Jesus Creed
On therapy animals, which we saw on a bus at Logan International airport this week:
A therapy-animal trend grips the United States. The San Francisco airport now deploys a pig to calm frazzled travelers. Universities nationwide bring dogs (and a donkey) onto campus to soothe students during finals. Llamas comfort hospital patients, pooches provide succor at disaster sites and horses are used to treat sex addiction.
And that duck on a plane? It might be an emotional-support animal prescribed by a mental health professional.
The trend, which has accelerated hugely since its initial stirrings a few decades ago, is underpinned by a widespread belief that interaction with animals can reduce distress – whether it happens over brief caresses at the airport or in long-term relationships at home. Certainly, the groups offering up pets think this, as do some mental health professionals. But the popular embrace of pets as furry therapists is kindling growing discomfort among some researchers in the field, who say it has raced far ahead of scientific evidence.
Earlier this year in the Journal of Applied Developmental Science, an introduction to a series of articles on “animal-assisted intervention” said research into its efficacy “remains in its infancy.” A recent literature review by Molly Crossman, a Yale University doctoral candidate who recently wrapped up one study involving an 8-year-old dog named Pardner, cited a “murky body of evidence” that sometimes has shown positive short-term effects, often found no effect and occasionally identified higher rates of distress.
Overall, Crossman wrote, animals seem to be helpful in a “small-to-medium” way, but it’s unclear whether the critters deserve the credit or something else is at play.
“It’s a field that has been sort of carried forward by the convictions of practitioners” who have seen patients’ mental health improve after working with or adopting animals, said James Serpell, director of the Center for the Interaction of Animals and Society at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. “That kind of thing has almost driven the field, and the research is playing catch-up. In other words, people are recognizing that anecdote isn’t enough.”
ROME—It all started with the usual complaints from disgruntled neighbors: funny smells, slamming doors, loud music, the sound of squeaky beds and laughter late into the night. In almost any other situation anywhere in the world, the angry neighbors would have confronted the noisy tenant, maybe left a mean note on the door or complained to the landlord and the matter would be settled.
But this particular dispute occurred in one of the most prestigious addresses in Rome, the so-called Ex Sant’Uffizio Palace, in the very apartment owned by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith where Joseph Ratzinger lived for decades before becoming Pope Benedict XVI. The palatial ochre-colored building is home to dozens of high-ranking cardinals who live within walking distance of their jobs at the Roman Curia in Vatican City next door.
The fed-up neighbors were simply sick of what they described as a “steady stream of young men” who frequented Ratzinger’s former apartment, which had been given to Monsignor Luigi Capozzi, the secretary for Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, who heads the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, which busies itself with deciphering and clarifying various points of canon law. So they called the cops, in this case the Vatican’s elite Swiss Guard gendarmerie unit, when the noise and movida nightlife just got to be too much.
The Vatican police showed up to find an orgy in progress, with an untold number of naked men allegedly writhing around the floor with Capozzi and his cohorts, who were apparently under the influence of hard drugs according to the Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano which broke the story that a host of Italian and international media have since picked up.
Calls to the Swiss Guard turned up neither confirmations nor denials, but Capozzi is no longer at his job, according to the switchboard operator at his boss’ office.
Zachariah Ibrahim dreams of being a pilot. That’s not so unusual for a 13-year-old kid. But not that long ago, Zachariah didn’t have many dreams for the future.
Two young Nigerians helped give him hope again.
Awofeso Adebola, 23, and Ifeoluwa Ayomide, 22, had well-paying jobs in the Nigerian parliament. Then Adebola visited the displaced person camp in Durumi, outside the capital city of Abuja, to donate relief materials. That’s where Zachariah lives. The camp is home to some 2,000 people who’ve fled from the attacks of Boko Haram, which is fighting to carve out an Islamic state in the north of the country.
“They were shooting people and burning down homes,” the bristly-haired teenager says, tears welling up in his eyes. “My family trekked for four days with little food and water.” That was in June 2014.
In the camp, life is better, but there aren’t a lot of services available. It’s hard to get drinking water. And it’s been hard to get an education. The Nigerian government runs the camp but doesn’t give a lot of financial support, so donations from aid groups, individuals and churches help fill the gaps.
The government originally established a school but did not provide teachers, so most of the children stayed away.
That’s what Adebola noticed when he first visited, and what made him return. Soon, Ayomide joined him.
“I was amazed at how much time and effort he was putting in the camp, and I was inspired to support him,” Ayomide says.
Even though they had no training, the two young men decided to start a school.
At first, Adebola and Ayomide juggled their government jobs with teaching, but halfway into the project, they quit completely in order to devote all their time to the school. Right now, they’re living off their savings, support from family and friends and individual donations.
They feel that for the students, their personal sacrifices are worth it.
