“Creaturely Solidarity: Rethinking Human-Nonhuman Animal Relations” (2014)

BookDiscussion

Books Discussed

Camosy, Charles. For Love of Animals: Christian Ethics,Consistent Action. Cincinnati, Oh.: Franciscan Media,2013.

Clough, David L. On Animals. Volume 1: Systematic The-ology. London: T&T Clark, 2012.

Hobgood-Oster, Laura. The Friends We Keep: UnleashingChristianity’s Compassion for Animals. Waco, Tx.: BaylorUniversity Press, 2010.

Miller, Daniel K. Animal Ethics and Theology: The Lensof the Good Samaritan. New York: Routledge, 2012.

CREATURELY SOLIDARITY

Rethinking Human-Nonhuman Relations

Grace Y. Kao

ABSTRACT

This essay examines several recent contributions to the growing literatureon animal ethics from Christian perspectives. I categorize the four booksunder review in one of three ways depending on the scholars’ methodologicalpoints of departure: (1) a reconstruction of the place of other animals inChristian history through a selective retrieval of texts and practices; (2) anidentification of a key Christian ethical principle; and (3) a reconsiderationof foundational doctrines of systematic theology. On the premise that socialethicists are interested in not only understanding the world, but alsochanging it, I observe that these authors have offered different answers tothe following three questions: (1) whether the theoretical basis for reform isultimately grounded upon notions of human sameness or difference withother animals; (2) whether scholar-activists should emphasize logic overpassion or values over interests (or vice versa) in their calls for transforma-tion; and (3) whether moral motivation for their targeted audiences is bestserved by reliance upon secular argumentation and interdisciplinaryresearch or upon the distinctive claims of revelation and other tradition-specific norms. I conclude by offering my own thoughts about whichapproaches might prove more effective than others.

KEY WORDS: animals, care, Christianity, compassion, dominion, feminism,justice, hospitality, rights, stewardship, vegetarianism, welfare

1. Introduction

The rapidly growing field of animal studies (also called human-animalstudies or critical animal studies) draws upon scholarship in the human-ities, social sciences, and natural sciences to examine relations of variouskinds between humans and other animals. Though still dismissivelyregarded as niche or trendy in some quarters, the field is steadily gainingtraction in the academy and beyond due to widespread recognition of thefragile interdependence of all life and grave concerns about the ecological

Grace Y. Kao is Associate Professor of Ethics and Co-Director of the Center for Sexuality,Gender, and Religion (CSGR) at Claremont School of Theology. She is the author ofGrounding Human Rights in a Pluralist World (Georgetown University Press, 2011) and isco-editor, with Ilsup Ahn, of Asian American Christian Ethics (Baylor University Press,forthcoming). Grace Y. Kao, 1325 N. College Ave, Claremont, CA 91711, [email protected].

JRE 42.4:743–768. © 2014 Journal of Religious Ethics, Inc.

health of our planet.1 Ethicists, theologians, and scholars of religion arejoining the emerging consensus that other animals “count” and are nolonger bracketing the “question of the animal.” They are evaluatinghuman-animal relationships in their historical and contemporary, realand symbolic, legal and extralegal, liturgical and institutional, andtextual and oral tradition forms. The books discussed in this essay—all byChristian scholars or ethicists—seek not only to understand but also toenhance the lives and status of other animals by exposing the crueltiesinvolved in their treatment as mere commodities in many industries,interrogating the conceptualizations of animality that undergird thestatus quo of human dominance over them, and constructing alternativevisions of and norms for more appropriate human-nonhuman animalrelations.

Yet these books also portray a diverse field. A primary issue here, as inother subfields of religious ethics, has to do with what might mosteffectively motivate Christians to act in such a way that they change howthey think about their obligations to nonhuman animals. This issueunderlies three questions with which all these books grapple. First is thequestion of the conceptual basis for reform. Is it the morally salientsimilarities between humans and other animals, their notable differences,or some combination of the two that ought to serve as the grounds forchange? Examples of activists, ethicists, and theologians invoking notionsof “sameness” in their advocacy abound, including but not limited to PeterSinger (2009), Tom Regan (2004), Andrew Linzey (1994), Carol Adams(2007), Paul Waldau (2001), and Damien Keown (2001). Claims of onto-logical difference between humans and other animals (supposedly withoutlanguage, rationality, personhood, souls, etc.) in Western philosophicaland theological traditions have historically been marshaled to deflate theextent of human moral duties to other creatures (see Linzey and Clark2004). Yet claims of difference can nonetheless be put to unconventionaluse. To illustrate, it is precisely the different (and greater) intelligence andpower that many humans have over many other creatures that cementsseveral scholar-activists’ convictions that we need to treat the latter witheven more compassion and care. As David Clough importantly notes,the identification of sameness or difference between humans and other

1 Students in the United States today can now find more than one hundred undergradu-ate and graduate courses that fit broadly under animal studies, in addition to majors,minors, graduate programs, certificates, and professional specializations at more thantwenty institutions of higher education. What is more, even though the legal status ofnonhuman animals remains that of property in the United States, more than forty out ofapproximately two hundred U.S. law schools offer courses in animal rights or animal law,including one that even offers an advanced degree, the LL.M., in animal law (Animals andSociety Institute 2014).

744 Journal of Religious Ethics

animals “does not predetermine the significance of this relationship forparticular moral judgments” (Clough 2012, 77).

However, what scholars think is the best conceptual basis for reform mayfall flat with their non-academic audiences, and so these authors face asecond cluster of questions concerning style and strategy. Those seeking tochange (and not simply interpret) the status quo must think carefully abouthow to inspire others to action. Should they rely on rational argumentationto make their case, particularly by appealing to the demands of logicalconsistency, or should they also persuade by engaging their readers on anemotional level? Will they primarily appeal to their target audiences’ deepestvalues and sense of self (for example, as just and merciful people, asprogressives who advocate for the marginalized, as Catholics who wish tosupport a “consistent ethic of life”) with reference to the narratives whichgovern their audiences’ lives, or will they sweeten their calls for socialchange through less grandiose and more pragmatic appeals to self-interest?The authors under consideration in this study have made different choicesabout this second set of questions, with some appealing to a greater com-bination of “head” with “heart,” or “values” with “interests,” than others.

Related is a third issue, about how these authors present their conclu-sions in the framework of the relationship between religious and seculararguments, or the extent to which texts from the Christian tradition orthe broad fabric of the Christian story might be necessary to inspireChristians to rethink their relation to nonhuman animals. A secular textsuch as Paul Waldau’s Animal Rights: What Everyone Needs to Know(2011) reports on scientific findings that versions of self-awarenesstests originally designed to confirm self-awareness in humans have beenpassed by some other animals (chimpanzees, bonobos, at least one gorilla,orangutans, and bottlenose dolphins) and that the inability of otheranimals to do the same may have more to do with the privileging of thesensory ability dominant in humans—sight—in the design of the testrather than a lack of self-awareness in other animals (2011, 169–70).2

Such studies work to undermine the centuries-long beliefs justifying oursubjection over animals: either the total lack of intelligence of otheranimals or their possession of an inferior variety. Nevertheless, such aline of argumentation may fail to persuade segments of the religious

2 The heroine of J. M. Coetzee’s The Lives of Animals similarly rebuts the argument thatnonhuman animals should be placed in a different legal and ethical realm entirely thanhumans with these words: “The program of scientific experimentation that leads you toconclude that animals are imbeciles is profoundly anthropocentric. It values being able tofind your way out of a sterile maze, ignoring the fact that if the researcher who designed themaze were to be parachuted into the jungles of Borneo, he or she would be dead of starvationin a week. . . . If I as a human being were told that the standards by which animals are beingmeasured in these experiments are human standards, I would be insulted. It is theexperiments themselves that are imbecile” (1999, 62).

