Animal Spirituality
Pigs Will Fly
I was at a meeting recently, when a set question came up to be debated. The question was “An old lady comes up to you and says that her pet Pit Bull Terrier has just died. She asks if she will see it in heaven. (She is in obvious distress).” At the time the obvious need was to comfort her. It would have been cruel, and unhelpful in such a situation to say, “No, animals don’t have souls, and it was a bad dog because it was a Pit Bull Terrier.” Maybe you disagree with me saying that, but to me the immediate need was that of a grieving old woman who had been bereft of a loved one. We must all know, or many of us, how hard it is to lose a pet. Sometimes it is harder than losing an adult because the animal is totally dependant, childlike. But I digress.
The question does, however, raise some questions that do need to be answered: “Do animals have souls? If so, do ‘good’ animals go to heaven?” Immediately I would say that there is no evidence for animals having souls. However, maybe I should define ‘soul’. A soul, or at least as I see it, is the essence of spirituality that confers self-consciousness on an organism. That is, the organism possessing a soul is conscious of itself, its environment and the spiritual world. Above all, it is conscious of God. Human beings possess such a soul. Now, I said that there is no evidence for animals having such a soul. This could be that we just can’t communicate across species-boundaries. It is hard enough, after all, to communicate with fellow human beings, and we all share the essence of language. Maybe animals do have language, in a form we just don’t understand. That is a BIG maybe. So at the present time I would say animals don’t have souls. This is a bit distressing, but there we have it.
However, we do know that animals have an awareness of sorts. Your pet dog feels your moods and is aware of its environment. So how do I explain this? I now come into an area that, as a biologist, I’ve had to think about. I’ve come to a conclusion as well — unusual for me.
Animals do have a spirituality of sorts, but animals are expressions of God’s Holy Ghost. Now I’m not promoting polytheism, worship a dog for it is God. No way. I am saying that God is in everything animate and inanimate. However, the miracle of life is a stronger association of God and his material world. This, in itself, brings about the realisation of God’s love for us. God gave human beings ‘mastery’ over the living world. Is this not reminiscent of Christ himself? God put himself in human hands, the Lamb was slain. In the same way, God puts himself, as everything living, in our hands. To me this makes sense, and fills me with wonder and distress. The wonder of God’s selfless love, and the distress of how we treat the living world. Are we not, by destroying the environment, as much responsible for Christ’s wounds, and the executioners of Christ? Every species made extinct is a wound on Christ’s head.
Now I’m not out to depress everyone, but I would like you to think about the way you personally treat the living world. We do have ‘mastery’, but we must respect that. Christ is Love, so we must love our fellow creatures, or at least respect them.