Will my dog be in Heaven?

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Does she have an official teaching on your opinion of what her official teaching is?

And since I said ‘maybe’

You are probably right…

Maybe.
 
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Arkansan said:
FWIW most of the arguments against limbo are also emotionally driven.
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My feelings about limbo aren’t emotionally driven. For me, it was just the first example of the Catholic Church doing a 180 on something that isn’t dogma. And I don’t blame them for that. Advances in psychology, philosophy, chemistry, physics, medicine, etc. all shed new light on the Church’s teachings. If it’s not dogma, the Church can take advantage of new information.
 
CD45 said:
I’ve been on the board of our local animal shelter for about the last 13 years. For all that time and probably more before then, our most popular selling t-shirts and sweatshirts are the ones that have the Will Rodgers saying on the back, “If dogs don’t go to heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.” For those of you who have just lost a four legged friend, you might find the poem “Rainbow Bridge” to be comforting. It is not Catholic Church teaching, but it can be very healing when you have lost a family pet.
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If I have a choice, I’d go where Will Rogers and the dogs and cats are. People are far to petty and mean, for the most part. Not all of them, of course.
 
thistle said:
The Church has no teaching or position on aliens!
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I think it should. People believe in them in increasingly large numbers. A lot of people are turning away from the traditional Christian God and toward a super-intellectual alien creator. (I’m not, just so no one accuses me of being an atheist again.)
 
ConstantLearner said:
My feelings about limbo aren’t emotionally driven. For me, it was just the first example of the Catholic Church doing a 180 on something that isn’t dogma. And I don’t blame them for that. Advances in psychology, philosophy, chemistry, physics, medicine, etc. all shed new light on the Church’s teachings. If it’s not dogma, the Church can take advantage of new information.
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If you are talking about Limbo for Infants there has been ZERO change. It has never been a Church teaching and it still is not a Church teaching. It was only ever a theological hypothesis which Catholics were and are allowed to believe in or not.
 
The Christian faith only addresses the relationship of man and God. Whether pets go to heaven has no bearing on human salvation, therefore the church cannot definitely rule on the matter.

However, it would not contradict the faith to believe a pet can go to heaven.
 
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thistle said:
If you are talking about Limbo for Infants there has been ZERO change. It has never been a Church teaching and it still is not a Church teaching. It was only ever a theological hypothesis which Catholics were and are allowed to believe in or not.
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It was taught in my grandmother’s and mother’s church and school. And by priests!
 
thistle said:
If you are talking about Limbo for Infants there has been ZERO change. It has never been a Church teaching and it still is not a Church teaching. It was only ever a theological hypothesis which Catholics were and are allowed to believe in or not.
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The Vatican is under the impression that Limbo for unbaptized infants was definitely a teaching:

“It is clear that the traditional teaching on this topic has concentrated on the theory of limbo, understood as a state which includes the souls of infants who die subject to original sin and without baptism, and who, therefore, neither merit the beatific vision, nor yet are subjected to any punishment, because they are not guilty of any personal sin.”

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/c...aith_doc_20070419_un-baptised-infants_en.html

It’s never been dogma, as I stated.
 
ConstantLearner said:
With all due respect, a priest told my grandmother the same thing, in almost the same words (as my grandmother related it to me) about limbo. An unbaptized baby in the town where she lived had died, and it was not allowed to be buried in consecrated ground, which distressed my grandmother greatly even though she was not related to the child. A priest told her she was being overly-emotional, and the question was settled: all unbaptized babies go to limbo. The Church has now reversed itself on this thinking.
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With “all due respect” right back to you: limbo was never a formal teaching of the Church.

Your comparison falls flat on its face.

Your emotional story does nothing to change the Incarnation, which is dogma.
 
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ErJ said:
No one knows that. But I believe God takes care of his all creations. Maybe there is a different place for animals, angels etc.
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You cannot say that “no one knows” it, when the Church does know it.
 
FrDavid96 said:
You cannot say that “no one knows” it, when the Church does know it.
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The Church doesn’t know. We will ALL know…someday. If only humans are part of the New Creation, it’s going to be a pretty sterile one. I can’t see that coming from Christ. I believe, and always will, that when that day arrives the earth will be filled with birdsong, cows and horses grazing peacefully in flower-filled fields, the lion lying beside the lamb, and every pet every one of us has known at our side, happy and healthy, just as we are.

I’m not going to change that belief.
 
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ConstantLearner said:
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FrDavid96:
You cannot say that “no one knows” it, when the Church does know it.
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The Church doesn’t know.
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Same answer: just because you don’t know it, that does not change the fact that the Church does know it.
 
Some mystics have compared the spiritual life or the ultimate destination to a garden or being a flower in that garden or various things… we cannot say for sure what it will be like… but there are certain things that are part of what is considered to be divine revelation. One of those is that the incarnation and the resurrection of Christ are integral in the way we are saved and go to heaven and that it is something primarily for humans because that is how we get there by being his body that is what the priest here I think is stressing. I could be wrong. Now people like Blackfriar have made an interesting point on how we are the image of God in the world and how we live affects nature including animals… who’s to say. Thistle and I really butt heads but we probably agree with each other on what is considered dogma I would rather just wonder than assume that just because something isn’t explicitly taught it isn’t possible…

I am of the position that sure… Christianity is the true religion…
But no one has a monopoly on God or what he decides to do or how he chooses to reveal himself.

And yeah I do agree with some of what you are saying because it is in the bible.
 
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Pets cannot gain salvation or lose salvation.

Pets are not morally culpable for any of their actions. Animals are all instinct.

They have mortal souls. So they cannot attain salvation. How can they? Otherwise they’d be capable of sinning.
 
Ok then you don’t know animals…

Usually when a domestic animal is behaving badly and acting guilty they know… and honestly it is usually the human’s fault… Not theirs…

so who is going to heaven now?
 
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They aren’t culpable though.

Cats sometimes will eat their litter.

Do those cats go to hell? Do they need confession?
 
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