That said, protecting anymals protects human beings: There are four other critical reasons that the world’s largest religions rightly pay particular attention to anymals—and particular attention to what we eat. Aside from respect for life and compassion for anymals, we ought to choose a vegan diet for the sake of the environment, to alleviate world hunger, to protect laborers, and on behalf of our own health. The consequences of our dietary choices are monumental

That said, protecting anymals protects human beings: There are four other critical reasons that the world’s largest religions rightly pay particular attention to anymals—and particular attention to what we eat. Aside from respect for life and compassion for anymals, we ought to choose a vegan diet for the sake of the environment, to alleviate world hunger, to protect laborers, and on behalf of our own health. The consequences of our dietary choices are monumental.

Those guided by core religious commitments in one of the world’s largest religions are rightly anymal liberationists.

• religions are, overall, radically friendly toward anymals; • people tend to be ignorant of these prevalent teachings; and • our current economic choices (bolstered by our collective spiritual ignorance) perpetuate anymal industries that profit from untold misery and billions of premature deaths.

Indeed, although the world’s religious traditions differ in many critical ways, there is much of commonality in coremoral teachings with regard to nature generally and anymals specifically. Religiously sanctioned morals around the world encourage a gentle, benevolent, service-oriented relationship with anymals.

Rightful relations between humans and anymals are spiritually significant in every major religion. Core religious teachings from around the world require humans to protect and respect all that is natural, to show compassion for all who are sentient, and in contemporary times, to rethink our relations with anymals—especially what we eat.

Although there are tremendous differences in the particular expressions of any one branch within each religion, core teachings tend to remain central to all branches of a given religion—each branch generally shares the same core texts, teachings, saints, and/or founders. For example, love is a core value among the many Christian traditions, ahimsa is central to each Hindu tradition, zakat is obligatory in all Muslim traditions, and the list goes on.

At a minimum, it is clear that human beings who claim a religious tradition that is rooted in compassion and/or respect for the natural world must adopt a plant-based diet.

Exploring sacred teachings from around the world demonstrates that nature, including anymals, is sacred, that anymals are central to our spiritual landscape, and that we owe them respect, justice, and compassion.