Liberating Spiritual Experiences in Nonhuman Animals

(Photo by http://www.thephotoargus.com)

Last week news broke stating the strong possibility that nonhuman animals have spiritual experiences.  Kevin Nelson, a professor of  neurology at the University of Kentucky, told Discovery News that since we cannot communicate in human spoken language with nonhuman animals  " it is unlikely we will ever know with certainty what an animal subjectively experiences."

"Despite this limitation, it is still reasonable to conclude that since the most primitive areas of our brain happen to be the spiritual, then we can expect that animals are also capable of spiritual experiences," added Nelson, author of the book, "The Spiritual Doorway in the Brain," which will be published in January 2011.  Marc Bekoff, professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder, finds common ground with Nelson.  Dr. Bekoff defines spiritual experiences as those that are "nonmaterial, intangible, introspective and comparable to what humans have."  By way of example, he writes about chimpanzees dancing when seeing a waterfall or a thunderstorms. "The actions are deliberate but obscure. Could it be a joyous response to being alive, or even an expression of the chimp's awe of nature? Where, after all, might human spiritual impulses originate?"   Dr. Jane Goodall has also written of primate spirituality (in the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature) and has wondered, "If the chimpanzee could share his feelings and questions with others, might these wild elemental displays become ritualized into some form of animistic religion? Would they worship the falls, the deluge from the sky, the thunder and lightning — the gods of the elements? So all-powerful; so incomprehensible."

Of what importance, you may be asking, is this question of whether nonhuman animals have spiritual experiences?  Is this  news nothing other than curious and fascinating material for dinner table conversation?  For me, it is much more than food for thought, it is nourishing for the flourishing of all beings on this planet.

For too long we humans have felt separated from existence.  Perhaps it's having too big a frontal cortex, but for whatever reason we humans have felt "different" from other animals. This results in perceived human superiority and risks that we treat other animals with less respect and compassion. Indeed history has borne out, and current practices support the idea that because we humans operate from the stance that we are so fundamentally different from nonhuman animals, we may use them as we wish. Great harm arises from this thinking, not just for other species but for our own kind.  When we think we are apart from creation, we suffer from feelings of fear and angst, for we cannot trust that we belong and all others belong on this planet.  Suffering and injustice knows no species boundaries. Humans and nonhumans fall prey to the results of believing that our we need only extend compassionate action to our kind and not to our kin of many different species.

I resonate with Marc Bekoff who writes, "I like to think that the bumper sticker for evolutionary continuity between humans and nonhuman animals would simply be: "If we have something they have it too."  I wrote about this recently in my other blog,  A Year's Rising with Mary Oliver:

 

    We are here not to be separate from others, from animals, from earth, or from God. In fact, we     cannot be. We are God’s body. We are the earth's body.  So if we are all one body together, so is our     monkey mind – imperfect yet perfect, and fumbling and bumbling, yet graceful. We have no climbing     towards an external perfection to do. As my favorite poet said (Mary Oliver),  "We only have to love     what the soft animal of our bodies love.

 

This love flies free in many ways, but can also be constrained, sometimes subtly, other times not.  A recent report describes how an Anglican priest spontaneously and graciously gave a dog a communion wafer during a service.  She received criticisms for her action and was compelled to offer an apology.

I wonder if there was greater good in sharing a communion of love between humans, nonhuman, and God/earth/existence than in adhering to the finer theological points that frankly over the millennia have contributed to our feelings of separation, superiority, and its counterpart, inferiority.  Aren't we all of one body?  Doesn't communion affirm that?   I'm not saying the dog had the spiritual resources to understand the grace of communion, but right now, in this moment, I like to think that you and I do.

 In Romans 8 (New Revised Version) we read:  

 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

    

From my experiences and understanding of the text, all life (creation) is here to be liberated.  Hope, as the text invites us to consider, comes from things we cannot see, such as our own spiritual life and longings, which includes our deep faith in the interdependence of life. This leaves us open to the possibility that we are not nearly as alone on this planet as we think we are, nor separate, nor better.    

 

Mark Bekoff,  writes, "Meager as it is, available evidence says, 'Yes, animals can have spiritual experiences,' and we need to conduct further research and engage in interdisciplinary discussions before we say that animals cannot and do not experience spirituality."

We do not know for certain about the spiritual experiences of others, but we do know what love is.  We can use that love to lead us into an open and unconstrained relationship with the holy other, so that we may grow love beyond thought into word and action.  Isn't that what faith is?  That we don't go it alone, meager as the evidence is?

