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Fog/Mist Babies or bulldogs: What’s a couple to do?
I hate to even appear to disagree with the pope, but not everyone wants to have children these days.
Early last month, according to America magazine, a Jesuit publication, Pope Francis made a casual comment about people wanting to have pets rather than children. Boom! He unleashed a dogfight in the public square.
The press went wild. The New York Times said, “Pope Scolds Couples Who Choose Pets Over Kids.” CNN blared, “Opting for pets over children is selfish and ‘takes away our humanity,’ says Pope Francis.”
According to the Jesuit review, the press sensationalized the pope’s remarks that day. It assured readers that he appreciates the grace of loving a pet, but like most religious leaders, he encourages people to be fruitful and multiply.
The puppy issue is a kind of red herring, pardon the cross-species metaphor. There’s the decision whether to have kids, and there’s the cultural sideshow of replacing babies with puppies.
The other factor playing out in our society is the humanizing of our pets. It seems to follow that if you decide not to have kids but want an outlet for your nurturing genes, a dog is a great idea. But it gets crazy, with dog strollers and individualized diets and dogs welcomed at restaurants and shops and on airplanes.
Young dog owners devote the same time and attention to their animals that, in another time and place, they might have dedicated to children. Thus the papal comment on pets.
With the new dogs-as-kids paradigm, many 20- and 30-somethings travel with their pets, staying at a growing selection of dog-friendly properties. The W Hotel in New York, like other high-end places, isn’t just pet-friendly, but downright pet-obsessed. Bring Luke the Lab to the W and he’ll get his own bed, food, water bowl, leash, birthday cake and poop bags.
I don’t have to enumerate the ways in which kids are way more trouble than dogs, do I? From teething to toilet training to teaching them to walk and talk, to braces and curfews and weed and sex: What a bother. This is not to mention tutors and religious school and the preteen years, followed by the teen years, followed by the pre-adult years, which last until age 45 or so.
I speak from long experience.
My dog always listens when I talk. She has never caused me a sleepless night. When I give her a haircut, she doesn’t slam the door and say she hates her life. When I give her chicken for the 60th time, it’s all good.
My kids are 47 and 50. My dog is 4. As I curl into my chair at night, who’s right there, snuggled into my lap? Not my kids, for sure. My girl Lillybee never considers “moving on.” She has spurned numerous suitors, threatening to bite any hound that comes too close. The Virgin Queen, as we fondly refer to her, has made us her life’s work. Her devotion is undiluted by conflicting loyalties or hobbies or obsessions with travel or exercise. Can’t say the same for the kids.
In the puppy-vs.-tiny human debate, in this time and place of pandemic and peril, going with a pet seems reasonable for all the reasons I mention. But the pope takes a longer and broader view, and at the end of the day, which may come at any moment, he’s right. The future of humanity doesn’t depend so much on a new litter as on a new generation. And according to the Jesuit magazine, it’s part of the pope’s job description to urge his flock to have more babies.
The magazine suggests, “There is more to the Pope’s comments than what you read in the headline. It was an offhand comment (about pets), but it also reflects something he believes. And whether you like it or not, the church is probably always going to have an opinion about your personal life and your family. It’s kind of how we do things. And it’s O.K. to wrestle with that and engage with that. That’s all part of the fun.”
Between the lines are the epic debates of our time. Still, I appreciate the magazine’s nonconfrontational approach to one of life’s most consequential decisions.
Copyright 2022 Randi Kreiss. Randi can be reached at randik3@aol.com.
