I taught Sunday school at my Catholic Church for YEARS. I went to a Jesuit college so I had a pretty liberal view of Catholicism. I taught my students that Jesus was a Jew (which always blew their minds). When I taught the older kids, we discussed how an observant Jew (like Jesus) at that time would have been married by the age of 30 years old. It would have been really strange if he wasn’t. So, yeah, I’m fairly comfortable with the idea that he had a family.
I still have a couple of childhood teddy bears (including one with a patch on its head after a cigarette burn from my grandmother – talk about fodder for therapy!). They came to college with me but are packed away in a memory box. I’m 63…
After my first dog’s death (I was an adult with small kids), I found a book called Cold Noses at the Pearly Gates. It was written by a Christian pastor. It was wonderful and made me feel so much better
My Catholic parish priest told me that Catholics don’t believe that dogs have a soul and therefore can’t go to heaven. I’m like wait, if my version of heaven includes all the dogs I’ve ever loved (and then some), how does Catholic theology fit THAT?! Sadly, it was pretty much the death knell for my church going days…
One of my sons routinely escaped from the stall while we were in there. Ewwww