St. Francis of Assisi: Patron Saint of Animals

This Saturday is the feast of St. Francis of Assisi.

As many know, this is a tradition in the Catholic church. Many churches throughout the U.S. will hold a ceremony honoring our beloved pets on Saturday. All animals are invited, but mostly people bring their cats and dogs to their local church for the blessing. St. Francis was a Roman Catholic friar - but that does not mean you have to be of that faith to participate. Maybe you'd like to take your puppy or kitty to be blessed. The churches will welcome you - no matter your faith.

I was reminded of this via a Twitter post with Johann the Dog. On his Squidoo page, he tells the story of how the feast of St. Francis came to be,

"A legend tells that in the city of Gubbio, where Francis lived for some time, there was a wolf "terrifying and ferocious," who devoured men as well as animals.

Francis had compassion upon the townsfolk, and went up into the hills to find the wolf. Soon, fear of the animal had caused all his companions to flee, but the Saint pressed on and when he found the wolf he made the sign of the cross and commanded the wolf to come to him and to hurt no one. Miraculously the wolf closed his jaws and lay down at the feet of St. Francis.

"Brother Wolf, you do much harm in these parts and you have done great evil," said Francis. "All these people accuse you and curse you; but brother wolf, I would like to make peace between you and the people." Then Francis led the wolf into the town, and surrounded by startled citizens he made a pact between them and the wolf.

Because the wolf had done evil out of hunger, the townsfolk were to feed the wolf regularly, and in return, the wolf would no longer prey upon them or their flocks. In this manner Gubbio was freed from the menace of the predator. Francis, ever the lover of animals, even made a pact on behalf of the town dogs, that they would not bother the wolf again.

This is just one tale of the good deeds of St. Francis of Assisi. A friend of animals, the environment and the natural world!" [Taken from Wikipedia ]

Comments

[Lindsay]

When I was a kid, my family's church had a blessing of the animals day and I brought my golden retriever. I'm not religious, but at the time, it was cool to bring my dog to this event. There's no reason why dogs shouldn't be "blessed" too. All dogs go to heaven, right?