Life & Faith

What our favourite companion animals can teach us about ourselves – and about God.  --- Are you a dog person or cat lover? You’re one or the other, apparently.  Wth 69% of Australian households now owning a pet, according to a 2021 survey by Animal Medicines Australia, this week Life & Faith is pleased to get controversial: we reveal that Australia’s “two-pet” system has a clear winner. Dogs. We speak to Barney Zwartz, long-time dog tragic, about the dogs in his life: the border collie-labrador cross Nessie, whom Barney dubs “Mary Poppins” because she is “practically perfect in every way”, and Lennie, a border collie-whippet who had a special connection with Barney’s late son Sam.  What explains the human-dog bond? Is it dogs’ “hypersociability”? Or “exaggerated gregariousness”? Professor Clive Wynne, the founder of the Canine Science Laboratory at Arizona State University, just calls it dogs’ capacity for “love”.  Barney draws on Professor Wynne’s Dog is Love: Why and how your dog loves you when discussi