The Peaceable Table

A Vegetarian Journal for Quakers and Other People of Faith

The Peaceable Table is intended for the mutual support, education, and inspiration of people of faith in the practice of love for our fellow animals and observance of a nonviolent diet

Editorial: Taking the Adventure

 



A Feast and a Paradox

On the third Sunday afternoon of each month, the members and supporters of the Animal Kinship (AK) Committee (sponsor of The Peaceable Table) gather to discuss business. Since most of us come directly from Meeting for Worship, a little refreshment is in order first. With much help from our clerk Kate's culinary skills, this potluck luncheon has evolved into a feast of abundant, colorful, and luscious gifts from Earth's bounty. Looking at this wonderful abundance of good things, and the caring and enthusiastic fellow-Friends seated around the table, I always feel an immense gratitude that was virtually unknown to me in the days before I came to embrace a "restricted" vegan diet. A feast is more than a meal; it is a refreshing communal celebration of plenty and life and joy and love. Especially when no innocent blood was shed in its preparation!

Yet one of our main motivations as Friends, as with any spiritually-oriented vegans, is a commitment to Simplicity of lifestyle, to taking no more than our share in a world in which our planet is being devastated and millions do not have enough to sustain life adequately, while others take more than they need. How can this crucial life-principle be compatible with the rightness of sitting down to so abundant a feast?

Knights and Dragons

A complex of images that suggests an answer to this question, and other related questions, can be found in an unlikely place: the stories of King Arthur's knights and the Quest for the Holy Grail. That this source is unlikely hardly needs emphasis. To begin with, the stories appear, confusingly, in a number of different versions, with varying implications. Even more problematic, in most of the tales the exploitation of animals is taken for granted. The knights' chargers are slaves controlled by bit and bridle; hunting, especially of deer and wild pigs, may be frequent; virtually every feast is centered in a corpse. The stories have touches of anti-semitism. Furthermore, the whole cycle is heavily male-centered, with female figures tending to be either either dangerous temptresses or sorceresses, or helpless Damsels in Distress. Problems are usually solved with the sword.

Then what is left? Quite a lot, actually. The Arthuriad took shape in a medieval world where civilization and order still had a shaky hold, where justice and peace were dreams--dreams that coalesced around valiant heroes who cared about the defenseless and could challenge the evil knights and the dragons of chaos who threatened to crush them. What with widespread subjection of women, with enforced marriage and rape by marauding knights or Norsemen, probably most damsels were in distress much of the time. In general, the poor of both sexes were subject to the casual violence of the powerful.

Modern Damsels

In our culture, concepts of women as frail beings needing protection and control are rightly seen by most as false and harmful. But that there actually are millions of defenseless beings in the clutches of agribusiness's robber barons--including damsels in terrible distress in dairy and egg factories--is indisputable. The victims are many, the champions few.

Does this mean we cast ourselves in the role of the Knights in Shining Armor who ride out to give battle to the dragons and blood-splattered oppressors? Well--no and yes. A minority of animal defenders evidently do, in a semi-literal manner: their sword-thrusts are shouts of abuse and violent phone calls, harassment of abusers' families, even bombing threats--sometimes carried out. Unhappily, this conspicuous minority is often seized upon by the press, eager to present a dramatic image of animal defenders as a violent lot. With friends like these . . . we need to proceed with Care.

Without seeing ourselves as sword-wielding warriors, we can still find the knight-in-armor image helpful. It can inspirit an activist not oversupplied with courage who faces, with beating heart, the prospect of civil disobedience in a literal rescue--or even just speaking up to her church, Meeting, temple, or family members on behalf of the animals. On the other side, the drama implicit in the images can be helpful in enabling us to get some distance on ourselves and on our mission, perhaps laugh at ourselves a little. Dragons, however terrifying, are mythological beasts!--and our Black Knights are not what they seem, either. The victims are very much physical beings, in physical chains, but not so the oppressors. Hidden in the heart of the hardest and greediest robber baron is the divine Light/Love, the seed of transformation. Our war, as St. Paul says, is not against flesh and blood but against the Principalities and Powers, against enslaving institutions and prejudices entrenched throughout society.

