About 20 years ago, United Methodist laywoman Gayle McKuin Fiser and her pastor, Betsy Singleton Snyder, discovered they had a mutual love of dogs. What’s more, they realized lots of folks at their church had a similar affinity for their pets.
That’s when inspiration struck. As Fiser writes in the introduction to their new book, New Tricks: How Pet Ministry Can Transform Faith Communities and Change Lives:
I was in a meeting at our church. We were sharing about our dogs when our pastor, Betsy, said, “Oh, that reminds me. I’ve been thinking we need to get our dogs trained as therapy dogs to visit people around here.” I raised my hand and said, “I can make that happen!” And just like that, our pet ministry began — sparked by a layperson with a passion for dogs and a pastor who loved animals and shared the vision.
The timing for their new book from Upper Room Books could hardly be better. Every two out of three households in the United States has pets, whether they’re dogs, cats, birds, rodents, fish or reptiles. In virtually every instance, pets aren’t merely pets — they’re family.
The authors think that sense of family offers churches a prime opportunity to reach people and bring compassionate care to them and their animals. At the same time, New Tricks makes a strong case that caring for pets makes humans better people by becoming more attentive to caring for God’s creation.
The authors are well-equipped to bring pet ministry into wider notice by faith communities of any tradition.
Snyder serves as pastor of Pinnacle View United Methodist Church in Little Rock, Ark. She holds a master of divinity degree from UMC-related Perkins School of Theology in Dallas and has served in a wide variety of church settings in Arkansas and Texas. She’s a published author and active in leadership of the Arkansas Annual Conference. She and her husband, Vic Snyder, are the parents of four boys, two dogs and two cats.
Co-authors Betsy Singleton Snyder (left) and Gayle McKuin Fiser.
Co-author Fiser is a former director from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences retired after a 30-year career in health care. She is a commissioned Community of Hope lay chaplain, a certified Stephen Minister and a certified Congregational Care Minister with extra training in death and dying. She has been a pet ministry director since 2007 and has helped several faith groups start their own pet ministries. She and her husband, Paul, live in Little Rock with their two therapy dogs.
Even with their impressive ministerial credentials, it’s their love of animals that infuses both the book and the authors’ conversation.
New Tricks starts with a hefty section on theological reasons for pet ministry, thanks to an editor’s suggestion the authors expand their original concept of a “how-to” book into something with more spiritual depth.
“I love me some theology,” Snyder joked in an interview.
The book taps into today’s expanded concern about the global climate crisis by connecting people and their animals as all part of God’s creation. Furthermore, Snyder said, the biblical injunction that humans have “dominion” over creation has been misinterpreted as having the right to “plunder” the earth. Humans are responsible to care for all God’s creation, an understanding now widely reflected in United Methodist resources such as those from United Women in Faith and the new Social Principles, she said.
Theology wasn’t at the top of their minds when they started the pet ministry almost two decades ago, Fiser added. They simply wanted to get their dogs trained to be therapy dogs to comfort people. A professional trainer offered to teach a class, and so they offered free classes at their church.
Not long after, the authors and their sewing team friends added a pet prayer blanket component to their ministry, creating fleece blankets with a faith logo on them. Once again, the goal was a ministry of care — welcome for a newly adopted pet, comfort for an ailing or dying pet, solace for an owner whose beloved companion had passed away.
“It really makes a difference; we validate their pain,” Snyder said of the pet prayer blankets, which even have been made in large versions for horses.
“Who knew a simple piece of fabric could be so meaningful?” Fiser said. She and Snyder often suggest that a church interested in pet ministry begin with a blanket project.
Other varieties of pet ministry have grown through the years, the authors said. In addition to training therapy dogs, pets have served as greeters for Sunday morning worship and comforters for those attending “longest night” or “blue Christmas” services. Fiser and other therapy dog handlers have been invited to bring their dogs to college campuses during exam weeks to give students a break from test stress by petting animals. There’s also a new ministry called “animal chaplaincy” that “provides support for both animals and humans by using ritual, ceremony and the tools of spiritual companionship,” according to a training website.
Churches additionally have offered foster care for pets when their “parents” go into the hospital. Fear for their pets sometimes has kept people from getting needed medical care, Snyder said.
“During Hurricane Katrina, people wouldn’t go in ambulances because they couldn’t bring their pets,” the pastor said. “Now laws have been changed; with the last hurricane in Florida, there were shelters for people and their pets.”
Fiser said sometimes the most difficult thing about starting a pet ministry is educating people, especially those who fear animals or worry about allergies. In many cases, the animals are kept off to the side to give people a chance to get acquainted gradually, she said.
“Often the first question we get is ‘Are they going to poop in the church?’” Snyder said. “We tell people the dogs get good obedience training.”
Plus, people don’t always understand the different functions pets, especially dogs, can serve, said the pastor. There are therapy dogs who go out visiting, emotional support dogs for anxious people, “facility” dogs like in schools, and service dogs trained to help people with disabling conditions such as blindness or epilepsy.
Snyder said she believes pet ministry gives churches “another theology model” for a community service that people can enjoy together without the political polarization afflicting American society today.
Fiser said the book’s chapter titled “Underdogs,” about caring for elderly or infirm pets or adopting supposedly “unadoptable” animals, “teaches us about society and ourselves.”
“Pets help us be better people and better neighbors,” Fiser said. “We can learn a lot from our pets if we’ll just listen.”