The ultimate purpose of these laws is to cultivate a devotion to God. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with or "unclean" about consuming pork compared to beef, for example. It's a sacrifice that's made to instill a habit of devotion and of being attentive to spiritual matters.

(Indeed, among Christ's criticisms of the Pharisees is that they had lost sight of the spirit of the law and reduced it to an exercise in OCD and appearing pious in public while their hearts remained impure. From the Christian perspective, the Mosaic covenant was fulfilled by Christ and superseded by the New Covenant in which such dietary laws are no longer needed, as they would have already served their purpose. Of course, Catholics do practice dietary restriction on Fridays and during Lent as a matter of canon law as a penitential sacrifice.)

Ritual, in general, is not some kind of superstitious witchcraft or casting of spells, but a matter of spiritual practice and a system of signs communicating unseen realities. Everyday life contains similar practices. We use signs to communicate truths that cannot be perceived through our senses all the time (think of all the gestures we use in everyday life). This is to be expected, as human beings are also corporeal beings, and we communicate through signs that can be perceived through the senses.

A Hindu coworker once brought me a housefly he trapped, and asked me to kill it.

"Oh, no! Krisna sees through your little sin-transferral plan, Abu!"