African Traditional Religions
In African Traditional Religions (ATRs), animal sacrifice is regularly practiced. In New World versions of these religions, such as or Lucmi, such animal offerings constitute a portion of what are termed "ebos" – ritual activities that include offerings, prayer and deeds. The blood of the animals is thought to hold "aché", or life force.
Animal sacrifice is also found in the Cuban religion called Palo, which derives from African religion of the Congo, and in Haitian Vodou, a religion that derives from the Vodou religion of Dahomey.
Animal sacrifice is also found in the Talensi tribe from Ghana, Africa. Their animal sacrifice ritual is practiced for their ancestors, with each family having their own sacrificial pit. The more sacrificial skull remains on top of a pit signifies the more respected families. Once a sacrifice has taken place, the family of the ancestor receives the majority of the sacrificed animal to eat. The type of animal, size, and color all have different meanings and some are valued more than others.
The landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of the Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah in 1993 upheld the right of Santeria adherents to practice ritual animal sacrifice in the United States of America. Likewise in Texas in 2009, legal and religious issues that related to animal sacrifice, animal rights and freedom of religion were taken to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in the case of Jose Merced, President Templo Yoruba Omo Orisha Texas, Inc., v. City of Euless. The court ruling that the Merced case of the freedom of exercise of religion was meritorious and prevailing and that Merced was entitled under the Texas Religious Freedom and Restoration Act (TRFRA) to an injunction preventing the city of Euless, Texas from enforcing its ordinances that burdened his religious practices relating to the use of animals, (see Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 110.005(a)(2)).
Read more about this topic: Animal Sacrifice
Famous quotes containing the words african, traditional and/or religions:
“The sacrifice to Legba was completed; the Master of the Crossroads had taken the loas’ mysterious routes back to his native Guinea.
Meanwhile, the feast continued. The peasants were forgetting their misery: dance and alcohol numbed them, carrying away their shipwrecked conscience in the unreal and shady regions where the savage madness of the African gods lay waiting.”
—Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)
“I conceive that the leading characteristic of the nineteenth century has been the rapid growth of the scientific spirit, the consequent application of scientific methods of investigation to all the problems with which the human mind is occupied, and the correlative rejection of traditional beliefs which have proved their incompetence to bear such investigation.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“Politics at all times lead to bloody wars, and not only politics, but also religions as well as social and economic systems of all times are spattered with blood. Invariably the big ones devoured the little ones, and the little ones the tiny ones.”
—Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)