 

 

 Painting by Cindy Capeheart (Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Gainesville)

 

 

 

 

Companions and Compassion

 Exodor 

I
lived with a Nanday Conure by the name of Exodor for 23 years.  He died in 2003.  I still have his egg and have an image of one
of his feathers as a tattoo.  More than
anything the image of his beautiful and graceful self is engraved in my heart
for ever.  He had such spunk, courage,
deep intelligence, and loyalty. He lived with me all over including California,
Alaska, Tennessee, Texas, North Carolina, and Guatemala.  There are hundreds of stories I could tell
that would testify to his inherent worth and dignity, but perhaps more than
anything I recall is the beauty of his flight as he flew across the room to
join me with that high pitched call that screamed out "I'm so alive, I'm
so glad to see you, I'm such a conure!"

Because
of my deep bond with him I am especially attuned to others of his species.  A few years ago I was in St. Petersburg. I
heard a squawk and my heart leaped. Sure enough there was family of Nandays
coming in and out of a nest cavity in a palm tree in a parking lot.  I was so enamored with them that I took my
spouse back there a few months later to celebrate our anniversary what we now
fondly know of as "St. Parrotsburg." 
We spent the day walking around the down town area chasing Nandays,
Quakers, and various other kinds of free flying parrots that were far from
their original lands. 

 

Nandays in Sarasota 

The
countries of origin though don't seem so far away now that I have known
Nandays.  Through Exodor I am forever
called to pay attention to wild parrots, and care for them.  For now I know how they are like feathered
angels, gifting us with a picture of heaven on earth where all beings
belong. 

 (photo by Robert Blanchard) 

Others have been
gifted to with this connection of wild and companion birds.  Recently I have become friends with Marc
Johnson and Karen Windsor of Foster Parrots. 
I am so taken with them and their projects in in
Guyana.  I interviewed them and highlighted their work on my other blog, Lafeber Conservation and Wildlife.   Here's is what I found.  They know power and are yielding it well, if
not with discomfort and pain on their part. Because in their work with
companion birds where they love them, care for them, sacrifice for them, and
witness to their beauty and their suffering, they can draw on authentic  motivations to address the situation of the
free flying wild counterparts in Guyana and other countries.  They do not
keep their heart and dedication enclosed into a box, but extend it out to other
species, including their fellow great apes - humans.  This is perhaps the hardest piece, loving our
human neighbors as ourselves in our mixed species communities. 

I have
struggled mightily with this, for I wish to blame someone for the pain and loss
of our beautiful world.  Somehow, though,
I know that blame is not the answer. For simply, if there is not enough love,
compassion, or beauty in the world, then I will do everything I can for there
to be more, and not less.  This means
that I must undertake to see the beauty in all of life and in the whole. This
includes we humans.  We need us all at
the table so we can nourish one another, so that the earth and all her beings
may flourish. 

A
simple message, but a most difficult one to follow through on.

So I
write here to gather us all together so that we might support one another
towards a more compassionate world - liberating ourselves as we liberate the
birds we love.

Thank
you Marc and Karen. For through your work, you give we humans the opportunity
to be who we are and were always supposed to be.

 Marc Johnson, Karen Windsor, and Friends 

Presidents and Parrots

 

 

I
recently read this poem by Mary Oliver:

 

Percy Two

 I have a little dog who likes to nap with me.

He climbs on my body and puts his face in my neck.

He is sweeter than soap.

He is more wonderful than a diamond necklace,

which can't even bark.

I would like to take him to Kashmir and the Ukraine,

and Jerusalem and Palestine and Iraq and Darfur,

that the sorrowing thousands might see his laughing mouth.

I would like to take him to Washington, right into

the oval office

where Donald Rumsfeld would crawl out of the president's 

armpit

and kneel down on the carpet, and romp like a boy.

 For once, for a moment, a rational man.

 

 

Now
that's an idea worth sharing - what might we bright to the influential and the
sorrowing multitudes so that they may gain reason, or perhaps better said, let
go of reason and let love and joy in?  I
think that I would bring a parrot to the oval office.

 

I
wouldn't be the first.

 

Many
presidents have owned parrots.

 

Lyndon B.
Johnson had lovebirds, John Kennedy had parakeets, Theodore Roosevelt and James
Madison had macaws, William McKinley had 
Yellow-headed Mexican Parrot that could whistle "Yankee
Doodle" and Andrew Jackson had some unknown species of parrot named Pol.
His pet parrot was removed from his funeral because the bird was swearing.

