Andrew Linzey

Andrew Linzey is an Anglican priest, theologian, author, and prominent figure in the Christian vegetarian movement. He is a member of the Faculty of Theology in the University of Oxford and held the world’s first academic post in Ethics, Theology and Animal Welfare — the Bede Jarret Senior Research Fellowship at Blackfriars Hall, University of Oxford.

Career

Andrew Linzey is the founder and director of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, an independent educational company, opened in November 2006. The company aims to encourage research into, and improve public debate on, the issues surrounding animal-related ethics. More than 100 academics in various fields currently act as advisers to the company.

He has written more than 180 articles, and authored or edited twenty books on theology and ethics. He has lectured and broadcast extensively in Europe and the United States. His Animal Theology has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Japanese and French.

He is most often quoted as saying "Animals are God's creatures, not human property, nor utilities, nor resources, nor commodities, but precious beings in God's sight. ... Christians whose eyes are fixed on the awfulness of crucifixion are in a special position to understand the awfulness of innocent suffering. The Cross of Christ is God's absolute identification with the weak, the powerless, and the vulnerable, but most of all with unprotected, undefended, innocent suffering."

Honours

In 1990, he was awarded the Peaceable Kingdom Medal for outstanding work in the field of theology and animals. In June, 2001, he was awarded a DD (Doctor of Divinity) degree by George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, in recognition of his “unique and massive pioneering work in the area of the theology of creation with particular reference to the rights and welfare of God’s sentient creatures”. This is the highest award that the Archbishop can bestow on a theologian and the first time it has been awarded for work involving animals. In 2006, in recognition of his role in the creation of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, Linzey was named the Henry Bergh Professor of Animal Ethics at the Graduate Theological Foundation in the U.S., the first such professorship of its kind in the world.

Works

Author

• Linzey, Andrew Animal Rights: A Christian Perspective (London: SCM Press, 1976)
• Linzey, Andrew Christianity and the Rights of Animals (London: SPCK and New York: Crossroad, 1987 and 1989)
• Linzey, Andrew Animal Theology (London: SCM Press and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1994 and 1996)
• Linzey, Andrew Animal Theology University of Illinois Press, 1995, ISBN 0-252-02170-3
• Linzey, Andrew Animal Gospel: The Christian Defense of Animals Hodder & Stoughton Religious, 1998, ISBN 0-340-62150-8
• Linzey, Andrew Animal Gospel: Christian Faith as If Animals Mattered (London: Hodder and Stougton, and Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1999 and 2000)
• Linzey, Andrew Animal Rites: Liturgies of Animal Care (London: SCM Press and Cleveland: Ohio: The Pilgrim Press, 1999 and 2001)
• Linzey, Andrew Creatures of the Same God: Explorations in Animal Theology (New York: Lantern Books, 2009). ISBN 978-1-59056-142-3
• Why Animal Suffering Matters: Philosophy, Theology, and Practical Ethics (Oxford University Press, 2009). ISBN 978-0195379778

Co-author

• co-authored with Dan Cohn-Sherbok After Noah: Animals and the Liberation of Theology (London: Mowbray, now Continuum, 1997)

Editor

• edited with Tom Regan Animals and Christianity: A Book of Readings (London: SPCK and New York: Crossroad, 1989 and 1990)
• edited with P.A.B. Clarke Political Theory and Animal Rights (London: Pluto Press, 1990)
• editor of The Animal World Encyclopaedia Kingsley Media, 2005

Co-editor

• co-edited with Peter Wexler Fundamentalism and Tolerance (Canterbury Papers) Bellew Publishing, 1991, ISBN 0-947792-74-0
• co-editor Dictionary of Ethics, Theology and Society Routledge, 1995
• co-edited with Dorothy Yamamoto Animals on the Agenda: Questions about Animals for Theology and Ethics (London: SCM Press and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1998 and 1999)
• co-editor, Gays and the Future of Anglicanism: Responses to the Windsor Report O Books, 2005, ISBN 1-905047-38-X
• co-edited with Paul Barry Clarke Animal Rights: A Historical Anthology Columbia University Press, 2005, ISBN 0-231-13420-7

External links

• The Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics

See also

• Animal rights
• Animal welfare
• Christian vegetarianism
• Vegetarianism and religion
• Animal chaplains