Sunday, December 11, 2005

Kittypix as metaphor of Christ's mercy on us

As the weather has grown colder here in Kikai and the wind has grown stronger, our wild
kitties have not flourished. Here is today's picture of Austin, the newly-named Peng (he's the black-and-white one on the bottom of the catpile [since it wouldn't be proper to say "dogpile"], or as we say, "the pile o' kitties"), and Satin, the grey one on our left. They rested for most of the day on this spool that is behind our house. We have left a pillow on it upon which the kitties often lounge.
Today we were struck w/ a strong sense of compassion and pity for the kitties. Kitty pity. All joking aside (well, almost), these three kitties have gone from pretty darn healthy kitties to looking fairly sick and unhappy these past three weeks or so. Tabi-Tabi, for example, has exhibited mild asthma for quite some time, but now all the kitties have it. And they are all getting runny noses, and as you may be able to see, all three of the kitties pictured here have eye infections. Satin's are especially bad - they are nearly closed due to swelling and are encrusted w/ mucus. Austin's right eye is looking bad. Peng's eyes are red and his face has a few sores on it. Each's fur is looking much more matted and less shiny and clean than just a few weeks ago.
Today we gave them a whole bunch of food, which they seemed to appreciate, and yet that was all we could do. We don't know what to say to them to find out what hurts or why their energy is seemingly sapped. We don't have any idea how to fix their obviously-painful eyes. We can't communicate w/ them to let them know that they could rest inside our entry hall for a while, where it's dry and warmer, if they wanted, and that they would not be in danger inside. As it is, they are suffering.
It reminded of how we are beggars before God. We would love to become cats for a little while to extend an invitation of safety and peace to these wild cats outside our house. We could communicate w/ them in a way that they would better understand. It's an imperfect (or, more properly said, "lousy") metaphor of the Event that we will celebrate in mere days - the birth of Jesus Christ, the 2nd Person of the Trinity, in human flesh and in realtime. He went from indescribable riches to being the son of a poor carpenter. He went from a throne room where he heard praise round the clock from all sorts of angelic and beautiful beings to the dust and stench of ancient Roman Judaea, to wicked men who willfully misunderstood why He had come and eventually executed him in one of the most horrible ways possible.
Isaiah 53:5-7;

"But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities;upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way;and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth;like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth."

Strange that some stray kitties tugged at my heart today, but sometimes it's the simple things. Posted by Picasa

3 comments:

T*ny and R*se said...

HI There,
That'a an interesting analogy. :) Do they have any domesticated cats in the area, out of curiousity.

Anonymous said...

The kitties need antibiotics from the vet and that will fix them right up. They have an upper resp. infection. It is common in cats - wild or not, and highly contagious.

Love, Aunt Kathy

Rhology said...

Wish we could get them some antibiotix - that would be nice. Unless they're like a powder the kitties could eat w/ their food, it would be hard to get 'em to take it - only two will let us touch them, and we can sometimes get close enough to touch the two kittens, Satin and Shoyu, if we distract them w/ food.

There are a few domesticated cats in town, it seems. There seem, however, to be quite a few wild ones. But maybe many of them are domesticated and just don't have a collar and are outside cats anyway.