Behind the Black Visor

Remarkably, one of the narratives of the Arthurian epic already exemplifies this truth in a powerful way. It is the cycle of stories about Balin, together with his beloved brother Balan (the names suggest they are twins) a Knight of the Round Table. Sir Balin is a zealous but undisciplined warrior determined to be the Bravest Fighter on behalf of the Worthiest Cause. In the first story he comes under the spell of an accursed sword; inflamed by a desire for its power, he seizes it. The curse follows him: later, pursuing an evil knight into and even through the hallways of the Castle of the Grail, he bursts into the holy chapel where the sacred Chalice and Spear are kept. When the guardian of the Grail, the Fisher King, tries to block his intrusion, Balin grabs the Spear and with it wounds the King. The result of this Dolorous Blow is that all the countryside for miles around withers into a perpetual Waste Land; furthermore, the castle and the chalice disappear from ordinary sight, withdrawn into another plane of being.

In a still later story Balin approaches a strange castle and is challenged to fight its champion, a black-armored knight with no identifying device on his shield. Unable to bear being thought a coward, Balin borrows a shield himself and gives battle. Both opponents fight valiantly, finally giving one another mortal wounds. But before they die, Balin raises the visor covering his enemy's face. What he sees is the face of his brother.

Today's Knights in Shining Armor--the small handful of animal defenders whose hearts burn to save all the billions of innocents from hellish suffering and death at the hands of animal agribusiness--are dwarfed many times over by their giant opponents. Imagine a Friend or church member trying to persuade her spiritual community (which may contain perhaps a hundred people out of the three hundred million in the US--to show compassion to animals by not eating them. He or she may be repeatedly blocked by a few other members, otherwise good people who refuse to see the monstrous evil they are championing. Another example: a small group doing a midnight open rescue know they can save perhaps twenty hens out of a hellhole containing two hundred thousand--and they know what will happen to all the others. In so grotesquely unequal a situation, with its painful frustrations, how does a defender bear in mind that the human beings whose callous and violent acts they are opposing are, under their visors, her own sisters and brothers? How does she hold this knowledge in her heart so that she can resist the temptation to hate and attack them even in her thoughts?

The Chalice of Light

The Arthurian stories contain another important theme, the Quest for the Holy Grail, which can help us meet this formidable challenge. The background of the story is the Waste Land, which had lain desolate for years. Linked to this situation of death was a mysterious seat at the Round Table, the Siege Perilous. It had long stood empty until finally taken by the High Prince Galahad, young offspring of the tragic affair of the enchanted Sir Lancelot and the Princess Elaine of the Grail Castle.

That same day, the Feast of Pentecost at Camelot, the knights all heard a peal of thunder and saw a blaze of celestial light, in the midst of which appeared the Holy Grail. Awestruck with wonder, when it vanished they each vowed to go on quest to find it. Most of them wandered about, distracted by other adventures, and some never returned. In one version it was only three, whose dedication to the cause was deeper, that were able not only to find but to enter the elusive Grail Castle. Sir Lancelot, whose heart was divided between Queen Guinevere and the Quest, fell into a deep trance outside the castle, and got no further. Sir Bors and Sir Percival entered the castle hall and saw the procession of the glowing Grail and Spear, but were struck dumb and deprived of initiative. Only Sir Galahad was able to act, asking the crucial question: "Whom does the Grail serve?" He was also able to take the chalice and look into it. The blaze of light from the heart of the Cup permeated and galvanized him, and he was translated from the human plane into the Light. He had "achieved the Grail." The wounded Grail King was healed, and the new life of Spring came at last to the Waste Land.

To Will One Thing

Although medieval readers apparently admired Sir Galahad, modern readers are likely to find him problematic. He is described as a magnificent knight, but he seems scarcely human; totally dedicated to his mission to find and achieve the Grail, he has no friendly warmth, no weakness with which we can identify. His saying "My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure," needs translation if we are not to dismiss him as an ego-bound brat.

