—Lancaster Farming. Saturday, May 1,1971
4
Let’s Agree on
There have nearly always been those
who for religious or moral reasons have
been vegetarians, renouncing meat and
meat products in favor of vegetables.
Most of us have disagreed with the
vegetarians, but we have never done any
thing about it. It has been a live and let live
attitude.
But in recent years, there has been a
surge of new efforts to attack meat and pro
mote vegetables. And the basis of the new
attack on meat and meat products has been
medical and scientific.
Because medicine and science are so
important and so highly regarded today*
these new attacks have made a deep im
pression with a small minority of the Ameri
can people, causing some to radically
change their diets. Many others have con
tinued their meat-based diet, but with some
misgivings or some slight change toward
less meat, eggs, poultry and milk.
While the overall impact of the polyun
saturated movement has not been great, it
has caused some persons to alter their diets
and it has rightfully caused many in the
farm community to view the trend with
concern. The concern particularly centers
around the new generation which is farther
removed than any previous generation from
the traditional farm diet, at the same time
this generation has been widely exposed to
the teachings of medicine and science
From a long-range point of view, the
poultry and egg, milk and beef industries
cannot afford to lose this generation.
That is one reason there is growing in
terest m the farm community tor promo
tional programs for their products.
That is why the reports on polyunsatu
rated diet and others critical of the tradi
tional American diet which places high em
phasis on protein foods are drawing the at
tention of farmers and their organizations.
That is why these reports will and must
be carefully followed by farmers and farm
organizations in the future.
The farm community has been particu
larly concerned by reports that indicate a
relationship between saturated diet and
heart attack. Stories on these studies have
received wide distribution in the national
news media. Efforts to show that these
studies were not representative or not
broad-based enough to show anything have
not stopped them; reports such as the Fram
ingham study which found no relationship
between diet and disease have slowed but
not stopped the reports.
Studies which show that the person who
saves himself from heart attack by avoid
ing saturated fats will die of cancer or some
other diease instead are now beginning to
appear.
The farm community increasingly has
been taking the position that to urge radi
cal changes in diet on the basis of existing
medical and scientific knowledge is at the
very least premature and is possibly ex
tremely hazardous.
The evidence is growing, for instance,
;hat one of the biggest medical problems of
LANCASTER FARMING
Lancaster County’s Own Faim Weekly
P. O. Box 266 - Lititz, Pa. 17543
Office. 22 E. Mam St., Lititz, Pa 17543
Phone: Lancaster 394-3047 or Lititz 626-2191
Robert G. Campbell, Adveitising Director
Zane Wilson, Managing Editor
Subscription price* $2 per year in Lancaster
County: $3 elsewhere
EstaMi'U’ o '! November 4 loss
Published every Saturday by Lancaster
Farming, Lititz, Pa.
Second Class Postage paid at Lititz, Pa.
17543.
Member of Newspaper Farm Editors Assn.
Pa. Newspaper Publishei s Association, and
National Newspaper Ass ‘ition
the Food Issue
the new generation is an ancient one. mal
nutrition.
We doubt, that this problem is going to
be solved during the controversy over poly
unsaturated and saturated diet. If anything,
malnutrition likely will increase as a result
of any further efforts to avoid 'polyun
saturated fats.
That’s true because the best way to
avoid malnutrition, and all the medical
complications which stem from it, is still to
follow the old standby: eat three square
meals and all the basic food groups each
day.
We can try short-cuts. We can cut out
certain foods, such as the saturated foods,
and change things so that the food values,
minerals and vitamins, we lose are made up
in other foods. But we mustn’t be surprised
if it simply doesn’t work simply because
we don’t know enough about human diet to
make it work.
All the research that has gone into per
fecting human diets, our information indi
cates, is very small in relation to the re
search that has gone into work on animal
diets. This may be unfortunate, but we be
lieve it is true.
One reason is that people won’t submit
to the rigid feed patterns that have been
successful in finding out what feed mixtures
keep animals vigorous and healthy.
Because of this and other factors, we
think it’s highly likely that much more will
be known about animal feed than our own
food for many, many years to come.
Our contact with animal nutritionists
indicates, it should be noted, that in spite of
their vast knowledge, they feel they have
just scratched the surface. While they know
a lot about the right amount of protein, en
ergy and minerals to put in the feed, they’re
constantly looking for and finding better
combinations.
Their work in the last 10 to 20 years has
played a major role in such achievements
as cutting the time period needed to grow
a market size broiler nearly in half and
cutting the amount of feed needed to pro
duce a pound of meat nearly in half.
Similar progress has been made in in
creasing milk production per cow and per
unit of feed input; major progress is under
way in growing better beef with less feed
and in less time largely because the farm
community understands what nutrition is all
about.
But these major achievements did not
occur overnight. They have been the pro
duct of painstaking and highly costly scien
tific effort by large numbers of scientists in
many firms working under highly competi
tive conditions for many decades.
Until medicine and science can put to
gether the broad-based and long-term type
of research on human diet that is now pay
ing such big dividends in animal diet, we
join the farm community in urging medi
cine and science to go slow on telling people
how to eat and what to eat' — except for the
balanced, three squares a day.
While the US. government in recent
years has increased its food program to the
point where it is now partially subsidizing
the diets of 14 million Americans, we may
find we’re working harder to do less if we
allow scientists with incomplete and un
reliable facts to dictate the American diet.
