I am not a big meat eater. In fact, when I am eating meat I cannot think of the animal from which it came, or I get nauseated and can't eat any more of it. The first time this happened to me, that I remember, was when I was eating some really, really good "fried chicken" at my grandparents one day. My grandmother casually mentioned (or maybe it was my mother) that it was rabbit, not chicken. I almost vomited right there on my plate. All I could think of was those beautiful soft furry animals outside in their hutches - and I was EATING one of them!! Ei yi yi.
Many years later when we were in our first pastorate, one of the women in the church and I were talking about my dislike of eating a lot of meat and how much I really didn't like eggs at all (again - just the idea of what an egg IS turns my stomach...). She looked at me in disgust - she was in her 70's at the time - and said, "Next thing I know you'll be saying you can't eat carrots because every time you see one you are thinking that while it's being pulled up out of the ground it's crying out 'don't eat me, please don't eat me!'"
Okay, point taken. I still eat veggies OFTEN, every day, several kinds every day. But I also am aware that they have a kind of life and that life of any kind should not be wasted. Yes, food sometimes goes bad in my fridge or storage area. Every time it does, though, I am reminded of the starving children in some 3rd world country who are going hungry (hmmm - what about that old woman going through the trash outside? it's closer than I am comfortable with). AND I think - this plant was alive, God created it for me to eat and I have wasted God's gifts to me - the beauty of its life and it's nutrition for my body.
NO! I am NOT a New Age person! Seriously! But I do think of these things!
So, without further ado, here is the beginning of the article and the link to it. I confess - it did make me laugh.
National Geographic News
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James Owen
for National Geographic News
June 14, 2007
Plants have family values, too, it seems, with new research suggesting they can recognize close relatives in order to work together.
An ability to tell family from strangers is well known in animals, allowing them to cooperate and share resources, but plants may possess similar social skills, scientists believe.
Susan Dudley and Amanda File of McMaster University in Ontario, Canada, report they have demonstrated for the first time that plants can recognize their kin.
This suggests that plants, though lacking cognition and memory, are capable of complex social interactions.
"Plants have this kind of hidden but complicated social life," Dudley said. (click on "National Geographic News above for the link)
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