Tag Archives: Calais Hospital

Peyo, the horse who comforts the sick and dying

The Guardian reports, March 12, 2021, that Peyo is a 15-year-old stallion who once competed at dressage events — a form of riding through a series of complex maneuvers performed in exhibition and competition.

Nowadays, by his choice, Peyo is a therapy horse who, with his trainer, Hassen Bouchakour, visits the palliative care center at Calais Hospital in northern France.

At the hospital, Peyo tells Hassen which room he wants to enter by stopping or raising his leg.

Peyo seems able to detect when humans have cancers and tumors, and has a sixth sense for those in the hospital who are in the most need.

Peyo often stays with sick people until the end, as in the case of a dying woman with whom Peyo stayed for nearly two hours.

Hassen said that since 2016, Peyo has comforted around 1,000 people until their last breath.

St. Bonaventure called animals “creatures without sin”.

And indeed, God’s non-human creatures are without the Original Sin — the concupiscence or inclination toward evil — which stains every human.

Truly, Peyo is a creature without sin — an angel in equine guise.

~E