Lions Guard Kidnap Victim in Ethiopia

Some news stories make you wonder about divine providence.  Netscape News reported a story of lions that rescued a kidnapped Ethiopian girl who was being beaten by seven men trying to force her to marry one of them.  In Ethiopia, men will often beat and rape a woman who resists a forced marriage; up to 70% of marriages involve such abductions, often with severe beatings.  The lions guarded and protected this woman for about half a day till she was found, then “left her like a gift and went back into the forest.”

No unwarranted claims here; just an interesting item.  The flip side is that this story should make us all angry about the lowest of beasts, sinful men, who would do such a thing.  The article says this kind of atrocity is the norm.  In this depraved culture, kidnapping and rape, with beatings, is the men’s “customary” way to force women into marriage when they resist.  For more ugliness, see what a photographer found going on in neighboring Darfur, Sudan, as reported in National Geographic News.  Let’s hear it for the lions.  If you find a Darwinist trying to excuse this “customary” behavior as an evolutionary adaptation from our ape-like past (see 07/18/2003 entry), let out a loud roar.*