March 8, 2010:Spiritual Intimacy & Our Pets

Our spirituality can have a wonderful effect on the pets in our lives. It is perhaps the least thought about but the most important aspect of connecting two creatures in a universal intimacy. It leads to a multi-dimensional relationship of signals, gestures and sounds, all complemented by our peaceful persona.

Some would be authorities would have us believe that achieving such intimacy is first of all ridiculous and secondly, represents our need to transmit human characteristics upon animals, thus making the relationship dysfunctional.

The truth is this type of thinking could not be further from the truth! Loving contact in any form is not dysfunctional, but very human. It helps to develop our humanity when we connect with the unconditional love of a pet and it has been proven again and again in nursing homes, hospitals and with our wounded veterans, just how animals can lift our spirits just by being close.

To get a glimpse of heaven is to have a pet or an animal that needs our care. They live here on earth in the present moment. That in itself is fascinating. As human beings, we live by the clock, for the clock and with the clock. Time plays into every aspect of our lives. Not so with animals. They know not time. Their internal gauge is different than ours. It is set to “life rhythms” rather than minutes and hours. Our pets especially are masters of observation. They take note of our routines, our habits and idiosyncrasies and move in our lives accordingly. The dynamics of the relationship is usually in the hands of the human. Together we communicate, we by voice, tone, touch, playfulness, sternness, love or even an unseen impulse, they by just a look. It is evocative and complex.

The deepest intimacy is based not on speech, but in the intuitiveness of being present in the moment. There are no questions, no hurtful words, just looks, posturing and acknowledgement in glances exchanged and the presence of the spiritual dignity given all God’s creatures. They have been given the ability to know our needs, weaknesses, strengths, love’s and dislikes in so many ways.

Our pets know when we are about to return home from work as much as they know that a thunderstorm will arrive during the day. One is in the rhythm of our life the other is the rhythm of the natural realm. Animals are acutely aware of so much more than our five senses are telling us.

Our pets are deeply rooted in spirituality. They were created as “good” by the Creator and given their own “particular good” to the extent that they can receive God in that “good.”  They were hard-wired to cooperate with the Creator in this realm as they move about with humanity, ever subject to humankind’s disposition of them.

It is up to us to receive and understand the mission given us from the Garden of Eden. That we were given dominion over all the earth and its creatures for the continued good that divine providence had willed from the beginning.

Our pets are a wonderful place to start understanding that. They lead us in their unconditional love to places in our heart that resound the harmony of old. Their devotion and physical presence in our lives enriches the “living” experience taking us beyond ourselves. Our pets would if they could, remain with us until our natural deaths. So many times, a family pet has mourned the loss of its owner to an early death, showing how deeply and emotionally they feel the loss.

The spiritual and physical bonds between pet and pet owner grow and change as the love matures. The trust, love and gentility given and taken is one of the miracles of God as humankind and our love for animals crosses the barrier of species.

Susi Pittman is author of the award winning book “Animals in Heaven? Catholics Want to Know!”She is also a conservationist, ecologist, and an animal activist who lives with 14 rescued pets and a member/advocate for the ASPCA.

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