Who and what is this High Prince? We may find some help from Soren Kierkegaard's line "Purity of heart is to will one thing." If we say that Sir Galahad's strength is as the strength of ten because his heart is one, that oneness being intent on the Source of Light, we will begin to understand why he is the only knight who achieves the Grail. Like the child in the Peaceable Kingdom scene who leads the lion and plays over the adder's den, Galahad represents the dimension of a human being that is linked to the Infinite. In a sense, he has always been gazing into the Divine Light, and thus is able to act with the Divine strength.

If we interpret the High Prince in this way, the image suggests that every action of ours to champion the victims of oppression and violence must also be our inner Galahad's Quest for the Grail. Unless we are informed by and intent on the Light/Love of God in all our work, we are in danger of falling to burnout or distraction. Worse, we may become like Sir Balin, assertive and well-intentioned, but undisciplined, blinded, and led astray by self-dramatizing passion. The result is calamity. But if we hold to the more difficult path of following the gleam of the Light within, we may begin to tap into its power to transform even the Waste Land, which our earth is rapidly becoming, back into the Garden of God.

Bread for the Journey

We can now see the outlines of an answer to the question with which this essay began: how is the bounty of a feast to be held in balance with the modest fare appropriate for those who are all too aware of the distresses of the world around them? The feast has its place: from time to time, especially on Pentecost, the knights gather at the Round Table to enjoy abundance and good fellowship, to hear of some great deed, and to be available to the call. But feasts are relatively infrequent, and when the call to adventure comes, one must be ready to leave behind things that may be good in themselves, to travel light. We remember that there are no supermarkets available to the adventuring knight, and he ( she) cannot count on taking time out to look for whatever wild berries or herbs may particularly please the palate--and this knight is hardly about to seek out and kill an innocent creature for supper! He carries what food he can in his bag; she dines moderately. Those on Quest do not complain about plain food or inconvenience, because have more urgent things in mind.

Let us take the Adventure that is sent us.

—Gracia Fay Ellwood

The painting of Galahad is by George Frederic Watts.

We invite responses to editorials or any other feature of PT for our next issue's letter column: graciafay@gmail.com.

News Notes

 

Medals of Martin

Activist Maru Vigo, whose letter appeared in PT 38, has recently returned from a visit to her home city of Lima, Peru, where she worked on a spay-and-neuter campaign. Her colleagues there have available a number of medals and cards (including tiny brooms) featuring the sixteenth and seventeenth century saint Martin de Porres, "Brother Broom," the beloved Black herbalist and healer of animals and humans. (Martin was the featured Pioneer in the Nov. '07 PT37.) Although use of such items in religious practice is not part of Quaker tradition, there may be readers who would like to have a set of these little mementos of an inspiring and saintly pioneer. You may contact Maru at Animauxlib@cox.net. Suggested donation: $10 or $15, which will go to the animal-defense campaigns of Maru's Lima colleagues.

 

Mirrored Magpies

A German study of magpie behavior reported by Reuters breaks the news that these remarkable members of the crow family can recognize themselves in a mirror. As with elephants, a magpie who had had a yellow mark put on her black feathers would scratch at the mark in a mirror, a sign she realized that what she saw was not another bird but an image of herself. The capacity for self- recognition has been found in primates, elephants, and dolphins, but this is the first known instance in a bird. See news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080819/od_uk_nm/

oukoe_uk_magpies_mirror

 

--Contributed by Robert Ellwood

 

Major Cleric Interprets Muslim Precepts Regarding Animals

The terrible suffering of sheep crowded into vessels bound from Australia to the Near East, and the cruel slaughter practices they undergo in Egypt, prompted Ahmed El Sherbeeny, of the Board of Directors of the Egyptian Society of Animal Friends, to ask the Imam, the foremost authority of Sunni Islam, for a statement of Islamic legal opinion on this situation. A summary of the fatwa statement he received (in April '08) is as follows:

 

In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.

