And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?” – Jonah 4:11

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 4, 2016): Jonah 3 & 4

A while ago I heard a comedian commenting on the fact that dogs are Christian, but cats aren’t. So I guess that means that all dogs go to heaven, but cats are going somewhere else. (cat lovers, please accept my humble apologies). The comedian’s bottom line was that cats are far too self-absorbed to be Christian. The Christian faith, as I have mentioned several times in this blog, is always to the other. The basis of our faith is Jesus, but the way it looks to the world is that we welcome the stranger. No one is unwelcome at our table. And sometimes that is a hard pill to swallow.

It was hard for Jonah. There were people, and the people of Nineveh were certainly some of them, that the Prophet wanted nowhere in his vicinity. He didn’t trust them, and they were certainly not welcome at the Temple as long as he was around. Jonah knew that he was at odds with his God, but he was too self-absorbed to want to do anything about it. And in that, Jonah was more of a cat than a dog.

But the final words of God, which close the book of Jonah, have little to do with whether or not all dogs go to heaven (and maybe even some cats.) It is a trivial question that we have spent too much time on in our culture. Will there be pets in heaven? Maybe. If heaven is a safe and happy place that is filled with the things that make us happy here, then why not.

The first portion of God’s comment to Jonah fills an obvious place inside of us. One hundred and twenty thousand people are significant to a God who assures us that each one of us is valuable and unique to him. What is maybe surprising from a Hebrew Bible focus (although Jonah was evidently not surprised) was that God was concerned about even how the Gentiles lived their lives. What might be more surprising is God’s concern for the animals. But his concern for the animals is not an “animals are people too” concern. It seems that it is more likely that it is a reminder of our job on the earth.  We (and this includes Jonah) are the caretakers of the planet. We care for the environment; we are responsible for making this world a place where the animals can live with us. It has been this way since God put Adam in the garden and paraded the animals in front of him so that he could name them (Genesis 2:19-20). And if Jonah could not get upset about the destruction of the people of Nineveh, could he not at least see that saving the city meant saving the animals which were humanity’s responsibility?

We have no idea what Jonah’s answer to God might have been. Here the story ends. But our responsibility to care for the planet continues. And in that, we need a change in attitude. Because we are failing at that task as much Jonah failed at the job that God had given to him.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Hosea 1