The more I learn about veterinary chaplaincy and ecospirituality or wild churches, the more I realize something that I’ve always known. While the deities are important to me, and I have some, including Epona, Celtic horse goddess, that I work with, to me the bigger connection to the sacred is the outdoors and the wild. Which is why for me, in addition to being the emblem of one of my patron Goddesses, horses literally connect me to the natural world.
Let’s be honest, as an AuADHDer who writes and podcasts a lot, staying in my office cabin, looking out the window, is how I spend a large portion of my day. However, the horses, chickens, and 2 pet pigs need care. I feed everyone in the morning, and then the horses and pigs get dinner as well. Add to that needing to shut in the chickens, and this time of year, opening gates an hour after feeding time (I have to separate everyone so they get their own hay rations), I am outside at least five times a day. Six if I go out after I open the gates in the evenings to shut in the chickens now that the days are getting longer.
What that means is rain or shine, hot or cold, I need to take care of the animals. Their care forces me out in nature, even on days when I’d rather be tucked inside with a blanket and a hot coffee.
This is a common theme among people who care for horses. They can’t be inside all the time. Even miniature horses used as service animals need to be able to be turned out (outside), and stretch their legs. Even if the horses are stalled all day, which isn’t really good for them as horses are designed to walk and search for food most of the day, you still have to go outside to get to the barn. I can’t think of anyone that has a temperature controlled tunnel from the house to the barn. And, adding to that, you have to haul in feed and hay, which again gets you outside.
So the theme of this is that horse care in any meaningful capacity gets us outside, even if we’re shuttling between buildings, and that puts us into the weather and into nature.
I can think of few companion animals who have the same ability. Though dogs often get us outside, they also can stay inside depending on their size and activity needs. Horses exist in the natural world, which means we’re going to be exposed to the cycles of the weather, of nature, of the seasons, and of the year. And these cycles will, to some extent, begin to influence our lives.
This shapes our view of nature, and if like me you see nature as sacred and a way to connect with the divine, then horses bring us into it, and for me, that’s an important part of my practice.