Creaturely Solidarity 745

public who simply do not see science or secular reasoning as determininghow they gain clarity about the nature and purpose of their existence aswell as their obligations to others. I propose a taxonomy of three differentargumentative approaches that can be found in current Christian animalethics. The first, represented by Laura Hobgood-Oster, is a kind ofnarrative ethic that retrieves in a piecemeal fashion texts from theChristian tradition that can be applied to questions of how humananimals should treat nonhuman animals. The second, represented byDaniel Miller and Charles Camosy, is an approach that claims a ground-ing principle for Christian ethical thinking (neighbor-love in Miller’s case,justice in Camosy’s) and generates norms of behavior (for pet-keeping, foreating, etc.) in animal ethics. The third, represented by Clough, is anapproach that argues that if Christians are to change how they regardnonhuman animals, they must first reconsider the most basic doctrines ofsystematic theology: creation, reconciliation and redemption. I treat thesethree approaches in order and, in my conclusion, offer my own thoughtson how certain approaches might be more efficacious than others.

2. Laura Hobgood-Oster: Retrieving Forgotten Texts

Hobgood-Oster’s The Friends We Keep seeks to uncover what “animalshave to do with, in, and for Christianity” (2010, xii). She argues that theChristian tradition as a whole has “collective amnesia” about the place ofanimals, even though Christians (like many others) encounter otheranimals daily—as food, clothes, companions, and so forth (2010, xiii). ForHobgood-Oster, this oversight is unacceptable. She thus seeks to do here(and elsewhere; see Hobgood-Oster 2008) for nonhuman animals whatfeminist pioneers like Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza did for women,namely to reconstruct Christian history through a painstaking recovery oflost voices. Just as feminists have noted that scholarship that neglectswomen’s lives and contributions is deficient, so Hobgood-Oster askssimilar rhetorical questions about nonhuman animals:

Might one also claim that current scholarly theory and research are deficientbecause they neglect the lives of all of the other animals and construe humanhistory as isolated from the myriad animals who surround us day in and dayout? Can Christianity be understood without knowing that bees lived at themonasteries, providing the wax for the candles made by these religiouscommunities for worship? Can Christianity be fully comprehended withoutknowing the stories of the wild animals who provided food for saints? Indeed,can Christianity be understood without consideration of the sparrows, thefish, and the donkeys with whom Jesus lived, those animals included in hislife and in his parables? And, in the contemporary world, can Christianity bea fully engaged, living tradition if it does not consider how the chicken gotinto the casserole at the potluck supper? (2010, xiv)


A historian of religion by training, Hobgood-Oster offers her book as a“religious-environmental history and a contemporary theology” (2010, 6).Most of the book’s chapters are organized topically: animals as compan-ions, in sports, for food, and as coinhabitants.

Hobgood-Oster’s work utilizes the approaches of both virtue ethics andnarrative ethics. For example, her denouncements of the underside ofcontemporary pet-keeping (namely, the millions of animals who areabused by their owners, euthanized by animal control due to abandon-ment or overpopulation, or bred under deplorable conditions in puppymills) and her prescription that Christians should “provide for themwith tenderness and responsibility” are not only premised on thespecial vulnerabilities and attendant responsibilities that flow fromdomestication—a move that emphasizes difference—but also specificallyon the Christian community’s call to “compassion, to the reverence forcreation, and to the celebration of life” (2010, 45, 42). In turn, these latterconvictions are themselves derived neither consequentially nordeontologically (at least not in any straightforward sense), but throughbiblical stories of animal companionship (for example, Tobit 6:1–2, Luke16:19–21, 2 Samuel 12:1–10), hagiographic tales of saints experiencingdeep and personal relationships with animal others, and historicalaccounts of other leading Christian figures, including Martin Luther, whofound inspiration in their pets. By uncovering the ways in which “otheranimals have been included in circles of care and friendship throughoutthe history of Christianity,” Hobgood-Oster demonstrates how renewedcompassion towards pet animals would be continuous with, and notdisruptive of, the Christian tradition (2010, 31).

She continues the theme of treating other animals in ways that bearwitness to the deepest convictions of faith throughout the book. In herdiscussion of thoroughbred horseracing, dogfighting, and trophy hunting,Hobgood-Oster utilizes tradition-specific sources to conclude that the “lossof life . . . for the purpose of entertaining those privileged enough toparticipate as safe spectators, or as powerful contestants (the ones withthe weapons)”3 would be grossly incompatible with the compassionatepeople Christians aspire to be (2010, 50).4 To be sure, she does not deny

3 To be sure, Hobgood-Oster takes pains to distinguish “sport hunting” done for trophiesand entertainment from “sustenance hunting” for food that is a way of life for many people.She is also willing to admit that “careful hunting for meat [may be] preferable to buyingmeat at a grocery store, since that meat likely came from a factory farm” (2010, 71).

4 These include her own application of the compassionate teaching of Matthew 12:11 tothe context of dogfighting, the seventh-century hagiographic tale of St. Giles who providedrefuge for a doe and took an arrow to save her from sport hunters, the Puritan abolition ofthe bloodsporting Cotswold Games, and the evangelical-inspired creation of the Society forthe Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) and its early opposition to bull-baiting andcockfighting.


the reality of the proliferation of organizations today that positivelyconnect Christianity with the use and killing of other animals for sport,such as the Christian Sportsman’s Fellowship, Christian Bowhunters ofAmerica, Christian Deerhunters Association, and Outreach Outdoors.Still, she encourages Christians to reject the “display of violence forentertainment and to show power over another” because it was the veryidea behind crucifixion in the Roman Empire and would also be reminis-cent of the ways in which the early Christian martyrs were made to sufferfor public spectacle (2010, 75, 79).

She approaches the chapter on “Eating Mercifully” in a similar way byreaching normative conclusions on the basis of historical Christian atti-tudes and practices surrounding the topic: biblical food imagery andinstructions on what, how, and with whom one should eat; the selection ofbread as eucharistic food as a reproach to the Roman Empire’s animalsacrifices; the eating discipline of the religious orders in the Middle Ages;the 1500-year Lenten practice of forgoing meat; and contemporary prac-tices of church potlucks, food drives, and campaigns to end global hunger.Without claiming an abundance of evidence in support of the view that allChristians should become vegetarian, Hobgood-Oster pleads for Chris-tians to be “compassionate . . . to all animals, even those that mightbecome food” (2010, 107). She particularly urges Christians to show mercyto the more than ten billion animals raised annually in factory farms byboth “refus[ing] to participate in a system that perpetuates pain andsuffering on a scale that is unfathomable,” and embracing their role astruth-bearers (2010, 110). She also exhorts fellow Christians to “take onthe responsibility of raising awareness and shedding light on the darksheds that hide the suffering of animals from view” (2010, 111). Sounderstood, Hobgood-Oster’s prescription departs from other approachesin virtue ethics that either limit the intended reach of Christian ethics toChristians or incline more toward separation from the world rather thanengagement with it, since her call to boycott industrial animal products isclearly intended for more than just one religious community.

Hobgood-Oster also turns to another Christian resource for groundingreform in Christian attitudes towards fellow animals: the practice ofhospitality. She provides various scriptural, hagiographic, and historicaltales of persons extending hospitality to—and receiving hospitality from—animal others, such as the popular non-canonical story of the “adoring oxand ass who share their home with the baby Jesus” (2010, 126). However,Hobgood-Oster issues an important caveat. She recognizes—correctly inmy view—that while the ancient Christian practice of extending hospi-tality to strangers, including those who had nothing to give in return,stands in notable contrast to popular notions today, it is still an imperfectcharacterization of ideal human-nonhuman animal relations because theearth does not actually belong to us. Thus it is only in the context of our


having practically “claimed the entire earth as our possession” throughtechnological advancements and our ever-increasing population that herconcept of hospitality, and its connotations of hosts and guests, makessense as a corrective (2010, 136).5 So qualified, radical hospitality toanimal others might in some cases entail a policy of non-encroachmentand leaving spaces such as forests and wetlands intact, while in othercases it might require the creation of spaces for displaced animals throughsanctuaries, wilderness preserves, and the like. A few vignettes of Chris-tians who have responded hospitably round out her chapter, including thegattare (cat ladies) in Rome who have fed stray cats for decades at anexcavated ancient ruins site, as does a provocative thought that those whoshow hospitality to other animals might in fact be entertaining angels“just as the biblical characters did so long ago” (2010, 143).

