Letter to the Pope: Leather Bibles
The good folks at PETA Germany just sent this letter to Pope Benedict XVI, asking him to encourage Catholics not to buy bibles that have been bound with leather. Pope Benedict is well-known for his compassionate stance on animal issues, having spoken out against the cruelty of factory farming (particularly the production of foie gras) in the past, and—being the pope and all—he’s in a position to make a huge difference for the billions of animals (including cats and dogs, btw) who are killed for leather. With as many as 168,000 bibles sold or given away every day, a large percentage of which are bound with animal skins, there’s a lot at stake here. From a religious perspective, there’s something particularly sick to me about wrapping a bible in a dead body, so I’m hoping this letter has an effect.