Do Dogs go to Heaven?

A Pet’s Death Opens A Wider View of Salvation

Bruce Myers

My dog died.

He was a seven-year-old, somewhat goofy, charmingly disobedient, painfully cute Bernese mountain dog named Calvin, in recognition of the fact he was an ordination gift from my two best friends in seminary, now both Presbyterian clergymen.

A 10-week-old puppy when we were united, Calvin became almost better known in my first parish than I was, enchanting young and old with equal, slobbery alacrity. When I moved abroad for a year of graduate studies, he moved to the family farm and became as much my mother’s dog as mine. When I returned to Canada and moved to Quebec City, he effortlessly learned to be a canis urbanis. As a single person, Calvin was an especially important part of my life. He was, as the canine stereotype goes, my faithful companion.

Living with Catholics

Ashley Cole

The word Catholic is often a word I associate with violence, patriarchy, and old men preaching irrelevant points. I did not grow up in the Catholic Church or even a Christian home, so I am not speaking from years of experience on the ‘inside’; I am however currently situated in a work environment that is a Christian run agency and refugee resettlement office. Although Romero House is open to people of all faiths and is inspired by Christian principles, its internship program and other spiritual activities are heavily influenced by the fact that the Romero House founder and many board members are Catholic (of which there is a nun, a former nun, and a Jesuit priest). On the train ride from Winnipeg to Toronto, I remember reflecting on how I was more afraid to meet the Catholics than I was to meet the refugees; what I have come to know in my time at Romero House, however, is that it  is in the living that faith becomes fact. I don’t work for a church, I work for a refugee office so there are some basic distinctions, but I have come to appreciate the underlying framework of Catholicism that shapes the work we do here. I believe that Romero House has opened itself to the idea that catholic means universal. In order to illustrate, I would like to spend some time reflecting on a few examples of how I have come to know this in my experience.