Two final points about her book merit attention. First, as many self-identified ecofeminists are wont to do,6 Hobgood-Oster relies on personalnarratives. We learn of the grief she experienced when her companion dogBeaugart died and how God was disclosed to her in their relationship thatshe explicitly names as sacred, the consternation she felt as she watchedthe filly Eight Belles run to her death after she came in second place atthe 2008 Kentucky Derby, her personal awakening as a twelve-year-oldgirl when she connected with the big brown eyes of the cow that wasslated to become the family’s food and then wondered for the first time“whom I was eating” (2010, 82), and her own attempts to embody radicalhospitality to others by rescuing and fostering dogs in need. Hobgood-Oster’s disclosures not only advance the ecofeminist critique of binaryways of thinking (for example, rational vs. emotional, objective vs. sub-jective), but they also allow her to engage her readers more intimately andemotionally by providing spaces for them to reflect on their own personalexperiences of animal others.

The second point worth highlighting is that while Hobgood-Oster gen-erally appeals to her (assumed) reader’s highest religious aspirations andsense of identity in an attempt to persuade, she is unafraid of invokingtheir pragmatic self-interest as well. In her chapter on animals as food, forexample, Hobgood-Oster draws upon recent findings by the Pew Commis-sion on Industrial Farm Animal Production (PCIFAP), the Center forDisease Control (CDC), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), andthe United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (UNFAO) toaddress issues of concern well beyond that of animal welfare in the

5 Miller appreciates Hobgood-Oster’s qualified ethic of radical Christian hospitality, butconcludes that we must not only envision ourselves as playing “hosts” or “guests” to oneanother, but as sharing life together as “neighbors” (2012, 102).

6 Hobgood-Oster’s feminist and ecofeminist methodologies and commitments are madeeven clearer in her first book (2008, 10–11).


current food system: its negative impact on (human) public health, theenvironment, and the vitality of rural American communities, to name afew. Finally, Hobgood-Oster urges readers to concern themselves with thefate of endangered species not only on the grounds of hospitality, but alsobecause “our own survival depends on the flourishing of diverse life onEarth” (2010, 134).

Hobgood-Oster acknowledges that “almost all of the topics in the bookcould, arguably, come under the umbrella of hospitality (sharing ourhomes with pets, rethinking the way we treat food animals)” (2010, 116).Yet had her retrieval of the ancient Christian practice of hospitality toothers without expectation of reciprocity been applied to the issue ofeating, for example, she might not have been able to conclude withanything short of a vegetarian-when-possible norm, since the consumptionof meat produced outside of the industrial food system still normallyinvolves an instrumentalist view of other animals that the concept ofradical hospitality would likely interrogate.7 This counterfactual approach(of scrutinizing all contemporary practices involving other animalsthrough the lens of radical Christian hospitality) might even have allowedher to advance one of her own goals more successfully: to distinguish herown platform of “active compassion in all that we do” more clearly fromthe merciful approach of “benevolent dominion” that she critiques in theanimal advocacy work of Matthew Scully, a self-avowed conservative andformer senior speechwriter to President George W. Bush.8 However, since

7 Why not a veganism-when-possible norm? The answer, in short, is that there may beindeed be ways of using animals even as sources of food (for example, milk or eggs) that areconsistent with radical hospitality. As neo-Kantian philosopher Christine Korsgaard notes,the use of animals in companionship or as aids to the handicapped and the police need notbe exploitative, but “whether they could consent to provide us with wool, dairy products, oreggs, depends on whether there are methods of gathering those products that are genuinelycompatible with a normal and happy life for the animals. Factory farming violates thatcondition in a scandalous way, but we can at least raise the question whether there is anymode of farming that does not” (2009, 14–15).

8 To be clear, Hobgood-Oster specifically presents her “active compassion” approach as“stronger” (2010, 109) than what Scully advocates in Scully 2003. But since Scully similarlyappeals to the compassion of his intended Christian readership to stop the cruelty involvedin factory farming, trophy hunting, and animal experimentation, and since Hobgood-Osterdoes not explain in The Friends We Keep how her views contrast with his, we are left withan argumentative gap. Perhaps it can be closed by appealing to Hobgood-Oster’s earlierwork, where we learn that it is Scully’s “patriarchal conservatism,” his continuation of theidea that “animals [should] remain utterly subordinate to the power of humans,” and hisreplacement of the concept of animal rights with notions of mercy or dominion that she findsobjectionable (Hobgood-Oster 2008, 137–38). The ambiguity of the later book arguably worksin her favor since advocating more explicitly either for animal rights or for a rejection of thetheological dominion paradigm would likely have alienated many readers, thereby limitingthe number of people who would be otherwise willing to consider her passionate pleas forcompassion.


Hobgood-Oster’s attempt to “unleas[h] Christianity’s compassion foranimals” as per the book’s subtitle will likely prove quite demanding forher target audience, her call for greater compassion, rather than radicalhospitality in all areas of human-nonhuman animal relations, might wellhave been the strategically wiser course of action to press from herreadership.

3. Norms for Animal Ethics: Neighbor-Love and Justice

Miller does not adopt Laura Hobgood-Oster’s aim to unearth a forgottenhistory of nonhuman animals in Christianity, but he likewise uses anarrativist approach to ethics, valorizes the role of emotion therein, andreveals his special indebtedness to feminist thought (especially to thework of care ethicists Carol Gilligan, Nel Noddings, and Virginia Held,philosophers Martha Nussbaum and Mary Midgley, and ecofeminist CarolAdams). Like Clough (as will be made clear in section 4), Miller groundshis ethical positions theologically in ways that foreground distinctiveclaims of revelation. Not surprisingly, Karl Barth emerges for bothauthors as a conversation partner. However, Miller’s central conceit is tomeditate upon the foundational love ethic of Christianity through the lensof the Good Samaritan and accordingly place animals in the ethicalcategory of neighbor (Luke 10:25–37). Miller claims that such an approachis “richer” than secular philosophical alternatives that allegedly fall shortof their desired ends as well as other theological accounts that he chargesas still “working within the confines set by secular philosophers . . . ofearlier consequentialist or deontological accounts” (2012, 2). Miller’sapproach is nevertheless grounded in an eclectic array of sources as heremains accountable to the vast, interdisciplinary literature of animalstudies and engaged with contemporary developments in science, philoso-phy, and other fields.

Miller’s primary claim is that if Christians viewed love as refractedthrough Jesus’s teaching in the parable of the Good Samaritan, theywould be compelled to respond to animal others as neighbors. He claimsthat Jesus responds to the lawyer’s question about line-drawing in such away as to focus our attention on the “act of loving,” not on the “station ortaxonomy;” in other words the “subject of neighborliness” rather than the“object of neighborly love” (2012, 14–15, 78). While Miller acknowledgesthat the “other” in the parable is most commonly conceptualized onracial-ethnic or religious (not nonhuman) lines, he insists that the ethicalthrust of the parable is tied precisely to transcending conventional notionsof who counts as one’s neighbor and turns to other biblical passages thatshow that neighborly love need “not falter at the species line” (2012, 16).

Miller accordingly marshals a number of biblical stories to make thislatter point. One especially powerful one is the prophet Nathan’s tale


about a rich man who steals and eats a poor man’s lamb (2 Samuel12:1–10). He finds it morally significant that the legitimacy of the inti-mate relationship between the poor man and his lamb was neverquestioned; there is no indication in the text that the poor man’s bondwith his companion animal threatened or diminished his love for hischildren (pace the frequently heard objection that moral concern for otheranimals will divert our rightful attention from humans). Indeed, hearersof the story (beginning with King David) are led to sympathize with theplight of the poor man on the basis of the rich man’s lack of pity (2012, 16,108–9). Miller also reads the story of Jesus defending his healing of awoman on the Sabbath (Luke 13:10–17), in which Jesus points rhetori-cally to his accusers’ willingness to untether one of their thirsty animalson the Sabbath and lead it to drink, as demonstrating how the care weshow to other animals can encourage compassion toward fellow humans inneed (2012, 16). These examples are powerful because they can informChristian views about appropriate human-nonhuman relations withoutrequiring anyone to assume that animal welfare was either the primaryintent behind those texts or even the primary lesson to be drawn fromthem.