. . . . Islamic law requires that the animal be treated with compassion and mercy. “Allah Almighty has dictated goodwill in everything . . . . In slaughtering one must sharpen the blade and comfort the animal before slaughtering it.”

Imam Aly (peace be upon him) prohibited the slaughter of sheep before each other or any other animals, so that the feelings of the animal would not be wounded in its last moments.

The Islamic requirement to be merciful also covers the transportation of the animal. Such transportation must be carried out by means that guarantee its safety, prohibits its abuse, threatening its life or afflicting it with diseases that are contagious to human beings or third parties.

Abuse of the animal at the time of its transport is considered prohibited in the law of Islam . . .

Allah is great.

Azhar Sheikh Imam
Dr. Mohamed Sayed Tantawy (signed)

 

--Contributed by Marian Hussenbux



Book Review:

Capers in the Churchyard - Animal Rights Advocacy In the Age of Terrorism by Lee Hall. Foreword by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson. Nectar Bat Press, 2006. 162 pages.

This book is a firm and thoughtful reproof of the use of violence, vituperation and coercion in defense of animal rights and environment. Such aggressive tactics are not only condemned as immoral and wrong, they are shown to be counterproductive. A notable example is the one that gives the book its title. To force a farm to stop raising guinea pigs for use in laboratory experiments, militant English activists stole the mortal remains of family relative Gladys Hammond, deceased at age 82 in 1997. Public opinion was horrified and disgusted by such blackmail combined with grave desecration. The guinea pig farmers were seen as the victims, not the perpetrators, of evil. The farm went on exploiting other animals and the labs obtained experiment victims elsewhere, so no worthwhile end was achieved that might justify the means.
Two ways this book could be strengthened:
1) It does not explore the possibility that some of the violence attributed to animal rights activists may actually be the work of provocateurs and spies hired by the animal-exploitation industries to make activists look bad. The day after I finished the first draft of this review, newspaper front-page headlines reported that a gun-control group had found evidence of having been infiltrated by a spy for the National Rifle Association, a woman who previously had carried out a similar infiltration of an animal-rights group on behalf of a laboratory. One of her actions had been to persuade an activist to carry out a bombing. Considering that Tom Regan reports similar false-flag operations in his book Empty Cages. we may wonder how many other, undetected betrayals have taken place.
2) Lee Hall considers reformism to be wholly inadequate; she advocates a policy not only of abolition but of of strict non-interference with animals' lives. This may be ideal in principle, but what about the millions of animals - cats, dogs, cows, etc. - who have become dependent on the care, or at least the control, of humans? How will they survive if we just leave them alone in a world with rapidly diminishing wilderness? Furthermore, is it not likely that there are cautious persons in the mainline who would balk if challenged to abolition of any sort, but may begin a journey toward full Care for animals if encouraged to take smaller, reformist steps first?

In spite of these caveats, I think the book should be a must read for young animal rights activists who have not yet decided if the use of violence (or the threat of violence) is ever justified. Lee Hall makes an excellent case that it is not, and we should listen to her.

—Benjamin Urrutia

For a Pilgrimage narrative of Lee Hall, see PT Issue43

A Glimpse of the Peaceable Kingdom

He Followed Me Home--Can I Keep Him?

A householder in the Bittinger, Maryland area came home to find that an apparently orphaned fawn had followed the family's dog-friend home, right through the doggie door, and made himself at home. The story appeared on the six o'clock news, beating out the latest pre-election story.

Contributed by Marjorie Emerson

Gems

What Shall We Eat?

"Do not be anxious, saying 'What shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear?' . . . . But seek first the Kingdom of God, and God's justice, and all these things shall be yours as well."

--Jesus, in Matthew 6:33

". . . [M]ystics seek to sink into and be engulfed in God's love. Whoever lives in this kind of intimacy with God sees God's face in unexpected places. . . . All living beings are pulled into the mystic's awe-inspiring discovery: we are all inseparably united with one another."

