1. CVA
T-shirts, etc.
2 .
CVA Sustaining Membership
3.
Upcoming Leafleting Opportunities
4.
Christianity and Violence: Ideological Certainty versus the Quest for
Truth, part 1
1. CVA
T-Shirts, etc.
Summer is coming, so it’s time to break out CVA t-shirts, which
tells the world that we think that vegetarianism honors God’s Creation.
To order t-shirts and other CVA supplies, go to
www.christianveg.org/materials.htm.
2.
CVA Sustaining Membership
The CVA offers Sustaining Membership to those paying our $25 annual
subscription. In addition to the weekly e-newsletter available to all
members, Sustaining Members receive the Take Heart! daily e-messages,
which include inspirational comments, biblical commentary, health tips,
an advice column, and recipes.
To become a Sustaining Member, go to our membership page, and fill
out the form, which will take you to the dues-paying section. Or, you
can send a check to CVA, PO Box 201791, Cleveland, OH 44120. Donations
to the CVA are tax-deductible.
3. Upcoming Leafleting Opportunities
6/21 OH N. Lawerence Alive Festival Kutless 6/22-23 OH Cleveland Women
of Faith Conference 6/22-24 NC Raleigh Harvest Festival (huge) 6/23 VA
Richmond Richmond Vegetarian Festival 2007 (table) 6/23 NC Hickory
Apologetix Christian Rock Concert 6/23 CA Adelanto Phil Wickham
Christian Rock Concert 6/24 SD Casper Casting Pearls Casper Mountain
Music Festival 6/28 CA Lake Forest Phil Wickham Christian Rock Concert
6/29 PA Wexford Apologetix Christian Rock Concert 6/30 NC Charlotte
Salvadore Christian Rock Concert 6/30 AL Mobile Promise Keepers 6/30-7/1
SD Sioux Falls Casting Pearls Tour 07 6/30 WA Seattle Women of Faith
Conference 7/1 NY Orchard Park Benny Hinn Special Event
To find out about all upcoming leafleting and tabling opportunities
in your area, join the CVA Calendar Group at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group.christian_vegetarian.
Read the home page, and then join. You will then be able to log in
anytime to identify upcoming events in your region. Contact Paris at
[email protected] if you might be able to help.
4.
Christianity and Violence - Ideological Certainty
versus the Quest for Truth, part 1
[This series reflects my views and not "official" CVA positions. It
is being archived at
http://www.christianveg.org/violence_view.htm.]
We are symbolic creatures, and our symbolic desires often conflict
with our biological desires. We want people to obey our commands, but we
also want mutually respectful, covenantal relationships; we want our
sexual activity to be desired by our partners, but this can result in
our biological desire for sex sometimes going unfulfilled; we want to
feel at peace with all of Creation, but many of us don’t want to forego
the taste of animal flesh; we want to relieve death anxieties by
heightening self-esteem, but we don’t want to alienate other people by
gaining self-esteem at their expense.
Perhaps even more troubling for the human psyche, what we perceive
seems to conflict with what we want to believe. Our innate fear of death
encourages us to believe in some kind of immortality, but we known that
all biological organisms die and decay. We desire to gain self-esteem by
pointing to our own accomplishments or the accomplishments of “our”
group, but our own failures and the obvious limitations of the members
of our group stare us in the face. One response to these internal
conflicts is to adhere to a religion that can tell us, clearly,
unequivocally, unambiguously, what our place in the universe is, and how
we should lead our lives.
We desire certainty about the great existential questions, such as
our origins, our post-mortem destinies, the meaning of our lives, and
how we are supposed to relate to each other, but such certainty can be
dangerous for individuals and communities. A sense of certainty can
blind us to strategies that can help us learn, grow, and adapt to
change. In order to make a difference in the world, it is essential that
we commit ourselves to what we believe, even to the point of great
personal sacrifice. However, as long as a sense of certainty does not
accompany such commitments, we can change commitments if overwhelming
evidence demonstrates that our actions or beliefs have been misguided.
A second problem with ideological certainty is that it can readily
lead to injustice. Because those who hold beliefs with certainty tend to
resist contravening logic or external evidence, they tend to ignore
information that might expose victimization and scapegoating. Third,
because novel perspectives might show weaknesses in a given ideology,
those attempting to maintain ideological certainty often have difficulty
coexisting with those who hold alternative views. Such ideologues often
respond to conflicting perspectives by sequestering themselves in
separate communities; by becoming hostile toward those who express
differing views (which discourages people from challenging their
beliefs); or by eliminating, by murder or banishment, those individuals
whose views threaten to “contaminate” their community.
Those manifesting ideological certainty tend to divide answers to
some of the most challenging existential questions into two absolute
categories – true or false. Girardian theory indicates that such
divisions are grounded in the scapegoating process, in which violent
scapegoating has generated the division between true, divinely ordained
belief and false, tabooed, satanic belief. Violence, or threats of
violence, maintains taboos, and historically those aiming to maintain a
sense of ideological certainty have often responded to critics with
violence.
If the divisions that underlie ideological certainty are grounded in
the scapegoating process, they are grounded on lies that always
accompany scapegoating, such as that those who espouse contrary views
deserve punishment because they are evil and threaten to instigate
communal crises. This helps explain why those claiming to defend the
“one true faith” – whatever that faith may be – have often participated
in scapegoating violence. Their commitment to their ideological
certainty favors legalism and rigidity and often blinds them to love and
compassion.
Stephen R. Kaufman, M.D.