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It is only one step from the murder of animals

to the murder of humans. (Tolstoy)

“The cow and the bear shall graze…” – but not in Bavaria

Surely everyone has heard about the Kingdom of Peace at some point in time, more exactingly, the “Kingdom of Peace of Jesus Christ.” Already with the prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament was it announced. There we can read in chapter 11:6-9 the following:

The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain.

With the words, “the cow and the bear shall graze” at this time surely people are reminded of the case of Bruno the Bear. Why? What is prophesied by Isaiah here and of which Christ during our times speaks of in the great work of revelation, “This Is My Word” (www.universal-spirit.cc) is a peaceful co-existence of human beings and animals in a peaceable nature. The cow and the bear – the cow, as a symbol of the peaceful domesticated animal, and the bear, a symbol of the wild animals that live out in the open – shall graze, their young shall lie down together. And what have we experienced during the past month in Bavaria – the absolute opposite to this!

Briefly, the facts:

For some time now a program has been running in northern Italy to resettle bears, which had been wiped out in central Europe about 150 years ago. And from this program, a young, two year old bear set out traveling north from Italy. By way of Austria, he landed in Bavaria where he was considered a “problem bear” because he acted like he had no fear of humans. This appeared dangerous to Bavarians and the Bavarian government gave the order to shoot Bruno.

The echo on the murder of this bear was worldwide. Many spoke about “barbarians,” as the newspaper WELT reported on Sunday, July 2^nd. According to TAZ (daily newspaper in Berlin), many called the shooting of the animal “murder.” The President of the World Wildlife Fund in Italy, Fulco Trateci, spoke of a “barbaric act.” And the President of the German Association of Nature Conservancy, Hubert Weinzierl, said: “In other countries bears and people are able to live together in peace, in Germany bears are liquidated.” (TAZ, June 27, 2006). The head of the Munich Zoo emphasized: “This bear was never aggressive; he never attacked people. This shooting is an incredible act, a disgrace for Bavaria, a slap in the face for Bavarian animal protection.” (TAZ, June 27, 2006). And also on June 27, 2006, the Franconia Post stated: “To kill bears is a crime against the protection of nature and animals. Apparently a handful of trigger-happy hunters, called upon by the District Administrative Office, knew exactly where to find the bear.” And the Italian Minister of the Environment stated that the bear had been “executed” in Bavaria. Guests at Bavarian vacation resorts in the area where the bear Bruno had been “executed” wrote in hotel guest books: “We don’t want to vacation among murderers. We’re leaving and never coming again.” (The Standard, Austria).

Bruno’s sacrifice should not slide into oblivion

Such and similar reports and comments filled the papers and were heard everywhere. Many people worldwide were outraged over what happened with Bruno. Our concern is that Bruno should not be forgotten after a brief uproar, because the manner in which Bruno was killed shows us that the animal Bruno sacrificed himself for his fellow animals. This becomes clear as we read the latest edition of the magazine FOCUS: There, we read that it was a policeman who went out with other officials to kill Bruno. The article in FOCUS describes how Bruno’s murder took place:

“Last Monday morning at 4 am, the head commissioner opened the door of the alpine hut in order to step outside. He couldn’t believe his eyes. Bruno, the bear that he was supposed to kill, stood only a stone’s throw away. Frightened, he slammed the door shut. The policeman yelled through the hut: ‘The bear is outside! The bear is there!’ His companions sat up in their bunks.

Bear Bruno ran up the hill in the direction of Auerspitze – a high spot nearby. It took almost 40 minutes for the excited hunters to load their rifles and position themselves at an open window in the hut. The bear stood on a meadow circa 150 meters above the hut. He stood up on his hind legs and turned his broad chest toward the gunmen. At 4:50 A.M. the deadly shots rang out.”

It is clear that bear Bruno knew what was in store for him. He offered them his broad chest, thus sacrificing himself. And this sacrifice cannot be for nothing, because what bear Bruno showed the whole world through this is the incredible barbarism with which responsible officials in Germany, particularly in Bavaria, treat animals. The only crime committed by this animal was the crime of trusting people. It was for this reason that he was considered dangerous! The potential for a co-habitation that this animal was demonstrating toward the people would have been a step in the direction of what was proclaimed by the prophet Isaiah and by Jesus, the Christ. But apparently, this could not be allowed! Animals that trust people have to be killed.

The execution of the bear was a punishable act of crime!

