Do plants and animals have a consciousness and feel pain or cruelty? Q #1082: I am wondering what A Course in Miracles has to say about the consciousness of plants and animals and perhaps even inanimate objects. I find the whole issue quite distressing -- nature red in tooth and claw -- and wonder if plants feel pain when picked / cut / eaten, etc. I have always been a nature lover and am passionately concerned about ecology, preservation of biodiversity, etc. I am also considering taking up gardening as a career. Yet I feel deeply conflicted because in creating better habitats I am allowing more plants, animals, bugs, etc., to come into the world and suffer pain, and also inflicting pain on the invader species I remove. I am very confused on the whole issue and I find a lack of explicit guidelines in A Course in Miracles . It is all very well to say the world is a dream; such an argument would allow for all kinds of monstrous evil to be committed to humans, plants, animals, alike. But saying it is not real does not help. The only thing that is real at this very moment is what is actually being experienced, not what would be experienced if it were not for the veil of illusion. I am not alone in this. The Jain religion takes the practice of not harming anything to extremes. Some Jains wear masks over their faces to avoid inhaling insects, bugs, etc., and lightly brush the road before them to avoid treading on living creatures. I sometimes feel I ought to be doing the same thing, and certainly not inflicting pain on millions of blades of grass with a mower, or injecting rhododendrons with poison to prevent them from spreading and destroying the countryside. Yet do I want to preserve / enhance the countryside when it is a killing field? A: One of the major teachings of the Course is that all Sons are the same, equal in content, not form. And Jesus is not speaking exclusively about homo sapiens when he uses the term Son of God , and so from this perspective he tells us that even the smallest grain of sand is part of the Sonship (T.28.IV.9) . Seeing qualitative differences, therefore, means ones mind has merged with the ego. As horrifying as it may be to acknowledge this, if you look carefully, you will see that the entire world is a “killing field.” What level does not share somehow in the ego genome of kill or be killed and one or the other ? Where is there growth and survival that does not come at anothers expense? -- root systems; insects; marine life; microorganisms; corporations; governments; defense systems. What can survive without feeding off another? What is there that is needed for our survival that is not also potentially harmful or lethal, to say nothing of limited? Granted, there are examples of stunning beauty, selflessness, and helpfulness. But if you scratch beneath the surface, are not most instances of beauty tinged with pain or vulnerability? Are not most instances of selflessness marked by sacrifice? Are not most forms of helpfulness limited? Given its origin in the egos vicious and defiant intent to produce an existence totally apart from Gods Kingdom of Love and Oneness, how could the world be anything other than this? It was made as an attack (W.pII.3.2:1) ; and since “ideas leave not their source” ( e.g., W.pI.132.10:3) , it simply replicates the thought that owns it. “Therefore,” Jesus teaches, “seek not to change the world, but choose to change your mind about the world. Perception is a result and not a cause” (T.21.in.1:7,8) . The problem, though, is that we have identified with the egos version of reality to such an extent that we have no sense of ourselves as minds always deciding to uphold this attack on truth. To protect its system -- itself -- the ego has us focus entirely on form, believing there is a hierarchy of values and beings, which leads to what Jesus calls “the first law of chaos” (T.23.II.2,3) . We think that what we perceive is reality. Thus we become obsessed with defending what we judge as good and worthwhile against what we judge as bad or threatening, in the process becoming totally confused and frustrated, as we intuitively sense that the situation is hopeless. And all because we have lost sight of the total picture -- that an illusion is an illusion is an illusion. One part of an illusion is no more valuable than any other. Fortunately, there is a solution, and it does not require that you deny what you are seeing and experiencing. Jesus is the loving presence in our minds who helps us get back to the sane part of our minds, where we can recall the steps that led us into this depressing state and then choose to begin the process of healing by looking at everything differently. This means seeing our lives as a classroom and all our relationships and interactions as the curriculum Jesus can use to restore our minds to their natural state of peace and oneness. The world will continue to be what it is, but because our perspective will be different, our perception of it will change. We thus can learn to use our body and the world for this purpose by changing the teacher in our minds from the ego to Jesus or the Holy Spirit. Any role you choose in the world can serve this purpose, and this purpose alone is what would give your life meaning. The thought system in your mind is the problem, not the world. Why would you allow the world -- made to conceal your true Identity -- to tell you who you are and what your purpose should be? A Course in Miracles as a spiritual path teaches that there is no way out of conflict and hopelessness unless we are open to the idea that we are choosing what we want to be real in our perception: “Perception selects, and makes the world you see. It literally picks it out as the mind directs. . . . Perception is a choice and not a fact. But on this choice depends far more than you may realize as yet. For on the voice you choose to hear, and on the sights you choose to see, depends entirely your whole belief in what you are. Perception is a witness but to this, and never to reality. Yet it can show you the conditions in which awareness of reality is possible, or those where it could never be” (T.21.V.1:1,2,7,8,9,10,11). This is a radical teaching, without question. It overturns everything we have learned in the world, and it therefore threatens the foundation of our self-concept and our lives. And it seems the only people who are receptive to it are those who have tried other approaches and found them inadequate, or who have thrown up their hands in desperation and have cried out, “There must be a better way!” facimoutreach.org/qa/questions/questions223.htm#Q1082
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 13:14:11 +0000
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