Tito, Me and Richard Rohr

Tito Schreiber passed away this week. Which left us devastated

He was such a good dog, loved so much by our family. I am choosing Richard Rohr forTiro’s eulogy.

Richard Rohr, a Franciscan friar, seeing “Christ” in his dog (famously his black lab, Venus) wasn’t about the dog being a deity. It was about his belief in Universal Christology—the idea that the physical world is the first “Bible” and that everything in it is a thumbprint of the Creator.

It teaches us that we can learn about God’s character by observing the unconditional love of a pet just as easily as reading a sermon.

Rohr teaches that “Christ” is much more than the historical person of Jesus. He argues that the first time God “became flesh” was at the moment of the Big Bang. Therefore, all matter is “Christ-soaked.” * The Application: If everything that exists is a physical manifestation of God’s thoughts, then a dog, a tree, or a person all carry that same divine energy.

The Connection: If a dog can “be” its most authentic self without religious rules, it proves that the Divine Spirit is already there. It’s “baked in,” not “added on” later.

Rohr says we often miss God because we are looking for a “spirit” in the clouds. He argues that if you can’t see the divine in the particular (the wag of a tail, the wet nose, the breathing of a living creature), you will never see it in the universal.

In the simplest terms, “Jesus” is the person, but “The Christ” is the light that fills everything.