Miller makes three discrete prescriptive claims in animal ethics in thecourse of his overall argument: (1) the moral vocabulary of rights ought tobe marginal; (2) one must distinguish between exercising dominion overother animals (radâ) and subduing the earth (kabaš); and (3) vegetarian-ism ought to be the normative, but non-absolute, dietary practice forChristians.

Miller rejects rights language as the primary way of speaking aboutanimal ethics for two main reasons. First, he believes that the vocabularyof rights necessarily “presuppose[s] an antagonistic or competitive envi-ronment between individuals” (2012, 110). In contrast, his ethic of neigh-borly care pays homage to core insights of the feminist ethics of caretradition, in supposing that our ability to relate ethically to one anotherfirst arose from and is still premised upon experiences of dependency andnatural caring, sympathy, and real interpersonal relationships with par-ticular others. Second, he worries about the “universalizing tendency ofthe animal rights position” to demand that we treat all animals whopossess a minimum threshold of certain capacities equally (2012, 111).Miller proposes instead a “taxonomy of nearness,” itself an acknowledgedadaption of philosopher Clare Palmer’s “taxonomy of relationship,” as away to differentiate the responsibilities we have to different kinds ofanimals (namely, wild, domestic, and our pets) based on the ways in whichthey are or are not proximate to us (2012, 90–111). His pointed contrastbetween the sameness-of-treatment approach that he supposes is man-dated by the animal rights framework and the differential treatment thathis “taxonomy of nearness” allows can be further explicated as follows:


If farm animals have a right not to be kept and used for human purposesthen neither do pet animals. . . . [but] historic and present relationships ofnearness do matter in our ethical consideration of animals. . . . To “liberate”one’s pet and begin treating it as if it were a wild animal would be a betrayalof the close relationship of care and dependency that one has establishedwith it. To care for wild, domestic, and pet animals differently is thereforenot arbitrary or unjust. Rather, it is to take seriously the differing levels ofresponsibility that the concept of nearness places on human moral relation-ships with other animals. (2012, 111)

For these reasons, it is only cautiously “within an ethic of neighborly care”or from within discussions of human relationships with wild animals(wherein human responsibility is best characterized in terms of restraint)that Miller is willing to accommodate a limited place for the concept ofrights (2012, 84–86).9

Those conversant with the decades-long debate in ethics between the(universalizing) “justice” vs. (particularizing) “care” approaches will knowthat a successful resolution between these frameworks will require morespace to develop than what can be provided here. Still, it is worth notingthat Palmer herself understood the differentiated, relational ethic shedeveloped in Animal Ethics in Context as not dependent upon, butnevertheless wholly compatible with, a conception of animal rights. Sheargued that our responsibilities, particularly our positive duties of assis-tance, to similarly capacitated others may legitimately vary for a numberof reasons—differences in nearness, responsibilities accrued by domesti-cation or our own actions—but she did not conclude that due recognitionof those factors would lead to a rejection of the rights paradigm in toto(2010, 44–76). I side here with Palmer’s insights that a focus on respon-sibility is not necessarily hostile to, and at a minimum compatiblewith, a conception of rights. In fact, I would argue that the greater thesense of care and dependency, the greater the need for a recognition of abaseline of rights, lest the carer unwittingly transgress the boundaries ofthe cared-for, act paternalistically in ways that are not warranted, or

9 Miller might be overstating what indeed the “rights view” requires, for even the leadinganimal rights philosopher, Tom Regan, justifies differential treatment of animals on contex-tual factors. For example, he provides several reasons for preferring the life of a human tothat of a dog in a “lifeboat ethics” scenario, even though both are subjects-of-a-life with rights(2004, 351–52). He also employs the concepts of moral agency and patience to explain whyjustice requires that we intervene to save farm animals that are slated to be slaughtered forhuman consumption, though we ought not do the same in the case of prey who may besubject to suffering and death from wild animal predation. In his words, “In claiming thatwe have a prima facie duty to assist those animals whose rights are violated, therefore, weare not claiming that we have a duty to assist the sheep against the attack of the wolf, sincethe wolf neither can nor does violate anyone’s rights” (2004, 284–85, compare 359, 361,emphasis in original).


otherwise neglect to mind the separateness and distinctiveness betweenthose who care and those who are cared for by them.10

Miller is much more successful when he urges Christians to make adistinction between the biblical commands to exercise dominion over otheranimals and to subdue the earth (Genesis 1:28). As Miller correctlyobserves, it is not uncommon for those working in Christian stewardshipethics or environmental land ethicists to lump all nonhuman animals,plants, and other natural phenomena indiscriminately together as“nature” or “creation” and then to discuss human responsibilities to it allas an undifferentiated whole. But through careful biblical exegesis, anunpacking of the meaning of the Hebrew verbs radâ and kabaš, andreliance upon the Barthian distinction between animals and plants, Millershows that the relationality implied in having dominion (radâ) is notsynonymous with the subject-object relationship implied in the commandto subdue the earth (kabaš).11 Of course, those pushing for greater equalitybetween humans and other animals might be disappointed by Miller’sretention of hierarchy in his defense of the concept of dominion. Butbecause he understands other living creatures (nephesh chayah) asdemanding a personal response (analogous to Martin Buber’s I-Thourelationship), they can take comfort in knowing that Miller has in mindbenevolent and responsible rule, not exploitation or the use of others as amere means to one’s end.12

We turn now, finally, to Miller’s normative defense of Christian veg-etarianism. It is one that he advances neither only for the spiritual elite,nor in such a way as to be absolute. His way of framing the question ofwhether we can practically name animals as both neighbors and food willbe of special interest to Barthians, since he applies Barth’s notion of theGrenzfall (exceptional case) to the topic, though in a way that Barthhimself did not. Barth used the Grenzfall to discuss a variety of situationsin which killing might present itself as a possibility—for example, suicide,abortion, killing in self-defense, capital punishment, and war—but hejustified the human killing of animals for food instead along the lines ofa sacrificial, substitutionary, and priestly eschatological act (Miller 2012,150, 153). This point notwithstanding, Miller proposes a “theologicallyinformed comparison of pacifism and vegetarianism” as Stanley Hauerwasand John Berkman did before him, though in a way that conceptualizes

10 For potential problems with paternalism, authoritarianism, and projection between thecarer and the one cared for in care theory, see Jaggar 1995 and Tronto 1993.

11 I have duplicated Miller’s transliteration from the Hebrew.12 It is worth noting that while the arguments of Hobgood-Oster (2008 (137–38) would

lead to categorizing Miller as continuing in the long tradition of “patriarchal conservatism”for these reasons, the arguments of Hobgood-Oster 2010 (which do not rely upon thelanguage of rights and repeatedly appeal to a reader’s sense of compassion and mercy) wouldnot.


cases of permissible meat-eating as exceptions to the divine rule to upholdlife, as opposed to when something akin to just war criteria are satisfiedas in the case of Hauerwas and Berkman (Miller 2012, 210–11n75;Hauerwas and Berkman 1992, 207). However faithful or appropriateMiller’s use of Barth may be, we are left in the end with a Christian callto vegetarianism that is premised upon the normativity of a nonviolentresponse to animal neighbors that is ultimately more demanding thanHobgood-Oster’s call for Christians to refrain from the cruel practices offactory farming (without necessarily having to forego meat obtained inmore “humane” ways).

