‘Hear Our Cries, Oh Lord’: PETA LAMBS’ Prayer Hits Knoxville Airwaves

For Immediate Release:
November 30, 2022

Contact:
Robin Goist 202-483-7382

Just in time for the Christmas shopping season, a 30-second prayer for the sheep exploited, abused, and eventually killed in the wool trade is hitting local airwaves in one of the country’s most religious cities, courtesy of PETA’s Christian outreach division, PETA LAMBS (“Least Among My Brothers and Sisters” from Matthew 25:40).

In the video, the Rev. Sarah Bowen of the Compassion Consortium, a nonsectarian and interfaith religious center, calls out cruelty to sheep used in the wool industry, such as routine beatings and genetic manipulation to cause them to produce more fleece than they naturally need. Her prayer is part of PETA’s push for shoppers to choose wool-free winter clothing and remember that God intended for humans to be caretakers—not killers—of his creation.

“Gentle sheep represent innocence in the Bible, yet the wool industry treats them as commodities to toss around, genetically alter, and shear bloody,” says PETA Foundation Christian Outreach and Engagement Campaign Coordinator Candice Kelsey. “This Christmas, PETA is calling on everyone to open their ears to sheep’s cries and honor God’s plan with vegan clothing.”

As revealed in 14 exposés, PETA U.S. and other PETA entities have documented cruelty to sheep while visiting 117 wool operations worldwide. Even on “sustainable” and “responsible” farms, workers beat, stomped on, cut open the skin of, and slit the throats of conscious, struggling sheep. Not only do vegan options protect these animals from this cruelty, they’re also better for the environment.

Bowen is a vegan and the program director of the Animal Chaplaincy Training Program at the Compassion Consortium, which she cofounded, and the author of Sacred Sendoffs: An Animal Chaplain’s Advice for Surviving Animal Loss, Making Life Meaningful, & Healing the Planet.

Every Sunday until Christmas, the video will run before and after Heart of the Nation Catholic Mass, which airs on WKNX-TV at 8:30 a.m.

PETA LAMBS—whose motto, a variation of PETA’s, is “Animals are not ours. They’re God’s”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETALambs.com or follow PETA on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram