By Pattrice Le-Muire Jones

Christmas Day, 2002
Princess Anne, Maryland USA

As the Christians gather to celebrate the birth of the founder of their religion, I find myself asking a question that I wish Christians would ask themselves: Who would Jesus kill?

The answer doesn't matter much to me, since I'm not Christian and thus base my moral decisions on other moral standards. But lately many Christians have been using the simple question, "What would Jesus do?" to help them make ethical judgments that are consistent with their religious beliefs. That's a good idea. If one practices a particular faith, one ought to put that faith into practice.

This Christmas season, as Americans discuss the prospect of war over dinner tables groaning with factory farmed meat, the most apt variant of "What would Jesus do?" is: Who would Jesus kill?

The answer, of course, is: No one.

Most Christians recognize Jesus as the "Prince of Peace" and remember his injunctions to turn the other cheek and refrain from casting the first stone. Even those few who imagine Jesus as some sort of avenging warrior do not conceive of him smiting the innocent or torturing the helpless.

Yet, this holiday season, Christians across the USA are sitting down to dinners centered upon the carcasses of tortured and innocent animals. The top topic of conversation: Whether and when to attack the people of Iraq.

Before I go further, let me make it clear that I don't think the United States ought to be a Christian nation. I believe in the separation of church and state and I devoutly wish that we had that here. The fact remains that I have the leisure to write this essay today specifically because a Christian holy day is recognized as a national holiday. More to the point, George W. Bush and his advisors regularly invoke religious imagery, speaking of a "crusade" against "evil," while the the members of the Senate and the House get together to sing "God Bless America" rather than the secular national anthem.

Therefore it is reasonable to ask ourselves and them: Who would Jesus kill?

Would Jesus kill Iraqi children so that the friends of Dick Cheney can gain control of Iraqi oil reserves? Would Jesus kill Iraqi mothers in order to boost the ego and popularity of George W. Bush? Would Jesus kill Iraqi wildlife in order to replace one undemocratic regime (that of Saddam Hussein) with another (that of military occupation by the USA)? Would Jesus kill any Iraqis at all, given that there is absolutely no evidence that Iraq would or even could attack us or anyone else?

Jesus is sometimes imagined as a kind of judge. I wonder whether judge Jesus would approve of the USA casting the first stone against alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, when it is the USA that has more weapons of mass destruction than any other country, when it is the USA that has pulled out of international treaties limiting weapons of mass destruction, and when it is the USA that has announced an official policy of preemptive first use of weapons of mass destruction?

I wonder how Jesus would judge the honesty of George W. Bush and his advisors, who have used deceptive rhetoric in their efforts to trick the public into supporting an attack on Iraq? Jesus would know, as the public apparently does not, that Israel and Turkey (not Iraq) are the most flagrant violators of UN directives. Jesus would know that an attack on Iraq would make terrorist attacks on the United States more rather than less likely. Jesus would know about all of the hospitals and homes and houses of worship leveled by US 'precision' bombing over the years and know that these purported accidents are actually part of an amoral military strategy embraced by the USA. Jesus would know that anything the government of Iraq has done -- invading other countries, oppressing its own people, deploying weapons of mass destruction -- the government of the USA has done more often and to worse effect. Jesus would know that the only just solution to the conflict between George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein is a peaceful solution negotiated by the international community rather than a violent solution imposed by the armed forces of the USA.

People of every faith tend to see themselves and their religions as embracing peace and love. I know that most Christians think of their faith in this way. Most Americans, too, think of themselves as peaceful people. How is it, I wonder, that people who believe in peace and imagine themselves to be peaceful are so easily persuaded to embrace war?

Every Sunday afternoon, I participate in a small peace vigil in a nearby town. Right across the street from where we stand are three fast food restaurants serving a distressing array of unhealthy and unethical foods. Staring across the street at those restaurants last week I began to wonder if the American diet might help to explain the ease with which Americans are persuaded to embrace violent solutions to problems that could be solved in other ways.

Meat eating is itself an unnecessarily violent solution to a problem. As every healthy vegetarian demonstrates, it's just not necessary to eat meat. People eat meat because they want it, not because they need it. Meat eating is, therefore, killing for pleasure rather than killing for self defense. When we teach our children to eat meat, giving them the wings of dead birds as after-school snacks, we are teaching them to place their own pleasure over the right to life of another being. When we allow egg factories and dairies to brutalize animals while polluting the environment, we are teaching our children to have reckless disregard for both the environment and the feelings of other sentient beings. They grow up to be the kind of people who would rather spill blood for oil than spend tax money on solar energy. 

Would Jesus kill the little chickens? Six weeks old they are when the people come to take them to the slaughterhouse. They've never seen the sun, never breathed fresh air, never met their mothers or jumped in a mud puddle. Would Jesus kill the little children? Over 800 million people, most of them under the age of five, live with hunger and malnutrition despite the fact that the farmers of the world grow more than enough food to feed everyone. That's because so much of the precious food is used as animal feed, at a rate of about ten pounds of grain or soy for every pound of meat produced. Every two seconds, one more child dies of hunger or a hunger-related illness. The average meat-eating American consumes enough resources to feed 20 people a healthy vegetarian diet. Thanks to the 'free market' reforms that have been forced upon poor countries, some countries in which people are starving actually export meat or animal feed to the USA.

People who choose plant-based diets not only avoid killing animals, they consume fewer plant and water resources and therefore free up food for hungry people. That's one reason why many people believe that, were Jesus alive today, he would be vegan.

While I'm not a Christian, I still can pray on Christmas day. Today I pray that the Christians will choose peace in their daily lives and in the policies of their governments.

Who would Jesus kill? The answer, of course, is: No one. Today I pray that the Christians will follow his example.