Let's All Be Dogs: A Random Thought Either Inspired by the Holy Spirit or Pulled From My 10-Year-Old Subconscious After Reading an Article or Something

This is my dog.

(Here's a brief pause so you all can say "AWWWWWWW!!!" - and yes, I expect you ALL to do pledge your allegiance to Cooper)

Maybe you have a dog. Maybe you don't. But I'm pretty sure you know what a dog is, so I'll spare you the biology. 

What I'm trying to say, albeit very poorly, is that we can all take several lessons from dogs (maybe from cats too, or parrots, or iguanas, or, G'D forbid, tarantulas...I wouldn't really know, I've only ever owned a dog). Spiritual lessons, I mean. 

Let me *try* to explain this a little better than I've started to...

1. Cooper follows me everywhere. I'm not even kidding...I could walk off a cliff and he would just jump right off with me. He's got a tiny brain.
2. Cooper is totally and completely dependent upon me for EVERYTHING. Cooper does not have opposable thumbs...so he can't open the food bin and pour it into his bowl in an orderly fashion. He can stick his head in there if he's being naughty, but if he keeps eating he'll just get fat and die. 
3. Cooper trusts that what I'll do is right for him. Cooper never wonders whether I've drugged his dog food. When I take him for a walk, he never thinks I'm taking him to the pound. He has this deep trust that I'll give him the right food, or bring him right back...again, he's totally dependent on me. 
4. Cooper finds peace in the moment. He doesn't worry. He doesn't freak out when our schedule gets messed up. He just keeps trusting me, and then he completes every activity with that big, slobbery puppy smile...

In a sense, Jesus calls us to be like Cooper in our spiritual lives. He calls us to follow Him in all things by following His teachings, to completely depend on Him for our spiritual needs, to trust Him even when the path ahead is different from the one usually travelled, and to find peace in our relationship with Him and put on a smile as we journey down the road to Heaven, hand-in-hand with Him, even when we have no clue what's going on (and wow, that's a long sentence!). 

So pay attention to your dogs, your cats, your *shudder* tarantulas, and observe them as they, in a SENSE, live the way we are called to. Think about the trust you are called to have in G'D, the daily surrenders you are supposed to make to Him in all your actions, and bring yourself to depend on Him more fully in these final days of Lent...

And if you happen to own a tarantula, please stand up and call a priest IMMEDIATELY. You should not be able to have a freakish wild beast like that living in your home. That can't be moral. So please make the right decisions and don't release them into the jungles (?) of Florida or they'll breed like crazy and then we'll have another problem like the snakes. Thank you and have a wonderful holy week.