Jean Houston believes dogs can be our spiritual guides and soul companions.

from http://www.beliefnet.com/story/116/story_11649.html

God Spelled Backwards

Jean Houston believes pets are more than just furry friends -- they can be our spiritual guides and soul companions.

Interview by Lisa Schneider

Jean Houston, a renowned scholar, philosopher, and teacher, has worked as a consultant to the United Nations, UNICEF, and other international agencies. She is the best-selling author of "A Mythic Life," "The Possible Human," and "Jump Time." She was a protégée of Margaret Mead and Joseph Campbell, and currently serves as co-director of the Foundation for Mind Research and the founder of the Mystery School -- an institution dedicated to education and the exploration of human potential.

In her latest book, "Mystical Dogs," Dr. Houston explores the ways in which the dogs in her life have guided her on each stage of the mystic path. She spoke with Beliefnet about how we can learn from our animal companions.

You say animals are part of the sacred flow of nature, while humans, on the other hand, are stuck in this "once-removed spirituality." Are dogs spiritually superior to humans?

[laughs] That's a funny question. I wouldn't say anything like that. I would just say that they are closer to nature and thus seem to be on a continuum with the natural flow of things. Obviously humans are much more complex in their spirituality, and in a sense it's almost the difference between the spirituality of a child and the spirituality of a grownup. Because as grownups we have eros, and aesthetic joy, and passion, and complexity, and the shadows of life that inform our brightness. And I think the same thing is true of animals; it's just that I think they serve as wonderful guides because of their simplicity and the naturalness of their being.
You seem to be saying that we go backwards spiritually as we evolve; why do you think that is?

I think it's the humdrum dailyness of everyday, isn't it, the muchness of our lives, a serial monotony; the living for the object, the goal, the thing. And of course, in our time, the too-muchness of it. At least in the West we've put so much of our emphasis on outwardness rather than inwardness and have disturbed the ecology between inner and outer spaces. This is why I think we turn so much to our pets because they remind us of our deeper nature, of what is truly important. And also in a strange way of what we can be. They rest us deeply and give us sudden joys that we have forgotten.

Have you seen the bumper sticker "Lord help me be the person my dog thinks I am"?

[laughs] Yes, I have that. And it's not a bad idea, that we could become what they see - what with their loyalty, their goodness, their constant presence, their availability to us even when we doubt ourselves. Not to [mention] the fact that they take us on our walks and keep us in shape and restore us to nature and the natural flow of things.

I happen to be a dog person, but I have to ask on behalf of cat lovers, what about cats? Can they also serve as spiritual guides?

Cats are very different from dogs, but I think equally evocative of our spiritual depths -- the way they will sit there and look at you and kneed bread on your chest and be so bright and shining. They have a kind of daemonic -- not demonic -- but a daemonic (as in the old Greek) aspect. They, too, are guides but at the same time they are tricksters who play games with us. Just like great saints and monks and people like Don Juan [laughs] are tricksters and fool our expectations and bring us to new ways of being.


Do you think that we can learn from any animal, or any pet -- does that include iguanas and rabbits and birds?

I've never had them for long periods of time so I can't respond to that. People who enter into any kind of bond with any kind of animal certainly talk about this. I've been privileged to know some elephants well in my time. I have been just astonished by not just the dignity of their presence but a kind of essential kindness.

It's not for nothing that we have often given our gods animal visages, animal personalities -- witness Ganesha of India. I've had the good fortune at one time in my life to spend a great deal of time with dolphins, swimming with dolphins. And I've seen extraordinary things. I've seen little blind kids be with the dolphins and the dolphins would come by and put their fins in such a way so that they would take the child for a ride, and this was not trained behavior, this was just instinctual.

One of the most popular features ever on our site was called "Do Pets Go to Heaven?" and it got an amazing response from our members. In an online poll, 86 % said yes, and 14% said no, and a raging debate ensued. So what do you think, do pets go to heaven?