--Annika Spalde and Pelle Strindlund, Every Creature a Word of God

Recipes


Curried Tempeh with Garden Vegetables
4 servings

1 package tempeh ("Three Grain" by Light Life® is very good)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 T. extra virgin olive oil
6 small very ripe Roma tomatoes, chopped
2 patty pan squash, washed but not peeled, sliced ¼ inch thick (or use yellow summer squash, if patty pan squash is not available)
1 cup fresh green beans, steamed tender-crisp
1 T. curry powder
½ tsp. sea salt, or to taste
1 can Light coconut milk
fresh basil leaves
Rice noodles, cooked according to package directions

In large skillet, warm olive oil, then add tempeh, garlic cloves, and curry. Sauté over medium-high heat about 5 minutes. Stir in tomatoes, green beans, patty pan squash and salt. Sauté for 3 -4 minutes on medium-high heat. Reduce heat and add the coconut milk. Stir with wooden spoon to mix well; cover and allow to simmer until squash is tender, but not limp. Toss with cooked rice noodles; garnish with a handful of fresh basil. Serve immediately. For an extra treat, serve fresh watermelon for dessert.

This recipe may be made gluten-free by substituting a different variety of tempeh.

--- Angela Suarez

Stuffed Collard Greens with Tempeh & Rice
Serves 4 – 6

12 large collard green leaves
1 package tempeh ("Three Grain" by Light Life® is very good)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
6 ripe Roma tomatoes, chopped
1 tsp. ground cumin
½ tsp. ground rosemary
½ tsp. sea salt, or to taste
freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 cups brown rice, cooked
1 ½ - 2 cups tomato sauce

Place collard greens in a large deep skillet with one cup salted water; cover and bring to boil. Cook about 10 minutes, until greens are just tender. Drain and set aside to cool.
Preheat oven 350° F.
Meanwhile, in another large skillet, sauté tempeh and garlic in olive oil for about 5 minutes. Add tomatoes, cumin, rosemary, sea salt and pepper. Stir with wooden spoon to mix well. Add cooked brown rice and ¾ cup tomato sauce. Mixture should be moist, but not “soupy” --- add a little more tomato sauce, if necessary. Stir with wooden spoon to combine all ingredients well.
Place a collard green on a work surface, place 2 T. filling (may need a little more or less depending on size of the green) on the collard. Fold the sides in to keep the filling from spilling out; then roll the collard to form a neat little package. Place seam down in an oiled baking dish. Repeat rolling the remaining collard greens. Cover with aluminum foil and bake until heated through – about 30 minutes. Top with remaining tomato sauce; return to oven for 10 minutes (uncovered). Remove from oven, sprinkle with Vegan Parmesan® and serve immediately..

-- Angela Suarez



My Pilgrimage: Benjamin Schmeiser

Like so many, I have always loved animals, but had allowed myself to believe that meat magically came from a ‘meat-tree’ or perhaps from a ‘meat-garden’. My pilgrimage to vegetarianism began ten years ago when I was watching TV late one night and the public channel had a documentary on chicken slaughterhouses. What impressed me the most
was that there was no voiceover or person talking, rather they simply went into a chicken slaughterhouse and started recording a typical night’s shift. I forced myself to watch it in its entirety, though it was both shocking and dreadful.

Benjamin Schmeiser and Natalia

My first reaction might surprise you, because it was one of relief, as I was glad I finally saw where my meat came from, instead of continuing to turn a convenient blind eye. Soon, though, the true impact of what was
transpiring in front of me hit me and I became entranced by the images: chickens fighting for their lives, distressed and jammed in cages; wide-eyed and scared, as they watched what was going to happen to them; the ease and indifference with which the workers slit their throats; blood-soaked wings that still flapped as they went down the line in tremendous agony.

For a few days afterwards, I was surprised by how affected I was, considering we all know what happens at a slaughterhouse. I find it so interesting we are typically shocked by images of events that we know occur. That is, why does it take seeing an image before we act compassionately? The same applies to war; we all know those who openly promote war as a ‘necessary alternative’, but people tend to change when they see images of the innocent who have been affected by the very war
they promote.

