Will my dog be in Heaven?

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I know the Syriac tradition talks about the deification of the entire cosmos…
 
NO; animals cannot be in heaven or for that matter hell either.

In all of the Created Universe only humanity emulates God {Gen 1:26-27]

Man alone is gifted with the necessary attributes to be RATIONAL

Both heaven and hell are determined my our Life-choices. Animals are not Rational

GBY
 
Kennedy said:
Do you think there will be animals in heaven?
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Yes, or we will not be, either. A soul is either mortal or immortal, and we have been assured that it is immortal. I don’t buy, for one minute, this stuff about “natural” souls. Of course animals will be in heaven. We will achieve perfect happiness when we are admitted to the Beatific Vision, but we are going to do more than sir around adoring God all day (no disrespect to God meant).
 
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Isn’t there some ruling in Canon Law about dogs going to heaven but not cats?
 
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Maybe this has something to do with it!

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ConstantLearner said:
Yes, or we will not be, either. A soul is either mortal or immortal, and we have been assured that it is immortal. I don’t buy, for one minute, this stuff about “natural” souls. Of course animals will be in heaven. We will achieve perfect happiness when we are admitted to the Beatific Vision, but we are going to do more than sir around adoring God all day (no disrespect to God meant).
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That contradicts the Church teaching that only humans have been redeemed and have immortal souls.
Animals souls cease to exist when they die. They do not go to Heaven when they die.
 
thistle said:
Animals souls cease to exist when they die. They do not go to Heaven when they die.
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Then human souls cease to exist, too. When Church teaching contradicts physics, chemistry, and medicine, I part ways with the Church.
 
Tldr.

For a long time many theologians have said that no there are not animals in heaven…

But.

I was riding the bus a while back over a year ago and there was a news stream of the pope saying that animals can go to heaven.

This also seems to be supported by more poetic parts of scripture even if it is mostly seen as a metaphor for the peace of Christ’s kingdom.
 
If “Heaven” specifically means “Beatific Vision” then no. Animals don’t experience the Beatific Vision, as a state of supernatural happiness where their soul experiences the reciprocating love of God through the consent of their free will. There aren’t eternal consequences for their actions in the way there are for humanity & angels.

I think animals, plants, and inanimate objects will all exist in some restored fashion, otherwise they wouldn’t have been created at all, and their existence will all praise & reflect the glory of God in some way or another, each representing a different facet of His infinite and incomprehensible majesty.

[If animals had rational souls and could experience the Beatific Vision like people, then keeping them as “pets”, parading them down the street in shows, locking them up in the yard/house, buying/selling them, destroying their habitat to build human buildings and infrastructure, using them as livestock, and eating animals would in all of the above cases be mortally sinful and a crime against their infinite dignity as persons. They aren’t metaphysically a “person” in the way an angel, demon, or human being is a person.]
 
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I would rather trust the word of the wolf of gubbio than many traditional speculations on this… Also I don’t think any of this speculation either way has been defined as dogma… but I’ll side with the pope as a more desirable end.
 
PaladinSword said:
I was riding the bus a while back over a year ago and there was a news stream of the pope saying that animals can go to heaven.
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Three popes (Paul VI who is almost a saint, JPII who is a saint, and Francis) have said or implied they go to heaven.

Two recent popes (Pius IX, who is a beati, and Benedict by some reports) have said they don’t go to heaven. Some journalists put Benedict on the other side because he did express love for animals and said they should be respected as part of God’s creation.

I think this is one of those questions where we’ll just have to find out the answer from God after death. The only certain thing about all this is that animals are not capable of sinning and therefore didn’t/ don’t need redemption and wouldn’t be able to go to hell or purgatory. Where they go instead is up to God.
 
PaladinSword said:
I would rather trust the word of the wolf of gubbio than many traditional speculations on this… Also I don’t think any of this speculation either way has been defined as dogma… but I’ll side with the pope as a more desirable end.
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I am 100.00% positive if you asked any of the Popes if animals will experience the Beatific Vision as a person, then the answer would be “no”, as that question is a fairly simple one.

But I’m likewise of the view that all of Creation will exist in a restored manner in some way.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07170a.htm#III

^ It isn’t light reading, but this article discusses the topic of “Heaven”. If you scroll roughly halfway down, the subsection “Supernatural character of heaven and the beatific vision” is the most relevant. The Beatific Vision is a supernatural state of communion with the Holy Trinity, where the blessed see God face to face, visione intuitivâ et etiam faciali, and by default, this requires a soul with the supernaturally imbued faculty to freely accept or reject it .

Peace.
 
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ConstantLearner said:
When Church teaching contradicts physics, chemistry, and medicine, I part ways with the Church.
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I don’t believe you really mean that. The Virgin Birth of Christ and the Eucharist contradicts physics, chemistry, and medicine, among other things.
 
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ConstantLearner said:
Then human souls cease to exist, too. When Church teaching contradicts physics, chemistry, and medicine, I part ways with the Church.
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Well at least we now know you must be an atheist. God and the Resurrection contradict these things!!
 
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