That's why I include in the beginning of the book that wonderful story from the Mahabharata about how the great king goes to the other world and he is refused entrance because he has his dog with him. He says, "I will not enter." And then the man says, "You have passed the test because anybody who would enter without their dog is not worthy." [laughs] And that really is my answer. The gatekeeper said, "Come in, come in, you've been faithful to the end and so has your dog. Your dog is a living example of the dharma, the way of truth. He has been with you always come in, come in." And the great king and his dog entered paradise.

What about people who don't have dogs? Do people with pets have an unfair advantage spiritually?

Well, obviously there are many paths and many ways into the spiritual life. I once discussed this with the Dalai Lama. I work with a small group that meets with him about every year and a half and we discuss and work on world problems. And I had this conversation with him, and I told him about my way with dogs. And he laughed summarily, "Very good way, excellent way! Animals take us to our spiritual depths." I did see an awful lot of cats there at his house, crawling all around. Whether they were his or not I don't know…

I just think that people who have an inkling of the glory of an animal's presence and the beauty and the sympathy -- one is in a state of utter sympathy which really relaxes one to deepen into the largest stages of life.

Are we better off spending our time with animals instead of people?

It was Matthew Fox who said his spiritual advisor was his dog. As I say at the end of my book I really have felt the same, even though I have been blessed with extremely wise and deep and beautiful human teachers. With dogs, my experience is that words and theologies are not that necessary. Because with them you are in the presence, you can pat and caress the most holy [laughs]. You can run and play and dance with spiritual company. And you can also enter into profound silence and they are there with you. They are there as copartner and witness and deep friend of our spiritual journey. That's why since ancient times they've always been the guides through our darkness, guides to our greater journey. And that's why I say at the end of my book, trust your dogs and cats because they know the way to the ordinary extraordinary life in the kingdom.

Eating meat

For those of us who don't feed our companion animals a vegetarian diet we can say this mantra over the food we feed them before we give it to them. Hopefully it'll help everyone involved!

om ahbirakay tsara hung

Recite this seven times over the meat to stop the fault of eating meat and to help the sentient beings whose flesh it was to be reborn in a happy realm.

What Christians and Buddhists should think and do about killing/liberating/saving sentient beings who aren't human

So another aim of this blog is to disseminate information that I've found elsewhere/log the crap that I've found so that I don't lose it. My mind is going - figuratively and literally, so I need to put this somewhere.

This is from "Meditate to Liberate - Buddhism and Animal Liberation" - it's a British organization, and the stuff they say is pretty good.

Their section on religion and animals is good because it covers some really basic ideas about God & Buddha very simply:

(Buddhist Idea)Duty to help animals
The bodhisattva vows chanted by many Mahayana Buddhists include the following: "Innumerable are sentient beings: we vow to save them all."
Therefore, just as it is wrong to kill or otherwise bring suffering upon a human being, it is also wrong to kill or bring suffering upon an animal. Furthermore, we cannot stand by when suffering is being inflicted: "Disciples of the Buddha, you should willingly and with compassion carry out the work of setting sentient beings free… Should you see a worldly person intent on killing an animal, attempt by appropriate means to rescue or protect it and to free it from its misery." (Brahmajala Sutra)

(Christian idea) A Gospel for Every Creature - Professor Andrew Linzey
I have been an advocate for the cause of animals for over twenty-five years. At first I did not believe that cruelty to animals, however important in itself, could ever become a big issue for Christians. An important but secondary matter, I once thought. Not now. In terms of pain, suffering and death, what we do to millions of animals constitutes, I believe, one of the major moral issues of all time.
Moreover, I now see that it goes to the heart of the gospel that Christians profess. This is a gospel of the invincible, unconquerable love of God - not just for human beings but for all creatures. The God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob, and especially of Jesus, loves all creatures. Christians have to find a new heart - a big enough heart to be open to two great gospel truths.

The first is that animals are God's creatures: not human property, nor utilities, nor resources, nor commodities, but precious beings in God's sight. The second is the Christ-like suffering of animals. "Think then, my brethren", preached John Henry Newman at Oxford in 1842, "of your feelings at cruelty practised on brute animals, and you will gain one sort of feeling which the history of Christ's Cross and Passion ought to excite within you." Christians whose eyes are fixed on the awfulness of crucifixion are in a special position to understand the awfulness of innocent suffering. The Cross of Christ is God's absolute identification with the weak, the powerless and the vulnerable, but most of all with unprotected, undefended, innocent suffering.

