Is ”stop it Archie!” a blessing? Just kidding, watched a neighbor’s puppy for a few hours yesterday.

yes, our Murphie Brown (RIP) was blessed a few times. Some of my favorite church services.

I am currently petless, but i notice that the Catholic church and the Episcopal church near me are blessing the animals today. Unfortunately it is raining buckets here.

I know of one church in my area that does this although my guys have never attended. Maybe a home ritual with a bit of water splashed.

I’m a lapsed, or recovering, Catholic. The riuals are memorable. I’m not sure if it’s still obseved, but the Feast of St Blaise is Feb 2 and used to include blessing of throats using a pair of unlit candles. tied with a red ribbon. The intention is to guard against choking on fishbones and sore throats.

Not churchgoers ourselves (although I do attend when I visit my mother - I love the people in her church). Australian Shepherds are fairly indepenent minded, so we would be unlikely to take our dogs to a ceremony (or a parade, for that matter). On outer Cape Cod, there is an annual blessing of the fleet in Provincetown harbor at the end of the Portuguese Festival in June. Blessings of good fortune for the coming year are given for the commercial fisherman.

Pretty sure my dog would start by peeing on the font, or the bishop. Can't see myself taking him to a church service!

We attended the AUUF for many many years. They had their blessing of the animals today , it is always early October. We would bring a picture of whatever cat we had over the years since they wouldn’t have travelled well 😂🤦‍♀️. We had bunnies and guinea pigs and birds as well as the usual suspects. I think we had a lamb once as well. We don’t have a UU here in our area so we ” home church” on our meditation cushions.

Love that story, Jo!

I've never attended such a service. I did, however, attend a Franciscan college. St. Francis holds a special place for me, and I've been to the beautiful town of Assisi and the basilica there.

No, but what a wonderful idea!

I once saw someone brink a snake to blessing of the animals. 🐍

Although I attended church for many years, I never have attended a service blessing the animals, it sounds like a wonderful event. I was raised Episcopalian, and it has a familiar ring. However, I can not see my mom loading all the pets into the car for a service, just not her thing. If it was on a Sunday, she probably would have elected to skip church that week.

It appears that our local Catholic church offers a special service on Tuesday and several churches near our desert home offered blessings this weekend. Calendared to watch for this event next year, hope to attend a service. Thank you for sharing.

Our UU church has done that for many years now, and encouraged people to bring a photo or a toy/model version of their pet if the real one doesn't travel well. It's very sweet and fun.

They also do a flower communion, and a water communion, where people bring flowers and little containers of water from cherished, special places respectively, and they are mingled together and everyone gets to say a little something about their offering, if they wish.

October 4th is the feast day of St. Francis although he actually died near midnight on the 3rd. My high school was Franciscan and one of the Brothers offered the annual Blessing of the Animals to the community. If the weather was nice we held it in the huge field behind the Motherhouse and typically students were recruited to assist.

My kids have had dogs, birds, snakes, lizards but for some reason I never even thought about having them blessed but then again I only go to church for weddings or funerals.

A local farm that was also a nursery/greenhouse used to have an annual dog walk. It was great. A priest would come and bless the dogs. Also, before we lined up in the beautiful landscaped yard to begin the walk, all around the edge of the property and then up into a wooded area to walk the trail and back, a trio of musicians that provided background music always played and sang Eric Clapton's "Tears in Heaven". It was for all those fur babies that had passed on but were never forgotten.

I cried every single time. ugh. It was just so moving.

Even though I consider myself agnostic—at best—I have a soft spot for Saint Francis. After many years of searching, I finally found a statue of him that looks perfectly at home in a nook in my yard by my bird feeder. I always have to laugh, when Cardinals sit on his head.

My Episcopal church is doing Blessing of the Animals next Sunday. I'm taking my grand-dog Otis. Last year he cried.

Oh gosh, we’re Episcopalian, we have it every year! Adore it, but Hudson does not! He gets extrodinarily nervous, perhaps he’s athiest? 😂 We stopped taking him. Koda hasn’t been yet (during Covid it was some sort of lame drive-up thing😂) She’ll love it. We’ve seen everything, snakes, other reptiles, gerbils….one lady brought a Great Dane who was so moved he did a #2 in the aisle (it was outdoors, thank goodness.) 😂

I imagine every church that does it does it every year?

Thank goodness we've never seen any accidents. How impolite!

"They are usually in Oct." The Feast of St.. Francis is Oct 4 and these pet blessings are most often on the Sunday afternoon of the Sunday closest to the feast day. Check out any Roman Catholic Church--pretty much a given. Not usually DURING Mass but later, held outside. It's pretty fun to learn what people you know have what pets. We used to serve Hot Apple Cider and animal treats!

We are Episcopalian and our new-ish rector does a blessing of the animals on the October feast day of St. Francis. Not all priests like animals and don’t do it; our last priest did not and we’re glad to see it back Our church holds it outdoors in the garden. We missed it this year, my mother, daughter and I went up to Atlanta for lunch and the final performance of Everybody at the Alliance Theatre. I’m hoping last year’s blessing will last more than 12 months for our rowdy dog duo.

Not all priests like animals

I have no words.

My church does it every year. In 2020 when we were still all Zoom church, we (me) put together a slide show of our pets accompanied by All Creatures of our God and King. I still watch it now and then, because animals.

Our entire 10:00 service moves outside for the Blessing of the Animals. It happens somewhere between the sermon and communion.

I do think animals, certainly dogs, have a sense about people and their intentions. I notice the pastor always starts by petting them a bit. They know.