In my walk toward understanding exactly who I am in Christ, both progressive and conservative friends and family have spent equal time being encouraging and frustrating. Accordingly, here are five suggestions for how you can be a faithful friend to those of us who are same-sex attracted and support a scriptural view of marriage.
1. You don’t have to understand the struggle to be supportive.
One of the most helpful things my best friend told me when I began sorting through my faith and sexuality was, “I don’t understand at all what you’re going through, but I’m here and I love you.” If the discussion of human sexuality is new to you, that’s okay. Don’t try to be an expert who always offers advice. Sometimes we just need a sounding board and faithful prayer warrior. Understand, too, that sexual identity extends beyond our physical nature. “Sexuality isn’t about what we do in bed,” Butterfield says. “Sexuality encompasses a whole range of needs, demands, and desires. Sexuality is more a symptom of our life’s condition than a cause, more a consequence than an origin.”
2. On the flip side, take the time to learn about the struggle—and the person struggling.
Be willing to challenge and possibly discard your stereotypes, judgments, and preconceived notions concerning same-sex attraction. Read works by someone who holds a view of homosexuality that is different from your own and then work through the questions that will inevitably come up. However, being versed in opposing arguments is not the same as being open to all arguments and interpretations. “Accompanying others and listening to their struggles with Christian teaching does not mean being open to all possible conversations,” says Jean C. Lloyd, who gives ideas for how to provide safe places for our same-sex attracted brothers and sisters. “While the world calls you ‘closed-minded,’ to be open to all ideas is actually hubris and folly. Read Psalm 1 and ask: In whose counsel are you walking?”
3. Make sure you aren’t expecting more (or less) from people than Jesus does.
When Jesus said in Matthew 11:28–30, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. … For my yoke is easy and my burden is light,” he was expressing an important paradox—that the law gives freedom. When my more progressive friends attempt to encourage me to “be true to myself” and to express love in the way that “God created me to,” they are not actually freeing me from legalistic bondage as they intend. So if you lean left on this issue, understand that your “blessing” to embrace same-sex attraction actually places a greater burden on us than the one Jesus gives us in our celibate devotion to him. His command to love and obey him is a light and easy burden, and I have found more peace, joy, love, and contentment by keeping all of my relationships rightly ordered than I ever did in seeking to fulfill my own desires in a relationship with another woman.
By contrast, if you are more conservative in your convictions, understand that seasons of struggle with sexual identity are not necessarily a tumble into sin or a lack of faith on our part. Like any other Christian, some seasons of life are simply harder than others, and the burden feels heavier as we learn to press more deeply into Christ. In those moments, you can faithfully fulfill the call of Galatians 6:2 to “carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”
4. Be an advocate for people who are same-sex attracted.
Yes, this applies even to those (like me) who firmly hold to the conviction that same-sex relationships miss the mark of God’s good gift of intimate, committed, exclusive sexual relationships. The best example in Scripture is the account of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery in John 8:2–11. While the Pharisees wanted to debate doctrine, Jesus wanted to minister to the image bearer thrust before him in a most vulnerable state. He was quick to defend her from her attackers and instead challenged them to care for their own hearts first.
However, once the stones had been dropped and the accusers had left, Jesus did not simply send her on her way. He told her to “go and sin no more.” So advocating for people means defending them from attacks of both external and internal forces. Although it’s important to advocate for us by condemning hateful and homophobic comments and actions, advocacy also involves being a mentor, an accountability partner, and a prayer warrior. If you know someone—especially a teen or young adult—who struggles with same-sex attraction, go out of your way to intentionally speak words of life and affirm her in the giftings God has given. Spend time with her in the Word, and also spend time praying for her. Make an investment.
5. Remember that marital love is not the highest form of love.
Friends who have lamented on my behalf the fact that I’ll never “find love” (if I continue to believe same-sex relationships are sinful) have overlooked the love and fulfillment all single Christians can find in the community of the church. No one is guaranteed a marriage relationship, and my natural inclinations make it even less likely that I’ll enjoy a heterosexual marriage. However in Scripture, marriage isn’t described as the highest expression of love—rather it’s the expression of the mystery of Christ and the church. The highest love is agape love, not eros love, and agape is available to all, which means God isn’t withholding the best of himself from single Christians. He offers all of himself and his love to all people.
Furthermore, my understanding of God and the work of the Holy Spirit allows for the reality that a heterosexual marriage relationship is a possibility for me. My choice to faithfully live as a single Christian doesn’t mean that I have a lifelong sentence to solitude. If a godly man comes alongside me on this journey, sees me for who I am in all of my strengths and weaknesses, and desires to serve the Lord with me, I wholeheartedly believe that he who gives us the “desires of our hearts” will shape and mold my heart to embrace that relationship.
And if that doesn’t happen? Then the body of Christ is here, showing love, support, and sacrificial community to me.
Ultimately, God is still good. And he is still enough.
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