All religions should promote cat welfare

All religions should promote cat welfare and, in fact, animal welfare. If religion does not do that and achieve progress in that goal it is not a worthy religion. It is a religion that is not worth being part of.

This is supported by the well known Abraham Lincoln saying:

‘I care not much for a man’s religion whose dog and cat are not better for it’

Why is this obvious? It could not have been obvious when Lincoln said if otherwise he would not have said it.

Religions should treat all living creatures the same and with respect. This is because it is good to do that and the true purpose of religion is to (a) make life better and (b) to achieve this by behaving better. That is my opinion.

The trouble is that people disagree on the purpose of religion or don’t think about that aspect of it. The philosophers think about the purpose. Marx said it was the opium of the masses. It kept people quiet because it supposedly explained away all the suffering and injustice or made it easier for people to accept injustice and the suffering of humanity. This has been said to be the oppression of social groups.

A lot of people today have their own religion. They have their own beliefs. If it does not support animal welfare it is not worth a hill of beans. We cannot disconnect ourselves from the rest of the living creatures in the planet. We are one.

The single biggest problem with religions is that they are old, very old. They were created during a time when people were less advanced. Religions tend to provide guidance that is dramatically out of date. It is the advice of a person living thousands or many hundreds of years ago. This is not good enough. I suppose wise people can reinterpret it so that it fits in with the modern world but it does not always work. There are always unscrupulous people who use religion to further their own agenda.

A god did not create animals for our benefit. That is a 2,000 year old idea. It is regressive and it still has a hold on millions of people especially in the less well developed countries.

It isn’t just in respect of animals that religions are regressive. Islam is very out of date in its recognition of the status of women. Women and animals are regarded as having a lesser status to the man. It is absurd that in modern life women should have a lesser status. The same goes for animals as far as I am concerned.

Religion supports animal experimentation – the benefiting people philosophy but with a disregard for the welfare of more vulnerable creatures.

Religion is “reactionary”. It reacts negatively to progress because that would weaken the status of the men who manage and run religions. It is about male domination and big business as usual.

We need a new, modern, up-to-date religion that promotes cat welfare, animal welfare. Someone needs to invent it. There would be hundred of millions of followers.