Politics blessedly aside, the White House has chosen to honor “all creatures great and small,” inspired by pets who have been such wonderful companions to many of us - including presidents - over the years. I focus on the word “all” because I like to think that the Almighty was impartial at the time of creation. When we think “pets”, we usually picture some adorable tail-wagging dog or a kitten playfully chasing a ball of yarn. Occasionally, a pig meets the pet criteria and of course there are various species of birds and small creatures such as hamsters and mice, provided they are white and please, let’s not play the race card here – I think it’s because white mice are usually brought into a home, whereas those others are intruders.

But what of the so-called “undesirables”, such as the pigeons in New York City? They’ve gotten a bad rap because they don’t clean up after themselves. For that matter, neither do myriad dogs who inhabit the city, but unlike pigeons, they have caretakers who do the dirty work. Pigeons visit my terrace all the time, foraging for food, which is hard to come by in the city. Occasionally I scatter some old bread around for them, but I hope word doesn’t get around the neighborhood. I may be wrong, but if my neighbors share the hostility of most city folk towards pigeons, I can only guess at what they would rain down on me.

Now according to the Bible, in Genesis, when God became outraged by man’s corruption, he instructed Noah, who he considered a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, to build an ark of cypress wood. Into this ark, Noah was to bring two of all living creatures, male and female, two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground. You will note that there was no proscription about excluding pigeons. Noah was further advised to bring every kind of food suitable for the variety of creatures. In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the springs of the great deep burst forth and the floodgates of heaven were opened and rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out, save Noah and those with him in the ark.

After forty days, Noah opened the window he had made in the ark and he sent out a raven that kept flying back and forth so that Noah knew the earth was still covered with water. Then he sent out a dove and the dove came back but seven days later he sent the dove out again, and this time the dove returned with an olive leaf and Noah knew it was all right to come out. How our destiny hinges on such inconsequential events is illustrated by Noah’s choice of the dove as messenger. Just think in what great regard we would hold the pigeon if he had been chosen to lead us to dry land. However, things happen the way they happen and as my grandmother would say, it was bashert. She said that about anything she approved of and agreed with, especially if it defied rational explanation.

Anyway, last week, I witnessed an act of kindness towards one of those small creatures, and my faith in humanity has been restored vis-à-vis the poor, benighted pigeon at least. My husband and I were walking down a side street and we noticed two people hovering around a tree. We started to pass by and then we saw that they were attempting to free a pigeon that had become trapped in some fencing at the base of the tree. We walked over and tried to help although we were concerned about the people who were handling the bird since like so many undomesticated creatures, they could be rabid. Then a third couple stopped and they offered some advice and when we all had begun to despair of the pigeon ever being freed, somehow it became un-entangled and with a frightening flap of its wings, landed on the ground and then inched its way under a car. Now we had another worry. It seemed injured and we were afraid the driver of the parked car would come out and run it over. While we tried to prod the pigeon out from the underside of the car, it flapped its wings again, inched its way out and soared up into the air. It did not return with an olive leaf, it did not return at all, but six people walked away, happier than they had been before.

If this seems like much ado about very little, you have my deepest sympathy, and I will not attempt to coerce you into a more righteous way of thinking. I know there is much suffering among people all over the world and God most surely was aware of it, but he didn’t consider any species a “throwaway” and saved them all. We human beings are often guilty of specieism an attitude of bias towards the interests of one’s own species and against those of members of other species. Peter Singer, who wrote Animal Liberation and is considered the definitive work about animals and their treatment, says that we must treat with consideration, any creature that has the capacity to suffer. The capacity to suffer – a shared emotion among all species, and for most caring human beings – one that is impossible to ignore.