I share Miller’s orienting convictions that a rejection of killing animalsfor food when not absolutely necessary ought to be seen as a legitimateexpression of Christian faith and that it should thus be meat-eating in ourcontext, not vegetarianism, that bears the burden of justification. Thatsaid, and with genuine appreciation for Miller’s careful and clever use ofBarth, it is not clear to me how and why Miller’s prescriptive vegetari-anism is best served by this detour through the Barthian Grenzfall. ForMiller’s naming of nonhuman animals as neighbors through the lens ofthe Good Samaritan would already seem to tend toward a normativeposition of nonviolent and peaceful coexistence between and amonghuman and nonhuman animals. To resolve real or potential conflicts withsuch neighbors, perhaps nothing more would have been needed to addthan Linzey’s exhortation for Christians to adopt a Christological “gener-osity paradigm” wherein those with greater power willingly endure sac-rifices for those with less—and not the other way around as in Aristotle.13

Such an appeal, aimed at a Christian’s desire to emulate Christ out oflove, might also have had greater affective power in Miller’s targetedaudience of scholarly Christian readers.

Miller’s vegetarian ethic, grounded in the feminist tradition of caretheory, can be productively compared with that of Camosy’s justice-centered approach, particularly since both regard meatless meals more asa normative diet for Christians than merely an option for a spiritual elite.Put differently, while Miller (and to some extent Hobgood-Oster) empha-sizes the virtues of mercy, love, compassion, and nonviolence and groundshis call for Christian vegetarianism on relationality (placing otheranimals in the role of neighbor), Camosy invokes logical consistency,principled reasoning, impartiality, fairness, and nondiscrimination tomake his case. To wit, the subtitle of Camosy’s book is “Christian Ethics,Consistent Action.” The Christian conception of justice he introduces in

13 See Linzey 1994, 30–33. Aristotle contended that nonhuman animals lacked thecapacities of speech, reason, and the “perception of what is good or bad, just or unjust,” whichis why they had been created by the order of nature for our use (Aristotle 1997, 4, 8[1253a15–17, 1254b2–12]).


the first chapter involves “consistently and actively working to see thatindividuals and groups—especially vulnerable populations on themargins—are given what they are owed” and the book concludes with areminder that “applying a principle means you are forced to follow itwherever it goes” (2013, 7, 127).

Camosy meets his readers where (he assumes) they are and then gentlybrings them to see the ways in which their preferences and prejudicesmay be unjustifiable from a moral point of view. Specifically, Camosyrecalls the outrage over NFL quarterback Michael Vick’s involvement indogfighting first to explain what precisely Vick did wrong (harm the dogsthemselves) through the concept of speciesism.14 In asking why there wasoutrage in Vick’s treatment of dogs but not about the “tortuous existenceof pigs in factory farms,” Camosy then canvasses many of the responseshis readers are likely to provide—mainstream Western culture considersdogs pets, not food; we find some animals “cute” and can empathize withtheir suffering better than we can with others; we consumers are largelydisconnected from the ways in which meat gets on our plates; we like thetaste of hot dogs and pepperoni pizza—before judging them as havingprovided insufficient justification to “discriminate between dogs and pigsin this way” (2013, 12–13). Elsewhere, in drawing the reader’s attentionto cultural variability on attitudes about which animals are fit to be eatenrather than loved as pets (dogs over pigs in “some households in Asia”),Camosy criticizes these ethnocentrist views and our “emotional attach-ments” to some animals over others for obscuring the consistent applica-tion of principles required by justice (2013, 102). In his words, “whyshould we in the West care about eating horse versus eating pig versuseating dog? They are all social, friendly, smart animals. There is virtuallyno difference, morally speaking, between torturing a dog to death andtorturing a pig to death—especially when both are done in the interest ofmoney and pleasure” (2013, 102).

Unlike the other works discussed here, Camosy is especially indebtedto Catholic thought. In correcting the mistaken assumption that concernfor other animals is for the “soft and sentimental” types of the secular left,he bases his ethical prescriptions in the tradition of Catholic socialteaching—a tradition that requires love and “countercultural commit-ment, determination, and strength” (2013, 77). His references include, butare not limited to, the following:

14 Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Camosy, the author of Peter Singer andChristian Ethics: Beyond Polarization (2012), would use the concept of “speciesism” thatSinger popularized to show how treating nonhuman animals as “other” would be no moremorally defensible than what racists or sexists do to those they unjustly discriminate againstor otherwise disparage.


• the Christ-like “preferential option” that Christians ought to demon-strate for those in the margins (including “prenatal children”) overthose in power;

• the teaching of Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas on nonhumananimals;

• St. Francis of Assisi’s great love of animals and the feast thatcommemorates his life;

• our non-absolute dominion over other living beings and obligation toshow them kindness as per the Catechism of the Catholic Church(2000, 2415–2418);

• the concern Christians should show over structural or social violenceand the rejection of the idea that the earth was created for humansin the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church;

• the need for us to respect the “covenant” between humans and therest of creation and accordingly resist consumerism in Pope BenedictXVI’s encyclical Caritas in veritate (Benedict XVI 2009, para. 4–5, 10,64–67, 72–74).

What is more, to those Catholics who try still to “dismiss [the author’s]animal-friendly religious views as a kind of post-Vatican II liberalism,”Camosy adds, with the aid of Berkman’s scholarship, that “pre-Vatican IImoral theology, for all its weaknesses,” had made substantial contribu-tions to our thinking about the “moral status and treatment of nonhumananimals,” while the aftermath of Vatican II arguably “took us in aquestionably speciesist direction by focusing almost exclusively on thedignity of the human person” (2013, 78).

Camosy’s appeal to Berkman’s application of the principle of “coopera-tion with evil” to the topic of factory farming (Berkman 2012) is onenoteworthy feature of the book. Their combined point is that we can becomplicit in evil even if we do not ourselves commit the evil deed, such aswhen someone “formally” cooperates with evil by “shar[ing] the aim of theterrorist” and showing him how to make a suicide vest. In contrast, wemight not be morally guilty at all if we “materially” aid the (eventual)evildoer without sharing his aim, such as when a “pharmacist unknow-ingly dispenses medication to a customer who uses it to poison someoneelse” (Camosy 2013, 103). Camosy ultimately uses this distinctionbetween formal and material cooperation to close the moral distance thatreaders are likely to feel between the cruelties that Vick inflicted on dogsand their own practices of meat-eating. Readers are not, in short, let offthe hook: insofar as we eat meat because “it is cheap and easy” and “givesus pleasure,” and insofar as it is the very factory-farm system that allowsus to buy meat conveniently and at an artificially low price, we areformally (not just materially) cooperating with evil when we purchasetheir products. We thus “condemn ourselves” with every condemnation we


hurl at Vick for analogously torturing animals for pleasure and profit(2013, 101–4).

To be clear, Camosy’s advocacy for “consistent action” and against“undue partiality” is paradoxically held together by his sensitivity tocontext. The latter is not synonymous with moral relativism—after all, heis unwilling to let Westerners condemn some Asians for eating dogs whenthey themselves consume other animals—but it reflects his affirmation ofthe teaching in the Catechism that we are not to cause “animals to sufferor die needlessly” (Catholic Church 2000, 2418, emphasis mine). Thus,while Camosy reasons that Jesus and his disciples were justified in eatingfish because they lived in a “time and place where protein sources were farless available than in our time,” he judges that our contemporary, envi-ronmentally unsustainable fish-eating habits are in most cases drivenmore by taste and convenience than absolute need and thus may not passethical muster (2013, 53–54). Camosy’s vegetarian ethic, in short, isnormative and principled without being exceptionless.