I have spoken of how sensitivity to suffering should be a matter of obedience to the gospel. But, in truth, it is among Christians today that one will find the greatest betrayal of this gospel. In Spain not one Roman Catholic authority can be found which opposes bull-fighting. In Canada, Anglican and Roman Catholic bishops support seal hunting and fur trapping. In Norway clergy defend whaling. In Ireland, Roman Catholic priests go hare coursing. And in England the General Synod of the Church of England will not oppose hunting for sport on church-owned land. This betrayal has a long and unflattering history. From the ninth to the nineteenth century, thousands of animals were subject to criminal prosecution and sentenced to capital punishment by ecclesiastical courts, resulting in barbarous cruelty. As late as the middle of the nineteenth century, Pope Pius IX forbade the opening of an animal protection office in Rome on the grounds that animals have no intrinsic worth, and the idea that what we do to them need not be governed by fundamental moral considerations has become standard theology in Catholic countries.

A God who remains passionless in the face of innocent suffering simply cannot be the Christian God. No theology which desensitises us to suffering can be truly Christian theology.

It cannot be stressed enough that the picture of God exclusively concerned with human salvation and indifferent to the suffering of the non-human creation has become a source of moral despair. If Christians today care so little for animals, it is because the God they seem to believe in cares even less. For myself, I believe that if God is good and just and holy, it must follow that there will be redemption for each and every creature that suffers. Nothing less than that would make God a truly just God.

That's just super.

Refuge Ceremony For Dogs

Annie was a little poodle I brought home Christmas day 2003 

Annie was dumped in a parking lot the Saturday before Christmas. It turned out she had a brain tumour and there was nothing I could do to save her and she was dying. It was one of the worst experiences of my life - I couldn't help but get seriously attached to her. But before she died I gave her refuge and called her "Prajna".

I can't remember now where I adapted it from, so if you recognize it, please let me know... but I think it's from somewhere that had something about ceremonies for liberating animals.

I sat Annie in front of me on my zabuton in front of my lit shrine and chanted the whole thing aloud - I wrote it in the context that she was in the process of dying (she died the next day) but it can be changed so that it can be given at any point in a dogs life I'd imagine.

At the end is my particular sect's Homage that is said at the end of all ceremonies - I love it.

Refuge Ceremony for Dogs

Homage to the Lord of Great Graciousness and Teaching, the Great Master Shakyamuni Buddha, Who from His great benevolence and great compassion has pity for all sentient beings.

Looking up in respect to the Lord of Great Graciousness and Teaching, Great Master Shakyamuni Buddha, I pray that his realization of the light of benevolence and compassion may guard and protect, care for and keep us. You are going to die soon, so in accordance with the Universal and Far-reaching Scriptures of Mahayana, I confer upon you the Three Refuges. It should proclaim the twelve links in the chain of dependent origination but, because as an animal you’ve been ignorant and unenlightened and, due to your creation of heavy karma, have received its retribution, your six senses are dull and deluded and have been unable to comprehend the profound Teachings of these Universal and Far-reaching Scriptures. I respectfully ask that the wondrous spiritual powers, awesome virtues, and profound unseen aid of the Three Treasures through Their compassion and pity open up the heart and liberate the mind of your wonderful sentient being so that you will be able to respond swiftly to the profoundly marvellous Dharma and thereby alter your karmic retribution and receive a rebirth that will help attain speedy liberation.

Explain the Three Refuges as follows:
O you sentient being, from beginningless time you have failed to hear of the Three Treasures and have not understood how to take refuge. For that reason you turn upon samsara's wheel of transmigration as it spins out existences in the three realms of sense desire, form, and beyond form. You have now fallen into the body of an animal which your past lives have earned you. For your sake we have now informed the Three Treasures of your piteous state and pray that you endeavour to protect Them and keep yourself ever mindful of Them. Open up the hearts of your companions and free their minds.