After that night, I was unable to eat meat for awhile, but I eventually went back to my old ways. I had never met a vegetarian before and I had no real conception of how to change my diet to one that was cruelty-free. I had only grown up listening to bands, such as The Smiths and Skinny Puppy, that talked about animal suffering. Something had changed inside of me, though, with seeing it . . . I could no longer forget or put aside those images. At that time, I felt that becoming a vegetarian was something dormant in me that needed to come to life; I felt that I needed to live according to my own beliefs and not just go along with society’s.

Some time later, I read Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation. With every page, it became more and more apparent to me what I needed to do. Though I thoroughly enjoyed meat, especially salmon, I knew that I needed to become vegetarian to address this inconsistency: I had tremendous compassion for some animals, but yet I ate others. By becoming vegetarian, I feel as though I finally have a lifestyle that coincides with my true love for animals and my desire for peace, compassion, and justice in this world. Not a day goes by that I do not feel tremendous inner happiness just by knowing that I do not add to the cruelty that animals suffer. Every time I see the semi-trucks go by carrying the frightened pigs and cows, an incredible sadness comes over me, but I do have the peace of mind of knowing that I do not partake in that ritual of cruelty.


Recently, after being a vegetarian for over five years, I made the natural progression into veganism. One might say I had a ‘second pilgrimage’ as I again watched documentaries, only this time on the dairy industry. I believe that everyone must be in touch with their inner self, should ‘meet their meat’ to see where it comes from. Then many people would convert to a vegetarian/vegan lifestyle. I know, because that is exactly what I did.

My wife and I recently had our first child, our daughter, Natalia. One of my goals as a father is to show Natalia, by way of example, how to live a life that is cruelty-free and full of peace. I strive on a daily basis to show her that a cruelty-free lifestyle starts with the dinner plate. I also strive to show her the importance of being true to yourself. An essential part of me is compassion toward all sentient beings, and the conviction that it must be
manifested in the cessation of abuse, suffering, and killing. We all instinctively know that the way we treat animals is appalling. We should live out our feelings of compassion and ask for nothing less than the end of the suffering our cruelty inflicts on the defenseless every day. I hope that as Natalia grows up and confronts the challenges of this life, she never forgets that there is ‘that of God’ in all sentient beings.

May your Inner Light shine brightly.

Pioneers: Melangell and Other Saintly Saboteurs

 

Although the Middle Ages were among the grimmest of times for wild animals, with virtually every male from churchmen and royals to peasants eager to kill them for fun and food, there are accounts of saints who followed another light, who protected and befriended them. Stories of medieval saints tend to have legendary accretions, but even this fact is significant: the compassion they embody is valued by the tellers in a world where the power to control and to destroy prevailed. Here are some accounts of saints whose love for animals led them to sabotage hunts.

 

In the sixth and seventh centuries, not long after the times of the historical Arthur, there lived an Irish princess named Melangell. A strong woman, she refused to enter a dynastic marriage, and instead ran away to become an anchoress in the woods of Wales. One day a coursing (hare-hunting) party led by a prince named Brochwel pursued a hare into a thicket in a valley, only to find, in a little clearing, their prey nestled in the skirts and cloak of a young woman in prayer. It was none other than Melangell. Brochwel ordered his dogs to attack; they tried to do so but were stopped short by what seemed to be a protective shield around her.

In awe, the prince recognized that here was a power greater than his own, a power that cherished life rather than destroying it. He gave the surrounding area to Melangell, asking her to build a convent, which she did. She lived there the rest of her life, abbess of her small community. She became known as the protector of hares, who are called "Melangell's lambs." There has been a church on the site for twelve hundred years.

 

It is interesting that a story with almost the same scenario and kinds of characters is told of St. Giles, who lived a century later in south France: the highborn individual who renounces all to become a hermit; a royal hunter; a wild animal (a doe in Giles' case) who is shielded; a spiritual opening for the hunter, and his request that a monastery be built on the site. Giles takes the arrow intended for the doe, a deed heroic, even Christlike, but not requiring paranormal powers.