Nevertheless, there are certain oversights, due to the book’s short lengthand accessible style (135 pages and 8 notes total), that are likely to leavescholarly readers wanting greater elaboration. For example, Camosyresponds to the question how the ritual sacrifice of nonhumans in the Biblecould be “consistent with the moral status of such animals as part of thepeaceful Kingdom of God” as follows: “the most likely explanation is thatthis sacrifice was a holdover from the influence of the practices of Israel’spagan neighbors, and not the will of the peaceful God revealed in JesusChrist” (2013, 50). Camosy does not explain why this “outside influence”answer is the most credible one other than by adding, with scripturalsupport, that later prophets such as Isaiah, Hosea, and Amos condemnedanimal sacrifice. In another place, after concluding that Christians todayshould “follow the biblical mandate to abstain from meat that has beensacrificed to . . . [the] idols” of “consumerism and profit,” Camosy adds thatwe “can and should strongly and publicly resist this practice in ourpersonal eating decisions, and instead shop at places like Whole Foods,Trader Joe’s, and local farms where we can be maximally sure that we arenot participating in this social structure of sin” (2013, 107, emphasis mine).He does not, however, explain how and why those shopping alternativesallow consumers to avoid such complicity. While I understand fully thedifference between a book written for fellow scholars and one written forthe masses, I regret that Camosy’s rendering of animal sacrifice to paganinfluences leaves the representation of the religious Other unchallenged—pace feminist postcolonial theologian Kwok Pui-Lan’s (2005) well-knowninjunctions to interrogate such representations—just as Camosy’s endorse-ment of Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and farmers’ markets unfortunatelyleaves intact the familiar but unnecessary linkage between conscientiousconsumerism and class-based elitism.


Camosy’s book is likely to be unsettling, and he acknowledges thatseveral of his family members and friends have told him that theysimply “can’t read [his] stuff on animals because I know that it will forceme to change” (2013, 37). While he is relentless in his exhortation toreaders to apply their principles consistently, it is heartening to see himown up to his own struggles in living out his convictions. As he acknowl-edges, “I became convinced by these arguments at age twenty-four, butit took me six more years to make the commitment to give up meat . . .and now seven years later I still struggle especially when eating meat isconnected to various family and holiday functions” (2013, 108). But inconnecting the “disciplining [of] our appetites so that we do not partici-pate in injustice” that is required for a boycott of factory-farmed meat,Camosy reminds his reader that the Church has long expected otherdifficult, countercultural commitments from followers of Christ, likegiving to the poor, fasting, and chastity. He thereby places his would-be“ethical eater” amidst a community of people who seek to model them-selves after “Christ’s self-emptying, his rejection of sinful appetites,and—ultimately—his holiness” (2013, 77).

4. A Systematic Theology of Animal Ethics

Clough offers a serious reconsideration of the “heart of biblical and focaltheological traditions” on the place of other animals in Christian theology.As such, his On Animals neither has him adopting Hobgood-Oster’smethod of retrieving “eccentric animal-friendly texts” that have beenpreviously unnoticed or forgotten, nor pursuing the more common alter-native, as Miller and Camosy each do, of meditating upon a key Christianethical norm (neighbor-love, justice) before applying it to concrete cases.Instead, Clough analyzes the most fundamental Christian doctrines—creation, reconciliation, and redemption—and thereby postpones teasingout the normative implications for the relation between human andnonhuman animals for a companion volume. A groundbreaking feature ofhis book is that it is the first to consider the place of animals in systematictheology. Interestingly, it is also the first book of theology (of any kind) tohave been endorsed by the eminent philosopher Peter Singer.

On Animals opens with the claim that Christian theology has come torely upon a flawed understanding of the difference between humans andother animals in ways that are “implausible, unbiblical, theologicallyproblematic and ethically misleading.” A serious reconsideration is hence-forth needed to ground an understanding of appropriate relationshipswith animal others, provide an adequate theological anthropology, andpreserve the coherence of Christian theology itself (2012, xii). Cloughcharacterizes his book’s argument as “simple,” but its presentation is moreexacting for the reader than such language implies.


By Clough’s own admission, this first volume must be judged as “finallyfruitless” if read in absence from his (forthcoming) second volume, givenhis Barth-inspired conviction that theology must remain in service toquestions of practice (2012, x–xi). Such self-confessed argumentativeincompleteness thus casts doubt on the propriety of a review of Clough’sfirst volume at this time. Yet the novelty and strength of Clough’sapproach merits attention here for the role it will play in grounding hisand perhaps others’ work in animal ethics in the future. I will accordinglyunpack three aspects of his theological account of animals that may proveto be of special relevance to those interested in such a task.

The first point is that Clough turns instead to the biblical and theo-logical record to achieve a similar result as Waldau does on the basis ofscience: we humans share “creaturely solidarity” with everything made byGod. Indeed, we share even more affinities with other animals in ourcommon origin and fate.15 While many other theologians readily concedethat much,16 Clough’s boldness lies in his application of his reflections oncreatureliness to the orthodox profession of the two natures of Christ. Inhis view, the proper interpretation of the incarnation in the historic creedsof Nicaea, Constantinople, and Chalcedon should be that “God became ananimal” or “God became a creature” or “God took on flesh, the stuff ofliving creature.” To think that God’s incarnation into humanity is whatultimately “counts” would be akin to erroneously believing that theparticularity of God’s incarnation as a man or a Jew “delimit[s] thesignificance of God’s action in Christ” in ways that would preclude womenor Gentiles (Clough 2012, 84–85, emphasis mine).17 To those who mightfind this interpretation “shocking,” Clough points to precedents in nothing

15 “[H]uman beings and other animals are thought of together in Christian scripture.Together they are given life by their creator as fleshly creatures made of dust and inspiredby the breath of life, together they are given a common table in Eden and beyond, togetherthey experience the fragility of mortal life, together they are the objects of God’s providentialcare, together they are given consideration under the law of Israel and its Rabbinicinterpreters, together they are subject to God’s judgment and blessing, together they arecalled to praise their maker and together they gather around God’s throne in the newcreation. Obviously there are great differences between the animals God made . . . [but] it isimportant to pause on this less familiar step of appreciating the common life of animals ofall kinds before God” (Clough 2012, 40, see also 27).

16 For instance, the title of a book by the preeminent animal theologian of our era isCreatures of the Same God: Explorations in Animal Theology (Linzey 2009).

17 In combining this insight with Barth’s notion of Jesus Christ’s election, Cloughconcludes the following “if it is through Christ that those human beings that God determinedto be with are elected to participate in God’s glory, then there seems little objection toclaiming that, through Christ, God’s other creatures are elected to this participation. . . . Wedo not need to claim that other-than-human creatures are elected only secondarily. . . . It isthrough the assumption of creatureliness by the divine Christ that all creatures may besaved; other animals are not saved through Christ’s taking on humanness any more thanwomen are saved by the taking on of maleness” (2012, 98).


less than the Johannine proclamation that “the Word became flesh” (John1:14) and in other biblical passages that use the inclusive term for allliving things (for example, Genesis 6:13, Job 34:15, Jeremiah 32:27, John17:2, 1 Timothy 3:16, 1 John 4:2).

Meditating upon the creatureliness of humans in general and Christ inparticular holds dramatic implications for the doctrine of atonement aswell. Clough reasons that doing so should propel Christians to regardChrist’s death on the cross as not merely having been “like an animalsacrifice” (as in 1 Corinthians 5:7, 1 Peter 1:19, or Revelation 5:6), for “it[wa]s an animal sacrifice”—and one wherein “a human animal wassacrificed not for humans but for the sake of all creatures” (2012, 128–29,98). While we must await Clough’s application of these doctrinal state-ments to questions of practice in the second volume of On Animals, thedivine assumption of creatureliness should at minimum work to affirm thegoodness of embodiment, just as his interpretation of Christ’s death as ananimal sacrifice for all might well be used to interrogate ongoing sacrifi-cial uses of animals for religious or secular purposes. Clough’s insistenceon the theological similarities between human and nonhuman animals, asall creatures of the same God, is clearly primed to do much work.

The second point of interest to ethicists is the surprising conclusionthat Clough reaches about the degree to which nonhuman animals may beheld morally accountable for their behavior. Miller advances what wemight call the “conventional view” of moral agency, praise, and blame:beings who are not in possession of the “level of intentionality andunderstanding of right and wrong necessary for truly responsible action”cannot be held morally responsible for their actions (2012, 20).18 Even ifwe may find “incipient morality” in some nonhuman animal species,perhaps in chimpanzees who inflict “punishments” upon one another inbrutal and cannibalistic ways, Miller insists that we must neverthelessconclude with Jane Goodall and others that we humans alone are capableof immoral acts of deliberate cruelty or evil (Miller 2012, 20, 31). Incontrast to Miller who concludes that “humans represent the only crea-ture, as far as we know, to possess true responsibility before God, otherhumans and other animals,” Clough doubts that humans alone are sinful,since on his reading theology coheres best if the doctrine of atonementwere to “follow the doctrine of the incarnation in encompassing allcreatures” (Miller 2012, 19; Clough 2012, 105).

