Miłość niemożliwa? Analiza ujęć relacji człowiek–zwierzę w filozofii św. Tomasza z Akwinu i tomizmie konsekwentnym Mieczysława Gogacza
Impossible love? Analysis of the Human-Animal Relationship in the Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas and Consequential Thomism of Mieczysław Gogacz

Summary/Abstract: The aim of the article is to try to answer the question whether love between people and animals can take the form of not only feelings, but also relationships. In the article, we show that such a relationship is possible, although it is a specific relationship as it connects two beings belonging to different species. From the human side, it resembles the caritas relationship between human beings. Man brings to it selfless care, sacrifice, patience, tenderness and a feeling of love. Animal, on the other hand, brings to it a feeling of love and attachment that creates a „permanent positive feeling attitude”. This permanent positive feeling attitude is the animal equivalent to the human attitude of love. Animals cannot adopt an attitude of love towards their guardian as they lack intellect and will. However, they seem to be able to give him a certain kind of love that is characterized by more permanence than the feeling in the usual sense of the word. We have called this type of love „the permanent positive feeling attitude”. This is a unique kind of love that the animal directs to its closest guardian – the one it has „chosen” to be its master. To sum up, the human-animal relationship has the form of caritas from the human side, and the form of a permanent positive feeling attitude from the animal side. The relationship itself is called by us a „unilaterally personal caritas relationship”.

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