>When Maggie died, (our awesome hospice ferret), I regressed to tribal
>ritual, and hacked off part of my hair to go with her on her path to
>the Rainbow Bridge.
 
I think this is such a wonderful sharing of spirit.  Thank you for
sharing your actions with us.
 
> Do I practice traditional Native religion...nope, I'm mostly a taoist!
> I follow my own path, and my heart.  I try very hard to harm no one in
> action, or word, try to help all that I can have a better life.
 
Most religions call for their followers to do the same.  That is was is
really sad about all of this, that folks seem to be so insecure in their
own paths that they must denigrate someone else's.
 
> I can see where a devout Christian might be scared, or angered by the
> Rainbow bridge.I am sorry that these hurt you.
 
I must admit, I don't see understand this.  Everything is made by God and
even in the bible we are called to look over animals (saying we in the
generic sense, not personal).  And Catholics have special blessings for
animals due to St. Francis.
 
I think folks get so caught up in labels they can't see the truth behind
them.  When I was in high school, I had a great English teacher who had
one failing, her husband was a Baptist minister.  I took protest lit
under her, and one day we started talking about Islam.  She said they
didn't believe in God, they believed in Allah.  We got into a rather
heated debate over it, because she just couldn't take in the fact that
Allah was another name for God.  It didn't matter that they believe in
the god of Abraham, it just mattered that they didn't use the word God.
 
I was raised believing that my family would await me in Heaven and greet
me.  To me the Rainbow Bridge is just another way of saying that.  And if
animals are important enough for the bible to call us into looking after
them, if they were important enough to be on Noah's Ark, then why are
they not important enough to be in Heaven.
 
As for concerns about Satanism, well folks, I have known some Satanists.
We have not been exposed to that type of stuff here at all, in any
manner.  Earth based religions such as Wicca etc DO NOT worship Satan.
This is not the place to go into depth about any of this.
 
The bottom line is that you elect to get this forum.  Bill decides what
goes in.  I know from many heated discussions with him that he tries very
very hard to be fair.  Your job as a consumer is to get past what you
don't like, scroll through it just like you would change a tv channel.
And if you can't do that, opt out of here.  Sometimes if you take a break
from it, you can come back with a better frame of mind.
 
After all, the goal of us all is to pay respect to our companions, with
proper care and love, and even to give respect to them in the manner we
let go of them.  Because it is ultimately about the ferrets, if the
practice doesn't actively HURT them, then pay your respect by not
attacking others for their respect.
 
Blessings,
Margie
 
I wouldn't want to do Bill's job here at all.  I know how much grief he
has had over some situations (from me and regarding me) and I also know
that is just a drop in the bucket.  I just can't decide he is rides a
caffeine high all the time to deal or if he gets a discount on gross
quantities of tranquilizers. ;-)
[Posted in FML issue 4367]