Do all dogs go to heaven? New books seem to think so

WASHINGTON (RNS)—About 170 million cats and dogs in the United States have found a place in the homes of American pet owners, according to the 2009-2010 National Pet Owners Survey. Probably most of them also have found a place in their owners’ hearts. And many whose pets have died have wondered if their beloved animal companions will be waiting for them in heaven.

Three recent books try to answer the question, and they affirm a special relationship between humans and animals—one that does not end with death.

Author Ptolemy Tompkins tracks the history of the relationship between humans and animals in The Divine Life of Animals. Tompkins looks to the ancient past for the best models of animal-human interaction.

“Pre-modern cultures … were apparently able to see animals as undying spirits dressed, for the moment, in mortal bodies,” he writes. The idea is to recover that “new-yet-old vision” that “will allow us to see (animals) as the genuine soul-beings they are and always have been.”

The Bible isn’t much help in answering the question of whether animals go to heaven, says Laura Hobgood-Oster, professor of religion at Southwestern University in Georgetown. But she maintains the question of animal souls was not always an issue for Christian theology, Hobgood-Oster asserts in her upcoming book, The Friends We Keep.

“It seems that the question of animals and the soul was much more plausible … in Christian history up almost until the Enlightenment or up into the Reformation,” she said in an interview. Hobgood-Oster doesn’t accept the idea that only humans can possess a soul.

“In the last 20 or 30 years, I believe we’ve seen these questions raised anew,” she said—questions that challenge “the traditional theology about humans being the only ones who matter, or humans as the only ones with souls.”

And if humans aren’t the only ones with souls, they’re probably not the only ones in heaven, she said. “There does not seem to be any indication (in Scripture) … that there is a special human exclusion” in heaven, Hobgood-Oster said.

Reluctance to the idea of animals in heaven persists in some Christian circles. Last year, Franciscan Friar Jack Wintz published the book, Will I See My Dog in Heaven? This year, he answered his own question with a new book, I Will See You in Heaven.

Taking inspiration from St. Francis of Assisi, Wintz presents biblical evidence for the inclusion of animals in heaven. In the book of Genesis, he writes, both humans and animals live in peaceful harmony—“a wonderful and insightful glimpse of the paradise that is to come,” Wintz writes.

“It makes sense to me, therefore, that the same loving Creator who arranged for these animals … to enjoy happiness in the original Garden would not want to exclude them from the final paradise,” he writes.

He also found inspiration from the New Testament, insisting, “The gospel message will have a saving impact upon the whole family of creation, and not simply on the human family.”