18 Versions of this conventional view can be found throughout the philosophical andtheological literature. Aquinas, among others, regards “dumb animals” as devoid of reasonand thus as moved by natural impulse as opposed to freedom (ST II-II, Q. 64, A. 1, ad 2).Holmes Rolston III, who is widely regarded as the “father of environmental ethics”, has alsoargued in a widely read essay that “all the vocabulary of redemption—sin, forgiveness,repentance, faith, hope, love, righteousness—is addressed to humans; animals are incapableof these vices and virtues” (1994, 224).


Clough’s reading of the biblical record and his commitment that God asthe reconciler of all things “does not effect reconciliation where there is noneed” leads him to reject the afore-mentioned conventional view (Clough2012, 127). He admits that while Genesis 6 is ambiguous about whetherthe actions of nonhumans played a role in provoking the divine wrath thatunleashed the flood, the idea that both human and nonhuman animalsshould be held responsible for their actions is no stranger to the Christiantradition. The snake in the Garden of Eden was clearly “acting inopposition to God’s purposes” and was later punished accordingly; bothhuman and nonhuman animals in the Noahide covenant were to beaccountable for their taking of human life (Genesis 9:5); both human andnonhuman animals were jointly prohibited from touching Mount Sinaiand were threatened with punishment for sexual misconduct (Exodus19:13, Leviticus 20:15–16); and both human and nonhuman animals werelegally prosecuted in trials for their “crimes” until relatively recently(Exodus 21:28) (Clough 2012, 108–9).19 Clough even interprets the samefindings in animal behavior studies (referenced above by Miller) as sub-stantiating, rather than undermining, his supposition that nonhumananimals may also be in need of the forgiveness of sins. He recountsGoodall’s observations in Gombe of an adult female chimpanzee namedPassion who, along with her daughter Pom, killed several infants of otherchimpanzees by biting their foreheads and consuming them (Clough 2012,112–13). He contends that if we are to reject the Cartesian view ofnonhuman animals as mere instinct-driven automata, we must interprettheir actions as due to “some combination of free and forced choices” andin so doing, acknowledge that a comparison can be made between theirmoral agency and our own (Clough 2012, 113). That is, to the extent thatwe are unwilling to excuse human misbehavior from being judged assinful if we can provide an evolutionary or “natural” explanation for it—inother words, if we are not to disregard the immorality of a homicide if thekilling secured a reproductive advantage to the murderer—we cannotshield these chimpanzee infanticides (and perhaps those of other species)from moral scrutiny for similar reasons.

To be clear, in opening up the plausibility of attributing sin to nonhu-man animals, Clough does not intend to equalize responsibilities betweenhuman and other animals, suggest that all sins are capable of beingcommitted across the species, or rationalize animal suffering as justified

19 To be sure, Miller also reflects on the significance of medieval animal trials but comesto different conclusions about their meaning. As he reasons, punishing nonhuman animalswho had ostensibly committed “crimes” may have had more to do with attempts to displaythe power of the church, beliefs that the animals were instruments of the devil or demonicpowers, an understanding that beasts who had killed humans had to be executed forviolating the hierarchical order of the universe, or that the trials themselves served aneducative and deterrent purpose to the public (2012, 20–23).


punishment. While again we must wait to discover what Clough willdetermine as the practical import of this account of sin in nonhumananimals, we might take note already here of how very different traditionalbiblical and theological notions of sin are from more conventional views ofmoral culpability. That is, many parents of young children, teachers,ethicists, and prosecutors in criminal courts operate under the assumptionthat it would be inappropriate and even unjust to punish individuals forcensorious acts if they neither knew that they were wrong nor could nothave realistically done otherwise (if they had acted under duress or couldnot adequately have exercised control over their actions due to mentalimpairment, young age, or another mitigating factor). But in canvassingthe many ways in which the Christian biblical and theological traditionshave theorized about sin,20 marshaling the doctrine of original sin, andsiding with Augustine over Pelagius, Clough reminds his readers thatChristianity historically has held a different and more complex under-standing of the relationships between sin, guilt, free-will, and responsibil-ity (2012, 117). Nonhuman animals on his score can thus be understood asnot only suffering from the consequences of sin, but also as fellowcreatures in need of the reconciling and atoning work of God in Christ.21

The final point worth noting is Clough’s frank but welcome acknowl-edgment that the transition from theology to ethics will not be a straight-forward affair, as even firmly held convictions about human-nonhumananimal sameness or difference will underdetermine answers to practicalquestions about how then we should comport ourselves. To illustrate, hopein some future deliverance of all creation might incline some Christians toemulate God’s mercy to animals in this life, as it did John Wesley, but itmight prompt others, particularly those who understand redemption interms of compensation for past suffering or injustice, to be less motivatedto ameliorate their miseries now. Conversely, the disavowal of the ideathat nonhuman animals, too, have souls might lead some to deny thereality of animal pain and thereby justify all manner of ill treatment

20 According to Clough, these include sin as rebellion, covenant-breaking, a violation ofdivinely mandated boundaries of creaturely flourishing, hamartia or “missing the mark,”distorted desire, and a breakdown of right relationships (2012, 104–30).

21 While controversial, we might contextualize Clough’s reflections on the moral culpabil-ity of other animals as consistent with the many ways in which researchers and scholars arechipping away at the human-nonhuman animal divide in cutting-edge scholarship in animalstudies. To illustrate, beyond considering human responsibilities to other animals as phi-losophers and theologians have done for centuries, researchers like Frans de Waal (2014) andMark Bekoff and Jessica Pierce (2009) are theorizing about the moral abilities of nonhumananimals. Bekoff (2013), has even documented what he describes as mourning or funeraryrites in some nonhuman species of animals such as magpies and elephants. Over and aboveexposing the ways in which humans commit sins in their treatment of nonhuman animals,those sympathetic to Clough’s project might increasingly entertain the ways in whichnonhuman animals themselves can be said to be exhibiting sinful behavior.


towards them (Descartes), while it might prompt others to refrain fromcutting short their lives prematurely because they have but one mortal lifeto live.

Clough briefly points us to a similar pattern of doctrineunderdetermining practice in the applied ethical issue of the humanproduction and slaughter of other animals for food. Belief in ontologicalsameness or similarity between humans and other animals could lead tomoral justifications for eating meat (if lions eat wildebeests, why shouldhumans not be permitted to eat chickens?) or, paradoxically, ethicalvegetarianism, if the “sameness” view were to entail a reconceptualizationof meat-eating as a form of cannibalism. Conclusions in the other directionabout ontological “difference” could likewise lead to disparate results. Itcould ground the moral acceptability of eating animal but not human fleshwithout logical inconsistency, yet it could also lead to calls for humans toexercise a distinctive capacity to rise above instinct and make a moraldecision not to kill fleshly creatures for food when unnecessary for humanhealth or survival (Clough 2012, 77).

For the record, Clough believes that humans are both like and unlikeother species of animals in many ways,22 but that the primary differencebetween us and other creatures has less to do with the possession ofcertain capacities per se than it does with the idea of vocation: “God hascalled human beings to be creatures in a particular way and take respon-sibility for the lives of other creatures” (2012, 76). Clough promises todescribe further how that vocation is to be experienced in his forthcomingcompanion volume. But in the meantime, it is the theological ethics of theother scholars treated in this essay that begin to fulfill that promise.

