Category: limerick

News item: According to guidelines published by CoExist House, a US and UK-based interfaith group, corporations are being urged to provide a less hostile environment for arriving Muslims and other religious minorities. In so doing, they should refrain from serving ham and cheese sandwiches and other pork related dishes in the company cafeteria, and refrain from using words and phrases that suggest any connection with these products.

Also: The federal Bureau of Prisons has banned pork products from being served in the 122 prisons it runs nationwide, The Washington Post reports.
The ban started with the new fiscal year, which began October 1, and is attributed by the bureau to prisoners not liking pork.

You know Armageddon’s at hand

when “Bring home the bacon” is banned

But God said: Kill and eat

all is clean that is meat.

I’m free from the law’s old command.

Yes, we are free from the law with its dietary restrictions. The source is from the Acts of the Apostles Chapter 11 verses 4 thru 10:

⁴ Starting from the beginning, Peter told them the whole story: ⁵ “I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision. I saw something like a large sheet being let down from heaven by its four corners, and it came down to where I was. ⁶ I looked into it and saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles and birds. ⁷ Then I heard a voice telling me, ‘Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.’

⁸ “I replied, ‘Surely not, Lord! Nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’

⁹ “The voice spoke from heaven a second time, ‘Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.’ ¹⁰ This happened three times, and then it was all pulled up to heaven again.

Then it was repeated in the Counsel of Jerusalem, which interestingly enough was chaired by Jesus half-brother James, not Peter.

In Acts 15, verses 7-20, Doctor Luke records:

⁷ After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: “Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. ⁸ God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. ⁹ He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. ¹⁰ Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? ¹¹ No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”

¹² The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul telling about the signs and wonders God had done among the Gentiles through them. ¹³ When they finished, James spoke up. “Brothers,” he said, “listen to me. ¹⁴ Simon^[a] has described to us how God first intervened to choose a people for his name from the Gentiles. ¹⁵ The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written:

¹⁹ “It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. ²⁰ Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood.

We should never shy away from proclaiming our freedom: As the Apostle Paul mentions in his letter to the Galatians 5:1:

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.