We aren't supposed to judge but I am always wary of anti-dog people, especially those who don't cotton to the notoriously gentle breeds.

We aren't supposed to judge

I can't help myself. I call it discernment.

I can watch dog and cat videos all day long. I just can't with anti-dog/cat people.

I can watch dog and cat videos all day long

This is a very real danger. I love "cats with jobs"

Especially during the shutdown, DH and I could easily get sucked into a channel, on broadcast tv mind you, of animal videos. No narration, no commentary, just one short video after another.

The chuch I ring at is Epsopalian and yesterday they were having a Blessing of the Animals after the service. You were to go home and get the pets and come back. I guess people did, I wouldn’t dream of putting the cat in the carrier and outting him theough that terror. That is, the terror of the carrier, the car, the people, the other animals. He’d think, ”if this is a blessing I’d rather be damned.” We never did these blessings in my Lutheran upbringing, but observing Saints’ Days wasn’t a thing. We would recognize them during the prayers, but not celebrate the days.

Yesterday, we sang a hymn of the Prayer of St Francis, which while apparently not likely to have been ”his”, does speak to his ways, and even if one does not believe in God, one likely still strives to follow the hopes in most the words.

Make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me bring love.
Where there is offence, let me bring pardon.
Where there is discord, let me bring union.
Where there is error, let me bring truth.
Where there is doubt, let me bring faith.
Where there is despair, let me bring hope.
Where there is darkness, let me bring your light.
Where there is sadness, let me bring joy.
Let me not seek as much
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love,
for it is in giving that one receives,
it is in self-forgetting that one finds,
it is in pardoning that one is pardoned,
it is in dying that one is raised to eternal life.

Jojoco, why can’t I find an image of St Francis with a cardinal, or a Cardinal, on his head?? Come on, surely there is one out there!

We do not celebrate the Feast of St. Francis but I would love to see this ceremony! I will have to look for this next year. I agree with being wary of those who do not like dogs, although I know some are scared of them. Dogs are a good judge of people. Patting the dog, easing up to it is a smart thing. Our pastor also does that with babies on their dedication day. Not that I'm comparing dogs to babies haha!!

Some people bring cats in carriers, some TAKE THEIR CATS OUT OF THE CARRIERS!!! Sorry for shouting, but I can't even deal with that. I have taken photos of my cats to be blessed. My cats say thanks, but they're already sitting at the right hand of God.

Bunny, haha haha, yes!

Bunny, our last priest who didn’t like animals didn’t really like people either. 😎

My kid's Catholic elementary school has a blessing of the animals. Some kids would bring small caged animals for the day but most parents would bring the pets to the outside after-school ceremony. It was not unusual for people to bring their horses! It was always a very sweet day.

This tweet about a judgey cat cracked me up yesterday.

https://twitter.com/buitengebieden/status/1576528492854153217

Dee, that's funny... And spot on.

I haven't been to a blessing of the animals. I do sing in a church choir, and on Sunday most of the hymns were St. Francis related (including a hymn based on the Prayer of St. Francis that bpath referenced and Canticle of the Sun, which Wikipedia says is actually attributable to St. Francis). I'm an atheist but the church is Catholic.

Cawaps, I’m intrigued. You are atheist, but sing in a church choir. I can think of all kinds of reasons for that.

I like singing? A Catholic friend of mine invited to sing with her church choir for Lent and Easter back in 1995, and I never left. She moved away, but I'm still going. We're small (post-pandemic attrition) but mighty. There were only two of us on Sunday, as our only other reliable regular was on vacation.

I feel a need to add a disclaimer when I say I go to a Catholic church because I know that people file away little bits of information about people from their posts (I do, anyway, to the extent that I can keep everyone straight in my head), and the natural assumption would be that I am, well, Catholic.

bpath - that brings back so many memories. Even after all these years I still remember the words and melody to the Peace Prayer of St. Francis. At the end of our school day when the dismissal bell rang one of our Franciscan nuns would use her pitch pipe over the PA system to start the hymn and 250 girls in plaid skirts and navy blazers would sing as we went to our lockers. St. Francis didn't write it but it is a beautiful hymn and one of the few songs in the Catholic liturgy that people can readily sing.

Cawaps, liking to sing was the top of my guesses. There as do many things to enjoy about singing in a group. And some beautiful music has been written for churches. Unless one auditions for a chorale, where else are you going to sing Bach?

Maire_cate, that's a nice way to end the school day.

I sing in my church choir and I love so much of the music, esp singing in Latin.

bpath - It was nice and I'm sure it also helped the hall monitor keep order - as in "single file to the right of the hall." That was definitely a different time - the late 1960's. When the all boys Catholic high school that my brothers attended went co-ed the all-girls high schools closed.

I recall at 2 of the Episcopal churches near us would have a blessing of the animals each year. I dont know if they still do it or not but i think it’s a cool thing to do. We are currently pet-less and never took our labs but our DD took hers a couple of times several years ago.

@deegw, that video is hysterical. (Maybe I'll start playing it when one of my Book Club members opines - it'd be the perfect response.) My dog has an Instagram account and I have wonderful interactions with my core IG friends (dogs, cats, 1 hysterically funny African Parrot). Yesterday the algorithm sent me a cat account. I usually ignore them but I clicked on a video and, whoosh, lost precious daylight laughing at cat videos!

When we lived in the city and DD was a mite, we always brought her pony to be blessed (outside), even though the pony should have been the one giving the blessing.