I will now bestow upon you the extremely profound and wondrous Dharma of the One Body which is the Three Treasures. The Three Treasures are called Buddha which signifies `realization', Dharma which signifies `the Teaching' and Sangha which signifies `the harmony of those united in their spiritual one-mindedness'. These Three are the One; this One is the Three. They do not form a hierarchy nor are They equally ranked nor are They lined up in a sequence nor are They separate and distinct from each other. We call That which goes beyond the grasp of the discriminatory mind the Treasure House of Profound Wisdom. Whatever in the world and in that which transcends the world is supreme and most valued is called a treasure. When Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha are considered to be Treasures, all things will never fail to take refuge in Them. This is why we call Them the Three Treasures. Although the underlying Principle may extend far and wide, nevertheless when It is your pure Original Nature, It returns and is never far from you. You should have the deepest faith and trust in this Principle and take refuge in It. Homage to those who take refuge in the Buddha.

Next, give the Three Refuges, repeating them three times:

I take refuge in the Buddha,
I take refuge in the Dharma,
I take refuge in the Sangha.



Then continue as follows:
From now henceforth, call upon the Buddha and make Him your teacher; do not take refuge in the pathways of Mara. Thus we pray

Offer incense and then recite the following:

And because you are now a Buddhist dog, your new name is –

You who are a sentient being related to land, because your hindrances from beginningless karma are very grave, be mindful that you have fallen into an animal existence. Accordingly, for your own sake, turn now and be face to face with the Three Treasures, lay bare all your mistakes and, with an imploring heart, repent your mistakes. I pray that the karma from your defilements will be eradicated in an instant so that you can then be reborn in a heaven where, being close to a Buddha, you may receive your prediction of Buddhahood. As someone of land now and in the past, repent your mistakes with utmost heart and mind. Since beginningless time you have not awakened to your Original Nature and have turned upon the wheel of birth and death within various states of existence. Now, having encountered these teachings of the Mahayana Dharma, we pray that you will now repent your defilements, however boundless and heavy they are, as though you saw what the Buddha, the World-honoured One, sees and as though you knew what He knows. We pray that you bring your defilements to an end. We pray that you bring your defilements to an end.

Next, recite the following concluding prayer :
From the beginning there is neither birth nor death. Because of the accumulation of bad karma you received the body of an animal; Discard this karmic body quickly and enter the world of purity. Desire the pure crown of Enlightenment and realize the mind of a Buddha quickly. At this ceremony we have heard this Dharma once again. As your heart awakens to the Unborn, you, equally and without the slightest difference, will personally receive the Buddha's prediction of Buddhahood just as the Blazing Lord of Awesome Virtue did. I earnestly wish this as I ordain you, the disciple [name of the animal].

By this merit may all attain omniscience
May it defeat the enemy, wrongdoing
from the stormy waves of birth old age sickness and death,
From the ocean of samsara, may I free all beings.
By the confidence of the golden sun of the great east,
May the lotus garden of the Rigden’s wisdom bloom.
May the dark ignorance of sentient beings be dispelled.
May all beings enjoy profound brilliant glory.

Beginnings and Stupas in Dog Parks

Well I figure I better shit or get off the pot with this thing. My idea is that our canine life companions - or at least my dogs - are part of every aspect of my life - and my spiritual life has also worked its way into every corner of my being.

I can't be the only person in the universe who's like that - so I wanted to make a space where information and ideas could be accumulated about how to help us and help our dogs.

It all started because I was looking for information on a "Buddhist funeral for animals" and I couldn't find anything anywhere - just snippets of things. It was tantalizing - there was one out there but I couldn't find the whole thing. It was like some terma that I wasn't ready for or something. I still haven't found it. But I've found a ton of other stuff. Which I'm going to post here.

I've also got a bunch of ideas - like dog parks that have stupas in the middle of them - the major dog park in my city is basically just a field that has a path that is a circle that people walk around - what if you put a stupa in the middle of it? So you could circumnabulate it? Acculumulate good karma while exercising your dogs at the same time?

Okay - I've got to go feed the dogs now...