A cat that attends church? At last Sunday's 10 a.m. service at Mission Hills United Methodist Church, in pranced a handsome gray and white long-haired cat. It cruised the aisles, licked its fur and curled up in a pew next to parishioner Larry Granfield for a cat nap – right in the middle of the Rev. Craig Dorval's sermon.

Churchgoers welcomed back "Bootsy Guzinski," who had missed the last couple of months and was now a skinnier version of his former self, causing church secretary Judy Mefford to wonder if he might have hopped aboard a moving van loading up across the street at the time he disappeared. Bootsy's real home is down the block with Vivian Guzinski. But he started frequenting the church after his "dad," Arthur Guzinski, passed away in 1996. Ever since, Bootsy, a rescued pound cat, has been as faithful as they come – attending Sunday devotions, joining in the two weekly AA meetings in the church basement, going to exercise classes, Christmas programs, weddings, keeping Mefford company in her church office, even attending garden club sessions. During one, Bootsy leaped through a half-open window midmeeting and proudly presented his human friends with a mouse – a church mouse, no doubt.

Copyright © Diane Bell
August 16, 2003