Perhaps we could take a look at two aspects of this kind of behavior. The first aspect would be the legal position. Let us ask the question if an animal that was raised in another country under a resettlement program can simply be shot in Germany through the arbitrary decision of officials. A lawyer answer:

When we look at this case from a legal standpoint, we have to be clear that shooting a bear is not comparable to shooting a wild pig, a deer or another wild animal; that is to say, this is not comparable to killing animals that is allowed by law for sport hunting. Instead, we have here an animal that is not even on the list of animals allowed to be hunted. For Bruno, the appropriate law is the animal protection law. In paragraph 1 of this law it literally says that “the animal is to be respected as a fellow creature and its life and well-being are to be protected.” Further on it states: “No one may cause pain, suffering or harm to an animal without reasonable cause.” Of course, in such cases the question is: “What would have been considered a reasonable cause under this law, that would have justified killing this bear that wandered through the Rotwand area of Upper Bavaria? That he nourished himself on chickens and sheep is scarcely different from the people who eyeballed him for weeks. The majority of them eat the same animals. They don’t tear the animals apart like the bear, but they do have them torn apart for themselves when they are slaughtered. And what the brown bear did not pay for his meals was covered by damage insurance. So, there was no reasonable cause at all for killing it. Under police law, acute danger to human life is necessary before firing such a deadly shot.

One can understand the concern of the responsible officials that one day such a thing could happen. But what cannot be understood is that the responsible minister and his advisors lost all sense of proportion in relation to the bear. There was no attempt at accommodation, as they at first tried to make us believe, like it would have been if they had tried to anesthetize him and, if possible, spare his life. This even got easier to do over the course of the weeks, as was evidenced by the reports of the bear cavalierly wandering over roads and through towns. On the one hand, to accuse this animal of not being shy enough of people, and, on the other hand, to shoot him down, because they had not been able to anesthetize him, just doesn’t fit well together. And we heard how his end came about. He was so close to the people and so peaceful, that it would have very easily been possible to anesthetize, capture and return him to his home in Italy. Therefore, many jurists in this country would conclude that the execution of this animal at dawn was a punishable act. It was a punishable killing of animal in the spirit of the animal protection law.

It is only one step from the murder of animals to the murder of people

It is quite shocking considering how normal patterns of behavior toward animals that are valid in many countries, are brushed aside in Germany. The words of Leo Tolstoy inevitable come to mind, who said: “It is only one step from the murder of animals to the murder of people.” Who knows when this reckless attitude will also take place in the face of other laws… In any case, a watchful attitude is certainly called for.

Abroad, Germany is already being compared with medieval times. For example, the head veterinarian of World Wildlife Fund, Alessandro de Gelme, said: “Germany and Austria appear to be falling back into medieval times and to set bounties on all bears in the future.” This is not so farfetched when we read in the latest newspaper that they are thinking about also killing Bruno’s mother – she is called Jurka. And why? Because she, too, is not shy enough of people. And it is feared that one of her young may come to Germany again.

Bruno is not an isolated case …

This manner of executing an animal has stirred up a lot of dust, but we may not forget that this is not an isolated case. In this particular case it was a bear, who perhaps captured special public attention. But we may not forget that in Germany alone 5 million wild animals, 4,000 to 6,000 dogs and 40,000 cats, along with 40 people, fall victim to the murder instruments of hunters every year. 80 people are seriously injured by hunting weapons every year. Bruno’s sacrificial death reminds us above all of the suffering and torment of these many animals.

And if you now say that hunting is necessary to preserve the balance of nature – which by the way, was destroyed by none other than people – then do take note of the statements of a well-known hunter, a neurologist and psychoanalyst who has won several awards. He is a leading personality among hunters, after whom a publishing house is named and which publishes literature for hunters, namely, Paul Parin. In his book, “The Passion of Hunters,” he writes the following:

True hunting cannot exist without premeditated murder. Passionate hunters want to kill. Hunting without murder cancels itself out. And because hunting is all about passion, greed, lust, that has something feverish about it, it is about sex and crime, about sexual lust and crimes of all kinds, about murder and sex murder. This is how a passionate hunter describes what hunters do.

As Christians, or as people who consider themselves Christian, we could and should ask the question: What would Jesus of Nazareth have said about this? In the great work of revelation of Jesus, the Christ, entitled This Is My Word, he unmistakably stated that every animal, every person is a creature of God, and that every person and every animal has the right to live. And no one has the right to kill them. How is it possible that such a bestial way of treating animals is possible here in Germany, and above all, in Bavaria? Not only toward bear Bruno, but also toward many other animals?

One or the other may still remember the order for the massacre of wild pigs given by the same state officials about two years ago in the vicinity of Würzburg and which could only be prevented by the courts …

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