Can walking with a dog improve your prayer life?

Prayer is made easier with a four-legged fellow believer.

"Your walks feel like a second childhood, when you ran through the woods with a pack of dogs and you belonged in a way you can't with humans." —Rachel Lyons, Becoming a Dog Person

My dog ​​and I get up in front of the sun every morning, at 4:30 in the morning to be exact. I put my shoes on quietly so as not to wake the family and tie my neck around my neck, asking them to sit down briefly while I do. I quickly press start on the coffee maker and go out.

The walk is the same every morning. We go down the steps and head around the corner to start our kilometer-long tour around the neighborhood. It's early - no one is awake except the lone rabbit who silently leaps away as we pass - but that's how I like it.

It only takes moments in the stillness of dawn, our six feet hitting the pavement at a steady pace, for my body to rest and my mind to slow down. Out here early in the morning, my dog, Jack, and I are with each other and with the earth. It is in this connection, between man and animal and nature, that I see and connect most clearly to God.

Prayer is not always easy or obvious. For me it was a thankless job for a long time. In my mind, prayer has always been a practice on your knees, your hands clasped together, your head bowed in reverence for the Lord. I didn't see the prayers passed on the counter, so I often let myself escape from life. It was only recently, on one of these walks with Jack, that I realized that I was praying every time we went out.

My dog's quiet pace is a welcome pause to appreciate all the goodness of God. St. Francis, paraphrasing Job 12: 7, said, "Ask the beasts and they will teach you the beauty of this land." Watching Jack interact with all of creation is quite a spectacle. It takes in every part of the earth. But his relentless nose does nothing to repress our meditation. Rather it is part of the practice itself. Smell, smell, stop and appreciate the blossoming flowers, the big towering trees in my Chicago neighborhood.

Call it whatever you like - divine intervention, an animal's holy influence, or maybe just introspection - but over time I started to be more aware of slipping into prayer during these morning walks. It feels natural and absolutely necessary.

Walking with Jack is my version of praying the Liturgy of the Hours, which Benedictine sister Anita Louise Lowe states that “we can only get out of worry about ourselves. . . and [connect] us with the whole church and the whole world. “Walking Jack creates the same sense of connection for me. I am drawn out of my daily focus on my own needs and wish to focus on those of another living creature instead. I wake up at the crack of dawn not because I like to get up before the sun has a chance to rise but because Jack needs exercise. His presence brings me into a deeper relationship with my faith. Even in the first few hours when I am most exhausted, I still find myself focused on prayer as soon as my feet hit the floor. In dedicating myself to this animal, I am dedicating myself to God, because Jack is a living embodiment of the goodness of God.

Dominican sister Rhonda Miska describes the daily office as “cornerstones at the beginning and end of the day”. This is exactly what our targeted releases are. Each walk is a bookend for the day.

The morning hike opens my mind and heart and gives me a chance to focus on the new day. I thank God for my life with its many blessings, noticing the changes in the neighborhood and enjoying myself in familiar places. With no one around and the sun slowly rising, it is much easier to get lost in the beauty that surrounds me. There are no distractions in the early morning, just the stillness of the fresh air as Jack and I trudge. This is our opening prayer, Jack and my personalized praises, which consists of sniffs and silence rather than psalms and canticles.

The other bookend of the day is our evening walk, our vespers. This walk is different but also immutable. We head in the opposite direction of our previous trip, appreciating new sights and - for Jack - smells that weren't explored during sunrise. While St. Benedict implies that vespers should take place before any artificial lighting is needed, our lighting depends on the time of year. In severe winters we are shrouded in darkness while in summer the sun is just starting to set. Instead of looking to the next day, I take the time to look back on the events of the past day. I make a mental list of my positive experiences over the past 12 hours, noting what I am grateful for and what I can work on to improve myself.

In these silent reflective moments I find it easier to focus inward. Since I am a generally anxious person, my mind rarely slows down. I have always slept badly, because I find it difficult to calm my thoughts. But as I walk with Jack I understand what Saint Ignatius means when he writes: "Because it is not knowing much, but realizing and savoring things internally, which makes the soul happy and satisfying".

Jack shows me the presence of God in the natural world. Her needs created the life of prayer that I lacked and that I desperately needed. Through our walks together I am more focused and less anxious about small problems. I finally feel connected to my faith.

Some may find their prayer life fulfilled under the magnificent roof of an old cathedral, others may find it singing and dancing or meditating silently in a dark room. For me, however, they will always be pleasant walks in the very young hours of the morning with Jack and methodical shooters in the evening, breathing in the fresh air and walking as one.

You could say that my prayer life went to dogs, but I would not have wanted to do it otherwise.