5. Conclusion

As noted earlier, Camosy is aware of the resistance that his work hascreated and will create in his own family and social circles. We might addthat his appeals to the authoritative teachings of the Catholic Church andhis explicit linkage of the logic of nonhuman animal protection with fetalprotection is likely to be met with deep appreciation in some Christiancircles but hostility and suspicion in others. To be sure, all the Christiantheological-ethical work treated here is likely to encounter pockets ofsympathy and opposition from different segments of their Christianaudience. Yet those books that ground their ethical prescriptions inunconventional or more specific, and thus contestable claims are lesslikely to procure agreement from co-religionists than those that base their

22 “Unlike birds but like rabbits we cannot fly; like whales but unlike sharks we arewarm-blooded; like crows but unlike protozoa we can engage in problem-solving; likemonkeys but unlike fish we use tolls; and so on” (Clough 2012, 76).


normative claims on longstanding Christian values or practices. To illus-trate, Hobgood-Oster’s theological ambiguity in some cases, modesty inothers, and focus instead on Christian practices in The Friends We Keepwork in favor of its popular Christian reception, for it is not easy to denythat Christians are called to compassion and hospitality in light of theirhistory. In contrast, Miller’s unconventional (but in my judgment, defen-sible) reading of the parable of the Good Samaritan and his recourse to theBarthian concept of the Grenzfall does not readily immunize him fromcritique from fellow Christians; those who reject his reading of the parableor who find fault with his appeal to Barth can accordingly dismiss theclaims that flow from them. While we will have to wait to see what Cloughdoes in his companion volume on ethics, we may now count his earlierpoint about theory underdetermining practice—that claims of ontologicalsameness or difference between humans and other animals can go eitherway—as itself instructive.

The point is this: if the goal of social ethicists is to change the world, notsimply understand it (à la Marx), those involved in the animal protectionmovement would be wise to ground their platforms on the least controver-sial premises possible if the same or similar ends could be achieved as aresult. That is, if the same or similar position on an applied ethical issuecould be reached by multiple theoretical frameworks and if one of those wasmore in tune with a targeted audience’s extant intuitions and convictions,those invested in transformation ought either to offer multiple theoreticalpathways to the same practical conclusion or else ground their appeal onthe underlying theory with greater (or the greatest) traction. Claims ofsuperiority of one’s theoretical framework over others may do much to incitethe interest of scholars, but they are not likely to endear the author to thebroader public. In conclusion, animal ethics might well be comparable tofeminist ethics in still another way not explicitly noted by either Hobgood-Oster or Miller. As the feminist movement has long known, ethical theory,however important and legitimate as a scholarly pursuit, cannot afford tobe narrowly tied to the academy.23 Too much is at stake.24

23 As bell hooks insightfully notes, revolutionary feminist thinking was “most accepted andembraced in academic circles,” though generally “not made available to the public.” Sheaccordingly regrets that much of feminist discourse remains only accessible to “those amonguse who are highly literate, well-educated, and usually materially privileged” (2000, 5). For ahistory and critique of how academic feminism was formed by the very institutions it originallyset out to transform and accordingly lost some of its radical activist rationale in the wake ofits institutional success, see Ellen Messer-Davidow 2002 and Joan Wallach Scott 2008.

24 I would like to thank members of the Animals and Religion Group (ARG) of the AARfor nurturing scholarship in animal ethics; Diane M. Yeager for inviting me to do thisfirst-ever book discussion on animal ethics in the JRE, and Aline Kalbian, Martin Kavka,Darlene Weaver, and Jeff Gottlieb—the editors, the book review editor, and an editorialassistant of the JRE, respectfully—for invaluable feedback on earlier drafts.


REFERENCESAdams, Carol J.

2007 “Caring About Suffering: A Feminist Exploration.” In The FeministCare Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, edited by JosephineDonovan and Carol J. Adams, 198–228. New York: Columbia Univer-sity Press.

Animals and Society Institute2014 “Human-Animal Studies.” Available at: http://www.animalsandsociety

.org/pages/human-animal-studies (accessed June 6, 2014).Aquinas, Thomas

1947 The Summa Theologica. Benziger Bros. edition. Translated byFathers of the English Dominican Province. Available at: http://dhspriory.org/thomas/summa/ (accessed June 6, 2014).

Aristotle1997 Politics. Translated by C. D. C. Reeve. Indianapolis, Ind.: Hackett.

Bekoff, Mark2013 Why Dogs Hump and Bees Get Depressed: The Fascinating Science of

Animal Intelligence, Emotions, Friendship, and Conservation.Novato, Calif.: New World Library.

Bekoff, Mark, and Jessica Pierce2009 Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press.Benedict XVI

2009 Caritas in veritate. Encyclical. Available at: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20090629_caritas-in-veritate_en.html (accessed June 6, 2014).

Berkman, John2012 “Are We Addicted to the Suffering of Animals? Animal Cruelty and

the Catholic Moral Tradition.” In A Faith Embracing all Creatures,edited by Tripp York and Andy Alexis-Baker, 124–37. Eugene, OR:Wipf & Stock.

Camosy, Charles C.2012 Peter Singer and Christian Ethics: Beyond Polarization. New York:

Cambridge University Press.2013 For Love of Animals: Christian Ethics, Consistent Action. Cincinnati,

Oh.: Franciscan Media.Catholic Church

2000 Catechism of the Catholic Church. 2nd ed. Libreria Editrice Vaticana.Available at: http://www.usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/what-we-believe/catechism/catechism-of-the-catholic-church/epub/index.cfm(accessed June 30, 2014).

Clough, David L.2012 On Animals. Volume 1: Systematic Theology. London: T&T Clark.

Coetzee, J. M.1999 The Lives of Animals. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.


Hauerwas, Stanley, and John Berkman1992 “The Chief End of All Flesh.” Theology Today 49.2 (July): 196–208.

Hobgood-Oster, Laura2008 Holy Dogs and Asses: Animals in the Christian Tradition. Cham-

paign, Ill.: University of Illinois Press.2010 The Friends We Keep: Unleashing Christianity’s Compassion for

Animals. Waco, Tx.: Baylor University Press.hooks, bell

2000 Feminism Is for Everybody. Cambridge, Mass.: South End Press.Jaggar, Alison M.

1995 “Caring as a Feminist Practice of Moral Reason.” In Justice and Care:Essential Readings, edited by Virginia Held, 179–202. Boulder, Colo.:Westview Press.

Keown, Damien2001 Buddhism and Bioethics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Korsgaard, Christine M.2009 “Exploiting Animals: A Philosophical Protest.” AV Magazine 117.4

(Fall): 14–15.Linzey, Andrew

1994 Animal Theology. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Press.2009 Creatures of the Same God. New York: Lantern Books.

Linzey, Andrew, and Paul Barry Clark, eds.2004 Animal Rights: A Historical Anthology. New York: Columbia Univer-

sity Press.Messer-Davidow, Ellen

2002 Disciplining Feminism: From Social Activism to Academic Discourse.Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.

Miller, Daniel K.2012 Animal Ethics and Theology: The Lens of the Good Samaritan. New

York: Routledge.Palmer, Clare

2010 Animal Ethics in Context. New York: Columbia University Press.Pui-Lan, Kwok

2005 Postcolonial Imagination and Feminist Theology. Louisville, Ky.:Westminster John Knox Press.

Regan, Tom2004 The Case for Animal Rights. 2nd ed. Berkeley, Calif.: University of

California Press.Rolston, Holmes, III

1994 “Does Nature Need to Be Redeemed?” Zygon 29.2 (June): 205–29.Scott, Joan Wallach, ed.

2008 Women’s Studies on the Edge. Difference Books Series. Durham, N.C.:Duke University Press.

Scully, Matthew2003 Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call

to Mercy. New York: St. Martin’s Griffin.


Singer, Peter2009 Animal Liberation. 1973. New York: Harper Perennial Modern

Classics.Tronto, Joan C.

1993 Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. NewYork: Routledge.

de Waal, Frans2014 The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among Pri-

mates. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.Waldau, Paul

2001 The Specter of Speciesism: Buddhist and Christian Views of Animals.New York: Oxford University Press.

2011 Animal Rights: What Everyone Needs to Know. New York: OxfordUniversity Press.


“Creaturely Solidarity: Rethinking Human-Nonhuman Animal Relations” (2014)

Documents

Transcript of “Creaturely Solidarity: Rethinking Human-Nonhuman Animal Relations” (2014)