈥 over the universe, he declares, should be understood 鈥渋n the sense of responsible stewardship.鈥
Against the background of nearly 2,000 years of Catholic thinking about 鈥渕an鈥檚 dominion,鈥 this is a revolutionary change. But the Pope鈥檚 recent encyclical includes another statement that could have even more far-reaching implications. That statement, which originally appeared in the Catechism of the Catholic Church issued by Pope John Paul II in 1992, calls it 鈥渃ontrary to human dignity to cause animals to suffer or die needlessly.鈥
When is suffering and death 鈥渘eedless?鈥 If you can nourish yourself adequately without eating meat, isn鈥檛 buying meat needlessly causing, or at least being complicit in causing, the death of an animal? Isn鈥檛 buying eggs from hens who have led a miserable life, jammed into small wire cages, needlessly causing, or being complicit in causing, the suffering of animals?
Before Cardinal Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI, he gave an interview in which he deplored the 鈥渋ndustrial use of creatures鈥 such as hens living 鈥渟o packed together that they become just caricatures of birds.鈥
Animals suffer
Unfortunately, right now, tens of billions of chickens are being forced to live this way; indeed, mankind鈥檚 realm is full of unnecessarily suffering animals.
Although animal advocates implored Ratzinger to reiterate his views on animal welfare after he became Pope, he never did so. Francis, by contrast, appears to have been referring to factory-farmed animals when he spoke, in 鈥淭he Joy of the Gospel,鈥 of 鈥渨eak and defenseless beings who are frequently at the mercy of economic interests or indiscriminate exploitation.鈥
Now, in his recent encyclical 鈥淟audatio Si,鈥 Francis quotes the passage in the Gospel of Luke, in which Jesus says of the birds that 鈥渘ot one of them is forgotten before God.鈥 Francis then asks: 鈥淗ow then can we possibly mistreat them or cause them harm?鈥 It is a good question, because we do mistreat them, and on a massive scale.
Most Roman Catholics participate in this mistreatment, a few by raising chickens, ducks, and turkeys in ways that maximize profit by reducing animal welfare, and the majority by buying the products of factory farms. If Pope Francis can change that, he will, in my view, have done more good than any other pope in recent history.
Peter Singer is Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and Laureate Professor at the University of Melbourne. Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2015.
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