Now We Know Why "All Dogs Go To Heaven"

The LCMS in Her Own Words – Comfort Dog Installed as Staff Member in Northern Illinois Parish, by Pr. Rossow

In addition to my editor’s blog, when I have time, I make an entry in the “The LCMS in Her Own Words” column. The Northern Illinois District recently publicized the following:

Dedication Service at St. John Algonquin for LCC Comfort Dog Butter 
Sunday, January 10th, LCC Comfort Dog Butter was dedicated as a staff member at St. John Lutheran Church, Algonquin by Pastor William Stroup. Pete Imlah also spoke. St. John will continue to use Butter as a Bridge into the community to share the Compassion and Care of Jesus Christ. Butter has served for the last six months as an LCC K-9 Parish Comfort Dog with St. John, visiting shut-ins, hospitals, school kids, community and youth group events. Butter has been certified to work at Good Shepherd Hospital and is close to certification at Sherman Hospital.

We have poked fun at the comfort dogs before. As we said in the past, we are not opposed to animals bringing comfort to people. What we question is using church resources (time and money) for such things and more importantly, associating canine comfort with “the compassion and care of Christ.” This is simply further evidence that the institutional church is drifting away from its Augsburg VII life in word and sacrament. Comfort dogs are not the work of the church. They are the work of any other non-profit but are not the work of the church.
By the way, there were no details released on the installation liturgy. One wonders if it may have gone as follows:
P: Do you accept the canonical books of the Old and New Testament to be the inspired and inerrant word of God?
B: (”Butter”) “Woof.”
P: Do you accept the Unaltered Augsburg Confession, The Apology to the Augsburg Confession and the other confessions in the Book of Concord to be the true exposition of the word of God?
B: “Woof.”
And so forth and so on…