 

Both these figures lived in the chaotic early Middle Ages, when literacy was rare; their stories were probably passed down orally for a long time, becoming streamlined into a common pattern. The case is different with the twelfth-century saint Godric; his story was written by the monk Reginald of Durham, who as a child encountered the elderly Godric personally, and provides a detailed physical description of him. Godric was not a onetime aristocrat but the son of an impoverished couple named Edwenna and Ailward, whom in childhood he helped out by peddling small items. He turned out to be good at selling, and later became a seagoing merchant. Despite his growing wealth, he nourished his spiritual aspirations by sometimes turning aside on his voyages to visit saints' shrines.

 

This practice culminated in a profound spiritual opening at the shrine of St. Cuthbert on the island of Lindisfarne. Godric gave up his business, and together with a friend became a contemplative in the forest of Finchale near Durham in north England. Living as a hermit after his friend's death, he befriended hares, mice, snakes, and other animals, letting them into his hermitage in winter; he had an impressive ability to find and protect animals threatened by hunters. In one case, a beleaguered stag ran up seeking shelter in Godric's hut. The saint let him in and shut the door, standing outside to await the hunting party. When they rode up and asked if he had seen their prey, Godric's answer was "God knows where he may be." The hunters marveled at "the angelic beauty of his countenance," and gave up pursuing the buck. They often recounted the story afterwards. Annika Spalde and Pelle Strindlund comment that his reply "was more than a clever way around violating the eighth commandment against lying. Perhaps it was a recognition that no being is ever forgotten by God."

 

Godric was also a visionary and a songwriter; Reginald transcribed four of his songs, the first ones in English to be preserved complete with musical settings.

 

--Gracia Fay Ellwood

From Every Creature a Word of God by Spalde and Strindlund, Vegetarian Christian Saints by Holly Roberts, Beasts and Saints by Helen Waddell, and online sources.

Poetry


Lepus

The hare lies dead, his trembling sides
Strike sorrow in the hardest heart,
The courser halts, away he strides
And leaves the field where once did dart
Those mythic beasts of Celtic art.
Melangell’s hare, caught in the chase,
But for her pity, was to face
A ritual death at hands of folk
Who longed for blood; but in that place,
The princess hid him ‘neath her cloak.

--Marian Hussenbux

 

Follow the Gleam

To the knights in the days of old
Keeping vigil on mountain height
Shone the light of the Holy Grail,
With a voice through the waiting night
Calling--

"Follow, follow the Gleam
Banners unfurled, o'er all the world--"
Calling "Follow, follow the Gleam
Of the Chalice of boundless light."

And we who would bear the cross
And bravely defend the right,
Let us take the adventure new,
Riding forth in the Spirit's might.
Let us--

Follow, follow the Gleam
Loving our foes, healing their woes
Let us follow, follow the Gleam
Till we come to the Halls of Light.

--Sallie Hume Douglas & Sr. Faith Bowman, O.C.G.

 

 

 

The Peaceable Table is a project of the Animal Kinship Committee of Orange Grove Friends Meeting, Pasadena, California. It is intended to resume the witness of that excellent vehicle of the Friends Vegetarian Society of North America, The Friendly Vegetarian, which appeared quarterly between 1982 and 1995. Following its example, and sometimes borrowing from its treasures, we publish articles, news notes, poetry, letters, book and film reviews, and recipes.

The journal is intended to be interactive; contributions, including illustrations, are invited for the next issue. Deadline for the October issue will be September 29, 2008. Send to graciafay@gmail.com or 10 Krotona Hill, Ojai, CA 93023. We operate primarily online in order to conserve trees and labor, but hard copy is available for interested persons who are not online. The latter are asked, if their funds permit, to donate $12 (USD) per year. Other donations to offset the cost of advertising notices, domain name, and server are welcome.

Website: www.vegetarianfriends.net
Editor: Gracia Fay Ellwood
Book and Film Reviewers: Benjamin Urrutia & Robert Ellwood
Recipe Editor: Angela Suarez
NewsNotes Editors: Lorena Mucke, Marian Hussenbux
Technical Architect: Richard Scott Lancelot Ellwood