I like dogs. I believe God uniquely created them to meet our needs just as he created everything else on this earth. I am amazed by the diversity of things they have been bread and trained to do. I have had pictures and statues of them everywhere. I certainly do not wish to give offense to anyone who loves these amazing animals. Please know this as you continue reading.

One day I came across a video that really got to me. I’ve never quite been able to understand having a deep emotional attachment to an animal, yet watching a video of a complete stranger whose dog was shot right in front of him about did me in. The screaming of the dog and the crying of the man replayed my memory like a very bad dream. I think maybe the Lord let me see that so that I would react with more compassion toward people who are close to their animals. I don’t know if it changes my opinion of how things should be, but it certainly changed my attitude toward the way things are.

When I was growing up, we had dogs at different times, but due to changing circumstances we never seemed to be able to keep one. Like many children, we wanted to have a dog, but usually didn’t do a very good job of caring for it when we got one. I suppose I loved them, but I would characterize it as the kind of affection a child might have for a favorite toy. Yet probably due to the books and television shows that depicted dogs larger than life, I always had an idealized picture of what a dog might be. I wanted the myth more than I wanted the reality. How many animals end up in shelters to be put down for much the same reason?

Even so, I never came to think of dogs as other than animals. The idea of loving a dog or any animal in the same way that we love other people is hard for me to understand. No dog can take the place of a human being. It is incomprehensible to me that anyone would put the needs of a pet over the needs of a family member or any human being for that matter. A pet may be considered a family member only in the broadest of terms. It may be loved and cared for by the family but should never be considered as an equal.

People say their dogs love them unconditionally. I don’t know if a dog is capable of love. I don’t suppose that anyone can be certain of such things. Certainly, there are verifiable accounts to be found of dogs doing things that sure look like love to us. I will share one here.  I do not claim to know where the line should be drawn between instinctive and emotive behavior. After all, I will concede that much of my understanding of animal behavior comes from the same people who believe that we are nothing more than sophisticated apes. Despite such preposterous pretenders as the Pet Psychic of past television fame, none of us really know what they are feeling or thinking. As I think it through, it’s not unreasonable to suppose that some level of emotional attachment exists, just as a young child who cannot intellectualize what he feels still loves his mother and father. He may continue to love them even if he comes to understand that they do not love him.

I think that what happens between pets and people is often an unhealthy replacement for missing human relationships. Because the creature does appear to offer unconditional love and lacks the capacity to hurt us in the way that another human can, we find it to be a safe way to meet our need. However, it does not meet the need. There is no suitable replacement in the animal kingdom for the human relationships that God designed us to have. As childlike as a dog may be in many ways, it cannot ever be a child. It may perform actions that you interpret as love, but it can never tell you that it loves you in words. It has no real concept of words or the conscious and coherent thoughts which produce them. It does not simply lack the means to speak. It lacks the concept of speech. It can neither substitute for a child nor a real friend. It can only be what it was created to be, a dog. When the unequal relationship between human and dog impairs or supplants the God-given relationship between human and human, something is tragically wrong.

Unhealthy relationships with animals can even destroy human connections. I recognized the potential for this in my own life before it had a chance to become a problem. It was 1997 and I had just moved to Dallas. I was living alone in an apartment, and I had been thinking about getting a dog for some time. This was the first place I lived on my own where it was permitted. I learned that a local shelter brought adoptable dogs to the pet store a reasonable walking distance from my apartment. I went up to look, but something didn’t feel right. The first week I didn’t bring one home. I had that feeling in the pit of my stomach that usually meant God was telling me “no.” That’s not the answer I wanted to hear, so I rationalized it and went back the second week.

Thus began a mighty tough week. I brought home a chihuahua dubbed Mickey by the shelter, but thinking every big-eared chihuahua in the country is probably called Mickey, I changed his name to Mighty. The name kept the mouse theme, and I thought it was a great appellation for a little tiny chihuahua. He wasn’t the sort of dog I imagined having. I’ve never really liked them. Most of them I’ve ever known were noisy and neurotic. Mighty was friendly and mostly quiet.

With the vet checkup, food, and supplies plus the pet deposit I dropped $500 on that free dog before the day was out, but I had everything I thought we would need. I still remember the feeling I had sitting in the chair next to the TV with Mighty on my lap. I had a friend. I had something to love. I imagined the beginning of a fulfilling companionship that would last for years and keep me from being alone. We played with the squeaky ball and rolled around on the floor, and I had what I wanted.