 
 

 

The
parrot that I would offer to our head of state would be bettered mannered than
this, but hopefully not too politically correct.  In this prestigious office the bird would bow
down his head, raising his neck feathers in which President Obama would
promptly bury his nose and inhale sacredness.  
Then he would reaffirm his faith that there is nothing sweeter than life
itself, or more beautiful than this bird, himself, others, republicans,
democrats, Muslims, or talk show hosts.  He
might secretly see himself as President Parrot, no more, and no less.  Then he would wing himself to Afghanistan,
Yemen, Bolivia, Argentina, or Venezuela  and offer liberation by now bowing down his head and
kneeling on the carpet to the beauty within and the beauty without.  Such is my hope here in the dog days of
August.

President Hugo Chavez of Venezueala 

Welfare from A Bird's Eye View

Nancy Burke Loving a Hundred Year Old Yellow-crowned Amazon Parrot

  

I have
recently returned from several weeks of being among bird people, attending a
bird veterinarian conference (the Association of Avian Veterinarians), a bird
owner/breeder conference (American Federation of Aviculture), an avian
veterinary clinics (Bird and Exotic Pet Wellness Center) and pet bird owners of
flocks. There was a time when I could not have spent enjoyable time amongst
them, for I thought they were "wrong" for keeping wild birds in
captivity.  Through the deep work of
Nonviolent Communication that I translate into Compassionate Conservation, I am
learning to see that these people are not wrong, nor am I.   Life
flows through them just as it does me, striving to bring appreciation, beauty,
companionship, and nurturing to their lives. 
They love birds, I love birds. They care for birds, I care for
birds.  They choose to do so by keeping
birds in cages in their homes, or treating captive birds in their clinics,
while I choose to work with wild parrots in Latin America.  Our strategies differ, but we are interdependent
with one another, not separate, but worthy and lovely.  We share life.  Because I appreciate our common humanity and
might empathize with them, I can be among them,  and even more important to me, love them for who they are
and keep my heart open to the beauty that is their lives.  This
does not mean that I do not mourn their strategies. Indeed, after several weeks
of being among captive birds and hearing of their hard lives in captivity, I am
ready for a break.  My heart hurts to
witness such suffering. 

Striving to
relate through common needs also doesn't mean that I don't tell others what is
going on in my heart.  Indeed there were
many such discussions.  In that sharing,
my aching heart does find relief, for at the level of universal needs, of
mattering and seeing that other species matter, we were able to connect.  By seeing our discomfort as being at the
level of strategy, and not at the level of universal needs, we find ways to empathize
with one another, support one another, and hopefully  help one another see that we matter so that
we can work together in ways that reflect the needs of all beings.

This is my
dream and my prayer for we who share our lives with birds, especially this year
as we work together to develop guidelines for birds under the Animal Welfare
Act.  I strongly believe that we need all
of us at the table, so that we might nourish birds, ourselves, and the world we
share with them with our creative, loving, synergy.  May this be so.

 

 

American Federation of Aviculture Convention: The Magic of People and Parrots

 

 

On Saturday I gave a
presentation at the American Federation of Aviculture (AFA) Symposium in St.
Petersburg, Florida (my spouse and I call it St. Parrotsburg because of all the
naturalized parrots flying around).  Some
20 years ago I was a regular attendee at these conventions when I was more
active as a veterinarian of captive birds. 
I returned to be with these aviculturists because I need them, and so
the people and parrots of the world.  The
goal for my paper, "Wild Psittacine 
Chick and Nest Assessment: A Green Paper" was to convey my
conviction that we need every one at the table to help solve the complex and
often overwhelming problems confronting us in avian conservation, especially in
Central America.  From my view point,
everyone is on the conservation team for parrots.  If you work towards the well being of
yourself, others, and birds - no matter where you are - you are contributing to
the well being of the planet and all communities of mixed species.  We are one planet and we share one
health.  The audience at AFA gave me many
wonderful and clear suggestions, and already I believe I can share this
information with those with whom I work more closely with on my various
conservation teams.  Imagine what we
might accomplish if more people become involved?

I ask you, therefore, if you
would be a participatory member of this team. 
One thing you can do is read this paper, and contribute to it.  I have it posted as a google document
at:   https://docs1.google.com/document/edit?id=1EsNt-a3dengFR5YVdI2iWYKTcVNiY5btWF41yHakPyI&authkey=CKOSgoMJ&hl=en#.  You can make comments, edits, additions, and
deletions directly there, or email me with your changes. If you have trouble accessing the document in google, email me and I will send you a copy of the paper.

 Please do distribute
this document to others so that together we can build the kind of world we wish
to live in.

