PETA’s ‘Get Well Soon’ Gift to Pope Calls for Compassion Towards Bulls
PETA’s ‘Get Well Soon’ Gift to Pope Calls for Compassion Towards Bulls
Rome – Following reports that Pope Francis has been admitted to hospital to undergo tests for bronchitis, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have rushed His Holiness a “get well soon” gift: a warm and cosy blanket to aid in healing, decorated with the image of a bull rescued from the cruelty of bullfighting. PETA hopes that, upon receiving this gift, the Pope will also help spare bulls from suffering by condemning cruel and unholy bullfights held in honour of Catholic saints.
Image also available here. Credit: Santuario Vegan
“We wish Pope Francis a speedy recovery and hope this gift will inspire him to speak out against the suffering inflicted on bulls in God’s name,” says PETA Vice President for Europe Mimi Bekhechi. “He is their only hope.”
Every year, tens of thousands of bulls are slaughtered in bullfighting festivals around the world, held in honour of Catholic saints. During these events, assailants on horses drive lances into a bull’s back and neck before others plunge banderillas into his back, inflicting acute pain whenever he turns his head and impairing his range of motion. Eventually, when the bull becomes weak from blood loss, a matador appears and attempts to kill the animal by plunging a sword into his lungs. A knife is used to cut his spinal cord. The bull may be paralysed but still conscious as his ears or tail are cut off and presented to the matador as a trophy and his body is dragged from the arena.
Pope Francis wrote in his encyclical Laudato Si’, “Every act of cruelty towards any creature is ‘contrary to human dignity’,” and as far back as the 16th century, Pope Pius V – who has since been canonised – banned bullfighting, which he described as “cruel and base spectacles of the devil and not of man” and contrary to “Christian piety and charity”. The doctrine of the Catholic Church clearly states that humans should not “cause animals to suffer or die needlessly”, yet Catholic priests often officiate at religious ceremonies in bullrings and minister to bullfighters in arena chapels. Some even attack bulls in arenas while dressed in a cassock.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment or abuse in any other way” – points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow PETA on Facebook, X, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Sascha Camilli +44 207 923 6244; [email protected]
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