I knew better. Even then I knew what I was trying to do. I needed a friend. That little dog could never really be the friend I needed. As you might guess, the next few days brought home the reality of owning a dog, particularly a house dog. Due in part to the emotional instability I was experiencing at the time, I soon realized I couldn’t handle it. I wish now I had been able to hang on. The no-kill shelter took him back and I suspect he found a good home, but I’ll never know. I did learn my lesson though. God wanted me to leave room for real relationships in my life and not to substitute anything less.

Eventually I took in another one. When I moved to where I live now I not-so-subtly hinted that I would like to have Savanna, a chow/collie mix that had originally belonged to my sister and was with my parents at the time. I wasn’t sure how attached they were to her, so I didn’t want to come right out and ask. I had always liked her. She was sweet as they come (provided you didn’t walk on four legs) and smart. She was an outside dog, though well behaved in the house. She preferred to be outside and wanted me to be outside with her.

By then I was in a very different place in my life. She didn’t come with the same expectations. I enjoyed having her around. I always felt guilty though. Dogs may just be animals, but when we take them for our own, we have a responsibility to meet their needs too. It’s even written in the Bible. Proverbs 10:12 says in part “A righteous man has regard for the life of his animal…” My life was just too busy. I worked downtown, often had church functions, and spent most of the remainder of my time in front of the computer at home. Most of the time my interaction with Savanna was to go out and fill her food and water bowls. Like the clichéd guilty parent, I bought her toys hoping she would occupy herself with them, but it’s hard to play fetch with yourself. So, when my sister moved back to a place where she could have a dog and was considering one for her kids, I told her she should take Savanna back. I did miss her when she left. Every time I walked past the back door where she would stand begging me to come out and play, I felt a little pang of sadness.

I believe it was best, at least with the information I had at the time. God made dogs to be social creatures. They need lots of interaction with people and with their own kind. If you want a well-behaved dog around people, the former needs to be foremost. I would not have willingly taken on another unless circumstances changed such that I had a need for the dog or the desire to spend the time necessary to treat it right.

But I did. Her name was Tia. She came with the wife. I was actually happy to have her in the beginning. She was the perfect dog for me; someone else’s responsibility yet available to me when I felt like interacting with it. At first, I walked her, tried to play with her and establish a bond. The relationship quickly soured. Linda and I had very different ideas about what was acceptable behavior and about a dog’s place in the household. Tia had been a companion and source of comfort to Linda for many years, and neither seemed very willing to make adjustments for me. That isn’t entirely true, but it was hard for me to see it.

Though not able to really understand Linda’s feelings about the dog, I recognized that nothing I could do would change them. I knew that trying to force my preferences on her would only keep Tia between us even after she was no longer with us. I didn’t hate the dog. She had some behavioral issues, but she was just a dog. She could not have any concept of the emotional tumult surrounding her, much less have any responsibility for it. She simply acted like a dog.

I think the Lord was dealing with me on what I really needed to do. As an act of love for my wife, I needed to make a best effort to love the dog. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. The best I could manage was to treat Tia with kindness and not take my pain and frustration out on her.

God is gracious. Despite my reluctance to do what I needed to do, He moved Linda to take the first step. She agreed to a change I wanted from the beginning. That issue was the greatest obstacle to me being able to accept Tia and believe that I was really the most important to Linda. We had a major training breakthrough and my whole attitude changed. I loved my wife more than ever, and I tried to learn to love the dog too.

I can’t say I ever really got there, but there was a positive development in 2013, not long before we lost her.  Linda has multiple sclerosis.  In January of that year, she experienced a major attack and was hospitalized for several weeks.  We had a dog door. It was common for Tia to go in and out several times as she roamed the house, but when I would come home from the hospital and sit down at my desk, I began to notice she was doing it more frequently.  I’d hear the slap of the flap as she went out and came back in, then the jingle of her tags as she paced up and down the hall.  It finally occurred to me what was going on.  She was searching for Linda.  When we’re both gone, we almost always come back together.  But something was wrong.  I was there but Linda wasn’t.  Did Tia love Linda?  I suppose that only God knows for sure, but I’m certainly not going to say she didn’t.  I did feel a little closer to Tia after that experience.

A few months later, we lost her.  Partially deaf and blind and under the influence of medication that the vet had given her so they could work on her ears, she wandered into the pool and drowned.  Thinking that she was asleep on the sofa, neither of us knew what had happened until it was far too late.  Naturally it was much harder on Linda than me.  I listened and let her grieve in her own time and way.

Will there be another dog in our lives?  Probably not.  We considered the idea for a while, but there are too many practical reasons why we shouldn’t.  My attitude has softened, but I still think it best to focus my emotional energy on human relationships.  I have a hard enough time doing that to accept any substitute.  But I have no doubt that God gave us the dog and knew what He was doing, so who knows?  I’m much less quick to judge now, and I am willing to accept that some time in the future there may be room in my heart for a furry friend.