 

 In gratitude,

LoraKim

AAV Welfare Symposium Helps to Liberate Wings

 

This week I am attending the Association of Avian
Veterinarians Welfare Symposium.  The
range of people present gathering in one room trying to learn and listen to one
another was the broadest I have ever seen in one room.  We had avian welfare activists, staff
veterinarians for Petco and Petsmart. 
USDA and Canada welfare regulatory veterinarians, sanctuary parrot
owners, advocates of poultry well being, conservationists, private practice
veterinarians, and one minister (me). The name of the entire conference was
“Waves of Wisdom” and it is clear from what was shared in that room that there
is gathering wisdom and power, and the wave towards human and avian liberation
is there for any who wish to ride upon. 
Here are some of the comments I heard that make up the gathering wisdom
literature  of those concerned with the
well being of all life (with my accompanying commentary).

  

 

Terry  Whitting , (Manitoba
Agriculture, Chief Veterinarian): It is easier to believe than to talk about
things.   He was referring to the complexity
of avian welfare .When people are confronted with complex difficult topics,
they shift into belief language and avoid communication with other humans.  It is this belief language then that keeps us
from communicating at the level of values, authenticity, and interconnecting empathy.
He went on to say that though we do some good work with the human –animal bond;
it does not count as a relational ethic.  If anything, it detracts from the real work we
need to be doing of compassionate care. 
He concluded that we need skillful communication and I can whole
heartedly echo – boy howdy!  Hence my
presentation two days later on compassionate communication at this same
conference.

Julie Murad, Director of Gabriel Foundation, a parrot
sanctuary, said in her presentation that we need a more compassionate society.
Again, I echo, boy howdy!  But how do we
get there?

One way I see is how we all came into that one room.  Somehow we are gaining a common language of
beauty, and this interconnecting gestalt ties us to one another and raises the
level of trust so that we find a way to still the chatter that says you are
wrong or you are different, and open our hearts to the beauty and dignity not
just of the birds we love, but of one another.

 Do you believe that I am over stating the evolution of these
people involved in avian welfare?  Let me
give you an example.  At the AAV Avian
Welfare Committee Jan Hooemeijer said that the social event kicking off the AAV
meeting held at Sea World was morally inadequate. As veterinarians interested
in the welfare of animals we should not be supporting activities that diminish
the well being of others.  Those in the room
were asked if they agreed. The hands raised immediately and enthusiastically. There
was no discussion, no argument - just a consensus to do the right thing for
those whose inherent worth has been diminished and disempowered  by the human species.  Yet is seems that is we who have been
disempowered over the long millennia because we do not see how our own lives
weave into the interconnected web of life. 
This is changing.  Seeing and
sharing the beauty and worth of whales, parrots, and chickens is finally
bringing us into our power, which liberates us as it liberates others.

Raising  Wings and Hands Together for Avian Welfare (Starling near AAV San Diego Hotel) 

 

Hands and Wings
Raised in Solidarity in San Diego

How Would You Live Then?

A Male Northern Cardinal (Member of Family Cardinalidae along with  Grosbeaks)

  

What if a hundred rose-breasted
grosbeaks

blew in circles around your head?  What if

the mockingbird came into the house with you and

became your advisor?  What if

the bees filled your walls with honey and all

you needed to do was ask them and they would fill

the bowl?  What if the brook slid downhill
just

past your bedroom window so you could listen

to its slow prayers as you fell asleep?  What
if

the stars began to shout their names, or to run

this way and that way above the clouds?  What
if

you painted a picture of a tree, and the leaves

began to rustle, and a bird cheerful sang

from its painted branches?  What if you
suddenly saw

that the silver of water was brighter than the
silver

of money?  What if you finally saw

that the sunflowers, turning toward the sun all
day

and every day -- who knows  how, but they do
it -- were

more precious, more meaningful than gold? - Mary Oliver

 

 

Just
this week I had a conversation with someone who asked "What is it you
want?"  I answered:  "I would have that singing cardinal come
down to the screened in porch where we are sitting and ask to be let in. Then
she would come sit on my arm and allow me to touch her."  My friend suggested this would be against the
bird's telos and if a bird did such as this, we would lose his or her's
wildness.  I believe my friend was
arguing that the bird is so very precious just the way she is, if we could but just
see her as such. I believe that I too was arguing the same thing. I just did so
by telling a fantasy story about a bird who desires to be with me, for that is all I
desire - to be with birds, to be birds. To be centered with such heart centered
awareness in every moment, that's how I would live!

 

How would you live if you could
see the beauty around you in every moment as if it were a fantastical dream, so
very wondrous because it is not a dream, but reality?