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The Sacred Cow

Statue of the sacred cow in Namchi Chardham in Sikkim, India

By Fr. Frank Hoare

After spending over a year in India from February 1979 to March 1980 I began to understand the reverence that Hindus gave to the cow and the importance for them of not eating beef. In a densely populated country the cow was very important. It gave nourishing milk. It could be used for ploughing the rice fields. Equipped with a wooden trailer it could transport items too heavy to carry. Its dung was useful as fuel or, mixed with water and clay, as an antiseptic gel to paste on the floor of poor houses. The cow in India is esteemed as a mother. How could one eat one’s mother! A religious preacher who ate beef would have no chance of gaining a hearing from Hindus.

Actually some years previously while on my way for a meal with a Hindu teacher in a local settlement I was discretely approached by a temple priest. He invited me to eat with him and his family. “We are having beef!” he whispered conspiratorially, thinking that for a European this would be an invitation impossible to refuse. Though shocked that this was happening in the grounds of a Hindu temple I politely explained that I had a prior invitation. 

Then, a couple of years after my return from India I was assigned to work primarily among the Indo-Fijian people. I decided to become vegetarian. We had a good cook in the Lautoka presbytery who was able to cope with this situation. I found vegetarian curry very tasty and so had no problem.

But then while studying for three years in Rome in the mid-eighties I used to spend my holidays at home in Ireland. My mother was not used to having a vegetarian on her hands, but she made great efforts to adapt. My counsellor in Rome, however, challenged me about giving my mother this trouble. So I reverted to eating everything. 

Now back in Fiji, I participated last night in a prayer meeting in a rural Catholic Indo-Fijian home. A very open Hindu family had been attending the regular prayer meeting at this home for many years. After the prayers a young man of the family who knew about my time in India asked whether I was still a vegetarian. I told him that I had to give up being vegetarian while at home in Ireland. “Do you eat everything?” he asked. “Yes, I do” I answered. “Father eats EVERYTHING!” he reported to his Hindu family members.  His emphatic report indicated that I now ate beef. Once again I was reminded how repugnant beef-eating is to Hindus. 

So I have now decided that I will eat meat but not beef. 

Columban Fr. Frank Hoare lives and works in Fiji

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