my journey to living in love...

I thought I'd start this blog by sharing part of my journey. This is an excerpt of my Spirit of Life newsletter column for UU Animal Ministry...

 It is a privilege and my deepest joy to work with other Unitarian Universalists on behalf of animals—those beings whose voices are not like our own need us to use our voices to speak for them so that their unique and wonderful voices might finally be heard. Those beings whose bodies are abused and broken need us to use our bodies – our hands, our feet, our heads, our hearts - on their behalf, for indeed, bodies count.

My journey to animal rights and advocacy was a journey of the heart—a journey toward living in love. 

I’ve always been an “animal lover.” I grew up with an amazing German Shepherd named Duke who was my protector, my babysitter, and my friend. My parents got six month old Duke from a shelter when I was two years old. Mama used to put me on the front porch with Duke and a sign pinned to me that read, “Do not touch child. Dog will bite.” Once, I wandered off the porch, Mama called for Duke, knowing that wherever I was, so he would be. When he was thirteen years old, Duke became ill, and thinking they were protecting me, my parents had Duke put to sleep while I was at school. I experienced my first broken heart.

I didn’t realize then that I would later continually live with a heart broken wide open with love for all animals— those near and known, those faraway and unknown. We had other German Shepherds and I loved them all—each one was unique and smart and loyal and loving. Oddly, I didn’t make any connection between our dear canine companions and the animals that we ate each evening with our mid-western meat-and-potato meals. That would take long time.

Various feline companions influenced my journey of the heart as I grew up, moved out, and had cats—as if they could be had. As any cat lover knows, we are theirs as much as they are ours. Cat professor Tex was an important teacher—my relationship with this eighteen pound orange tabby, who was my companion from 1982-1994, furthered the process of opening my heart to awareness of the power of human/animal relationships. Tex accompanied me through a divorce and a cross-country move, and I just knew that loving him was the purest thing I’d ever done. I was stunned at how much I loved him. I don’t know how it happened really, or just when it happened. At some point, I realized that he was a part of me is some very fundamental way. It was then that I opened to earth-centered spirituality and began to feel a part of everything, “not separate at all,” as Shug in The Color Purple said. When Tex died at the age of 15, after two years of daily insulin shots, I got a tattoo over my heart—a broken heart with paw prints in it. I had no idea at the time that it would become literal again and again.

I still hadn’t made the connection between my companion animals and “other” animals – those raised for food.

Enter Lil, also known as Little One. It was while living with my feline companion, Lil, from October 1995- December 11, 2004, that I was transformed from “animal lover” to animal advocate, defender, and protector. I got Lil when she was six weeks old. Shortly after that I was diagnosed with cancer and my other kitty, Rocket Man, died from kidney disease.  Lil was my constant companion and my best friend. For six months, during those long dark chemo nights, Lil would drop her small pink ball on my chest, playing fetch with me until she could tell I was tired. Then she’d move my left arm up so that she could nestle there and sleep too. And so it went, as I healed from chemo, Lil healed me. We played hide-n-seek, she often initiating the game. We sat companionably for hours watching television or reading (well, she watched TV, I was the one who read). We rejoiced in each other’s company—each of us often preferring each other to anyone else.  Our ability to communicate with one another, to enter into each other’s experience, to see and be seen by each other, opened to me the possibilities of trans-species relationships.  Lil healed the remnant of the split that existed between me and other animals.

I had considered vegetarianism and moral consumption for many years before I committed myself to these practices. I had heard about factory farms and animal testing. Each time I was reminded of these conditions, I had a nagging sense of discomfort, though the discomfort would eventually fade. At the time, it was part of my earth-centered practice to celebrate the seasons and work with them in spiritual ritual. Every year, as winter ended, I thought about the promise of spring, the new beginning and hope that it symbolizes. I thought about what new things—what ideas or concepts—I would like see in my life with the coming of spring. Each spring I created a collage with images and words that symbolized what I was intending to bring into my life. In the spring of 1998, I was looking for pictures and words for my annual collage. I wanted to bring health, beauty, and harmony into my life, and perhaps greater clarity to my educational goals. I went through several magazines without finding any inspirational images. Synchronistically, I believe, I picked up Animal Times – PETA’s magazine. I chose pictures of farm animals and animals used for testing. I sat with the articles and the pictures. I chose words like cruelty free, beauty, and love.

This was my turning point. I had not intended to focus on animal issues. I had barely allowed the mistreatment of animals into my consciousness.

I felt the love that I had for my Lil. I saw how responsive she was, how she had her own purposes and desires, how she seemed to want to be with me, and enjoyed my company as I enjoyed hers, and how she was frightened when I put in her carrier to go to the vet. Certainly, what I’d learned about the intelligence of pigs being greater than that of dogs, and what I read about the fear that cows demonstrate when they are near the slaughterhouse and about the social structure that chickens have—certainly, I said to myself, the beings that are used for food and as test subjects must have as much value as Lil. Surely, I concluded, they are deserving of my love and protection.

And so they are.

And something remarkable happened. Unbelievable as it was to me, I found that I loved Lil more. The love that I felt for her was overwhelming at times. And the more I loved the more love I had until I realized that my heart was simply overflowing with love for all beings, and that I was held in love by them.

Lil died suddenly and too soon at age nine from a rare liver disease.  Never more than six and a half pounds, this little orange tabby taught me more about living-in-love then I would have ever thought possible. And so it is for Tex, and in Lil’s memory, that devote my life to all animals.

I look forward to getting to know your stories of love and transformation.

All love, all peace to all beings,

beth