Vegetarians are people who abstain from eating the flesh of all animals but may eat eggs or dairy products.  People who eat fish or seafood are not vegetarians.  There are three basic types of vegetarians:

  I have always had a profound and strong love for animals and because of that, became a vegetarian at age 14 for ethical reasons. I am now a Vegan. My mom said that I never ate much meat as a kid and when I was a freshman in high school I felt guilty eating animal flesh so I stopped. My family thought I was crazy but I didn't care. I have never missed eating meat at all. I did dream about eating chicken for a while but that was it. While working in Alaska I did eat a minimal amount of seafood and after my 5th heart surgery in 1997 I also ate a small amount of seafood for a short time to regain my strength. Aside from those two short times, I haven't eaten animal flesh since 1978. However, at this point in my life, I would never consider even eating sea food again. I don't eat eggs or anything with eggs in it and I just recently stopped eating cheese - my last holdout on animal products. I distinctly remember as a child visiting a chicken farm in Wisconsin and being horrified at the conditions of the poor animals in cages!!! The smell was horrible and I felt awful for the poor birds. That sad scene left an indelible mark on me which over the next years ate away at me until I finally stopped eating animal flesh.  When I was 14, back in 1978 (EONS ago!) I had NO idea all of the issues revolving around vegetarianism; animal welfare, health problems, pollution, etc. I just knew in my heart that it was wrong for me to eat animals.  I also don't wear or use any products made with animals parts - leather, wool, etc.

  I am a member of the Christian Vegetarian Association, which has an outstanding website devoted to a vegetarian diet based on scripture and health.  I strongly encourage everyone to visit the Christian Vegetarian Association website! Studies have shown the health benefits of a vegetarian diet to be superior to that of a meat based diet which makes sense because when God created humans and animals he told Adam that all creatures were to be plant eaters. 

  And God said, "Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. {Gen 1:29-31 RSV}

  I believe that because God created a sinless world there was no room for the savagery of meat eating.  However, after Adam and Eve sinned, God later allowed the eating of meat (after Noah's flood) but I believe that eating animals goes against the foundation of God's creation and spirit. God allows sin in this world but as a result we are all subject to sin's ramifications.  Eating animals may have been allowed after the fall of man but the consequences of doing so are in place. Since God did not intend man to eat animal products, I believe that much of man's illness comes as a result of eating meat and consuming dairy products and eggs.  It is not natural for humans to drink the milk of another animal and there are bound to be negative consequences to it. You see no other animal in nature drinking the milk of another animal.  Plus, even with humans, babies only drink the mother's milk for 3 years at most.  It is certainly not normal to consume milk beyond breast feeding age for any species, let along the milk of another species!  Many health problems are attributed to eating animal products such as heart disease, kidney disease, obesity, gastrointestinal problems, etc. 

  Besides the health issues of eating animal products, the cruelty of how animals are raised for food is a large factor which has enlightened many of us to stop eating meat and consuming eggs and dairy products.  Not that I condone hunting because I don't, but it is actually far more kind to kill an animal with a gun or bow and arrow than to raise it the way we do in the United States, especially when it has been left to live in the wild until it's death.  The "factory farm" conditions of animals raised for food is so beyond cruel I am speechless to describe it.  There are many website out there devoted to exposing factory farms but Vegan Outreach is an excellent website.  If humans stopped raising animals for food the world would be a much less violent place. Because raising and slaughtering animals for food is so violent it creeps down the chain to how humans treat humans. Imagine  a world where animals are released from the bondage of our selfish need to eat them and how that would affect in a positive way each animal and human on the planet!!

  When I first became a vegetarian there was not too much available to eat other than vegetables and fruit at the regular grocery stores. There was a local health food store which I frequented. I learned about textured vegetable protein and tofu.  A staple of the Asian diet for centuries, tofu is one of the most healthy and versatile foods you can eat! Sometimes I actually crave tofu. I love to stir fry it with vegetables and I also like to grill it or make it with pre-packaged mixes. Nowadays, you can find tofu in a variety of textures and flavors. You can also find a fairly "healthy" selection of vegetarian foods made by the same companies I got to know years ago.  We've definitely come a long way from the 1970s! There are also many vegetarian and vegan food companies that sell frozen entrees and pre-packaged mixes, making it much easier to live a vegetarian lifestyle. The bulk of any vegetarian diet should be made up of greens, fruits and veggies with occasional nuts and grains. I absolutely love and crave salads with the fixings. Chick peas (garbanzo beans) are a mandatory part of any salad that I make!

  As the population of the United States has now reached over 300 million and the population of the earth has grown to over 6 billion, we need to do something. So many people die of hunger every day due to corrupt governments, drought and overpopulation. One thing we can do is switch to a vegetarian diet. Over half of all farming and fresh water in the United States is devoted to raising animals for food.  This is an extremely wasteful way of feeding people! The amount of produce and water it takes to feed an animal used for human consumption is far greater than the amount of produce and water it would take to nourish a human directly on a plant based diet. Consumption of animals as a food source is completely inefficient! Cows are VEGETARIANS and so are CHICKENS!!! If they can live on produce why can't humans? I have been a vegetarian for 28 years and I am still alive and healthy! If we were to devote our entire farm land to raising produce strictly for people, we COULD erase human starvation!!!  The amount of agricultural pollution from factory farms that gets into our rivers and eventually our oceans, is staggering!

  We could eliminate much of our pollution, starvation, violence and disease if we BECAME VEGETARIANS!!!

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