Spiritualists, Christians etc

[Fucksandflowers]

And anyone else who believes in God, spirit, karma etc, could you explain something to me?

1. Why do we have prey and predator?

Why would God or a creator or whoever create animals who cannot survive without killing others?

And why would those animals destined to be prey have the ability to feel pain, fear etc?

All this talk of treating others kindly, not killing, Yoga masters having to be vegan, non animal foods having higher vibration etc, seems crazy to me when all around us creatures have to die, and feel pain and terror as a result to keep another creature alive?

1. Why is it that certain animals particularly claimed to be spiritual, like cats, are predators?

My cat has a mouse, I heard the squeaking earlier in the garden and managed to rescue the mouse and bundle the cat inside the house. Until DH accidentally let her out again... I am not going to try and rescue the mouse again because I suspect it will be injured and die a long and painful death. But at the same time, I have no doubt that the cat is currently engaging in absolutely torturing said mouse and I’m feeling really upset for the poor little mouse. Why would an animal that allegedly protects and keeps negative spirits away and allegedly has healing powers take such enjoyment in the torture of an innocent creature? It just seems totally at odds with this idea of everything happens for a reason and there being lessons taught to make us better people and the importance of living kindly causing no harm etc?

Things do not happen “for a reason”. HTH.

🤨

That is a good question and not one I have the answer to. I suppose it fits in with the ‘ if there is a God why does he allow suffering ?’ question. My own belief system (I’m a spiritualist) would say that suffering = growth= development of the spirit and that God is not separate from the suffering but part of it as God is within us and we are just fragments of the whole divine system. As a classic example, Jesus was tortured, convicted unfairly and led a slow painful death - God chose to feel the pain of the least loved.

I know this isn’t a very popular thread but thought I’d leave a little update in case anyone’s watching....

Mousey lives!!
He/she was saved by my dense patch of lemon balm, I watched my cat and another cat working together to try and flush mouse from the lemon balm before getting bored and fucking off.
I assumed poor mousey had died, DH has just been hedge trimming and disturbed the apparently uninjured mouse from behind the bins (a fair way away from the lemon balm), he caught it and put it under the hedge as the bins are my cats favourite spot to sit...

Still curious as to God’s (if he is real of course) reasoning for creating predator and prey and giving the prey the ability to suffer.

An incredibly cruel thing for a supposed loving God to do.

I don’t believe in the bible it’s all metaphors and codes written centuries ago. I believe where we come from we then return so their isn’t this great creator making people and creatures like puppets.

From what I understand, pain is a really important mechanism that our bodies use to alert us to problems. I've read about people who don't have a pain response and they can have health problems because, for example, they ignore minor injuries. So pain is important to survival, but also leads to suffering as you can't turn it off when you're being eaten to death by a bear for example. Or maybe you can if you're good at self-hypnosis... 😕

Fwiw I'm a Christian and I'm not aware of a Biblical answer to your question as to why animals suffer. I'm not sure from your op whether you want an answer or just an opportunity to bash the religious.

I don’t believe in the bible it’s all metaphors and codes written centuries ago

Lots of mixed messages too.
Me and DH watched a documentary on the death penalty recently.

There were people on there claiming the bible was in support of the death penalty as they used to stone people to death in it!
Despite it being written in the commandments about not killing...
So which is it?
Can you kill or not?

I’m sure there was some guy in the Bible too who was told to sacrifice his son, then sacrificed a sheep instead which again, goes against that thou shalt kill commandment.

So many people who claim homosexuals will go to hell and just as many gay people who claim to be Christian/Muslim/whatever religion.

It’s all very mixed messages and open to interpretation and to date, no one has ever been able to give me a satisfactory answer to the prey/predator/suffering debate nor a concrete answer on things like homosexuality, veganism, death penalty and so many other subjects.

I do to a degree I think believe in spirituality/a creator/alternative plains etc, I am absolutely sure I have seen spirit before, my mum has always claimed to be psychic and gets bizarre premonitions and messages and they always turn out true.

But then I think about suffering in the world, the fact that insects and small creatures are there primarily by others and they have the ability to feel the pain and fear which is beyond abhorrent and the numerous horrific diseases out there and stillborns and natural disasters etc and think how can that possibly be?

It doesn’t ‘fit’ with this idea of peace and kindness and divine love.

I'm not sure from your op whether you want an answer or just an opportunity to bash the religious

Answers.
I’m not the sort of person to ‘bash’ or insult others beliefs.