This is one issue, we believe, which is
basic to the success of farming and the na
tion. Everyone in the farm community can
get together on this one.
We must all begin to spend more time
and energy on the food issue.
' Saturated foods still are, and we need to
see that they remain, an important part of
the health of the nation.
To Raise Calves Carefully
The changeable spring weath- ticks after being outdoors in
er can be very hard on the these areas. Wood ticks suck
health of young dairy calves blood from the body and may
Roused in barns and sheds start serious fever cond'tions.
Young calves (under a month) Picnic grounds or recreational
cannot tolerate excessive damp- areas near woods may be kept
ness, drafts, and overheating, mowed during the season apd
Special quarters for these young several sprayings with sevin,
calves is strongly recommended. Chlordane, or Lindane wiE help
They should be kept clean, dry, i educe the problem.
and free from drafts or sudden
changes m temperatures Dur- Sh epherds are ur | ed to ive
mg the hot summer months out
side exercise lots mav he nro special attention to the
side exercise lots may De pro- flock at thls time of the year
mon?hs f n r f The ewes should be sheared and
not te expected tfconsume the fleeces ke P t clean and dr y
ficient Ss S green fZg eto ““ j 3o * Th£ f is “*> ad ‘
ti,o „ too/ „„ vantage to waiting until hot
tuents The feeding of gram v ! eatherto the sheep All
and hav is recommended for sneep should be treated for ln ‘
he.(L T?,™? when ff"“> M "¥
under a year of age he st f te; tbls “ very tlmely be '
fore turning them to pasture.
Cooperative wool pools at Read-
To Beware of Wood Ticks
Pleasant spring weather is mg and at Carlisle in June
about due for this area and all might provide a good outlet for
tjpes of insects will be appear- the wool If stray dogs are a
ing Folks living near wooded pioblem, the flock should be
sections, or those who go into {nought into the barn or in the
wooded areas, are urged to be barnyard at night; dog problems
on the alert for wood ticks should be reported to the local
Children and pets should be Dog Law Officer.
'RIGHT' WITH GOD
Lesson for May 2,1971 ,
•ackground Scripture Amos 5.4-15. 21*
24, 9 7-*„ 13 15
Devatianal Reading: Isaiah 55.1-11.
A radio preacher recently pro
claimed that the trouble with the
church today is too much empha
sis on social issues. In fact, he
said, our political, economic, and
social issues have nothing to do
with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
All any of us need
to do, he claimed,
was to “get right
with God through
Jesus.”
A "right” rela
tionship with God
certainly ought to
be a Christian’s
first and foremost
concern, Both Old
Rev. Althouse and New Testa
ments are deeply concerned with
helping us to see that this is the
most vital of all issues. It is by
sin that our relationship is rup
tured, by atonement and grace
that the relationship is repaired,
and God’s judgment is the evalu
ation of that relationship.
"Just save souls”
The problem arises when we
try to define what is a “right” re
lationship with God. Some people
hold that it is strictly a personal,
individual matter that has noth
ing to do w ith our social, politi
cal, arrtl economic involvements.
These would say simply that our
task as the Church is “to save
souls and not change society.”
Thus one of the reasons that
many of us are not too taken with
Amos and the other piophets, for
often they will not fit into that
kind of compartmentalized pat
tern. Amos, for example, makes
it veiy clear that to be “ught”
with God, one must “Hate evil,
and love good, and establish jus
tice m the gate” (Amos 5T5). It
is not enough for people to be
regular in their worship. In fact.
NOW IS
THE TIME..,
By Max Smith
Lancaster County Agent
carefully examined for these
without justice in their com
munity, the worship only makes
God angiy:
I hate, I despise your feasts, and
I take no delight in your solemn as
sembhes. Even though you offer me
burnt offerings and cereal offerings,
I will not accept them, and the
peace offerings of your fatted beasts
I will not look upon. Take away
from me the noise of your songs; to
the melody of your harps I will not
listen. (Amos 5:21-23)
If these rituals and modes of
worship by themselves cannot
please God, what will? “But let
justice roll down like waters, and
righteousness like an overflowing
stream” (5 24)! A person cannot
claim a "right” relationship with
God if he is not compassionate
and just in his relationships with
his neighbors and fellow citizens,
particularly those who cannot
help and protect themselves.
A word for the pious
Because he is Lord of history,
God is concerned with the be
haviour of men, both as individ
uals and as members of groups.
If man sins against his neighbor,
God is concerned. If a community
sins against individuals, groups of
people, or even another commu
nity, God is concerned about that
no less.
Amos make a very scathing in
dictment:
Woe to those who are at ease in
Zion, and to those who feel secure
on the mountains of Samaria, the
notable men of the first of nations
... (Amos 6:1) '
Those who feel secure because
they worship m the Temple on
Mt. Zion in Jerusalem (the peo
ple of Judah) and those who like
wise feel complacent because
they worship on Mt. Gerezim in
Samaria (the people of Israel),
aie living under a false security.
Worshipping in the ‘Tight’' place
and in the “right” way is not the
same as being “right” with God.
Rev. and Mrs. Althouse will
conduct a 15-day Alpine Holi r
day tour to Europe this sum
mer, June 30-July 14. Complete
cost including first class acco
dations and private bath: $895.
If interested, please write Rev.
Althouse in care of Mohnton,
Pa. 19540.
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Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S A.
Released by Community Press Serricej