Lutheran Church Charities Comfort Dogs Help Students and Staff After Waukesha, Wisconsin, Parade Tragedy

Lutheran Church Charities (LCC) created its K-9 Comfort Dogs program in 2008 to bring compassionate ministry to communities through the calming presence of dogs. The program uses purebred golden retrievers, which are trained from puppyhood until about age 2 to sense when people need support. LCC board member Lynda Streich said the dogs are focused on being present and comforting people. She described the charity’s mission as sharing “the mercy, compassion, presence and proclamation of Jesus Christ to those suffering and in need.”

The program has more than 130 dogs across 26 states. The dogs routinely visit nursing homes, police stations, schools and churches in communities going through a crisis. When deployed, they are available to be hugged, petted and comforted by people who need it. Gary Kilvinger, a handler for a dog named Charity, said people often “drape themselves on the dogs” when they are going through difficult times. His wife, Becky Kilvinger, manages Charity and her team of handlers. She said Charity “takes on a lot of emotions” when she wears her vest.

The team has deployed across the country, including to Uvalde, Texas, and Surfside, Fla. Becky Kilvinger said the team was also called to its own community of Waukesha, Wis., after a vehicle struck and killed several people in the local Christmas parade. She said it was difficult to be deployed in their own community, but the team responded quickly.

After the incident, Clarendon Avenue School principal Andrea Kaplan learned that one of her students had been killed. Charity and a team of comfort dogs were called in to support students and staff. Kaplan said that when students and staff first saw the dogs, “you could see a calming effect.” School psychologist Brittany Sadorf said emotions were very high in the building and that the comfort dogs and Charity “helped get us through it.” Comfort in grief is the work the dogs were brought to do (Psalm 34:18).

Becky Kilvinger said the LCC K-9 staff and dogs help people express their emotions, whether through joy, tears or anything in between. She said allowing those emotions is part of the healing process. “That’s why we do what we do: to change someone else’s world.”

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