Father Beretta loses best friends: 'It was my first night in 35 years without a dog'

Ysolt, launched into headlines and national stardom when she was rescued as a puppy from a drainpipe within 24 hours of arriving in Butte, died of old age on Saturday with Father Patrick Beretta by her side.

The heartbreak didn't end there. Beretta also lost his other giant mastiff, Tristan, to old age on Saturday.

"You know, Saturday night was my first night in 35 years without a dog, so it's the end of an era for me," Beretta said Monday. "They were always the best companions to me."

Beretta has a sister in Texas but most of his family lives in Europe. He left when he was 17, first to Ireland, Rome and then America, and here, dogs became his best companions and best friends.

"In a priest's life, there are a lot of encounters with sadness and people who experience just the most severe heartbreaks," he said. "Priests are human beings, too, and my dogs were always an immense source of comfort for me and joy and belonging. We were inseparable."

Tristan and a mastiff named Cleopatra already had their own churchyard next to the rectory at St. Patrick's Church where Beretta lives when he got a new puppy in 2015. He named her Ysolt — pronounced "ee'-zohlt — after an Irish princess.

Not even a full day had passed before the 8-week-old puppy went missing. Beretta was concerned someone had stolen her so he called police.

Within 30 minutes, two police officers and an animal control officer pulled a stuck, trembling puppy from a 30-foot long drain-pipe that stretches underneath the church vestibule.

The Montana Standard did a story on the rescue, with photos of Beretta holding his pup, The Associated Press picked up the story up and it took off.

U.S. News and World Report ran with it, Beretta said, and within hours it was on digital versions of The Seattle Times, The Denver Post, The New York Times, USA Today Magazine, Washington Post, People Magazine and others.

"My sister in Houston saw me in the Houston Chronicle," Beretta told The Standard on Monday. "So it really went like wildfire throughout the country and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out why.

"I think then, as now, there was a craving in the country for innocent, good news, and there was something about a puppy, a police officer and a priest, and that combination really captured the imagination of the country," he said.

An editor at The Huffington Post, an online news website with millions of visitors, called Beretta and after a long conversation, asked him to write a regular column that lasted several years.

The Virginia-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, heard about the Butte officers' good deed and gave them its Compassionate Police Service Award.

"It was a good news story all around and it was heartwarming," Beretta said. "That's what people were craving then, as we do today."

Beretta lost Cleopatra several years ago, and he said Tristan and Ysolt "were really struggling towards the end of life in a different way."

Mastiffs have an average life span of eight to 10 years. Tristan was 11 and Ysolt was 10 — long lives for their breed.

Ysolt had a hard time moving in the end and stopped eating completely about 10 days ago, Beretta said. Tristan had a "fairly voracious appetite" until the end but was unable to stand to drink water.

"It was hard to watch at the end but they went very peacefully and with great dignity," said Beretta, who was by their side.

Father Beretta said he talked about Tristan and Ysolt during Sunday's service.

"There were more people in the congregation weeping than I was because people understand this incredible bond that we have with animals sometimes," he said. "I told them I choose gratitude over grief every day. And so in spite of my heart breaking, I focus more on the gift that I had them, that they so enriched my life."

Two of Beretta's past dogs, including Cleo, lived to be 15. Beretta said he's not sure he will be around for 15 more years, so he's not going to get another puppy.

He will take some time to heal, he said, then go the Chelsea Bailey Animal Shelter and "foster dogs that nobody else wants" — two dogs at a time.

"I will take them and they will be with me as long as it's needed," he said.

People have different beliefs about the afterlife, if they believe in one at all, and some people who do believe don't believe dogs go there.

On Saturday, as Beretta said goodbye to Tristan and Ysolt, he told them, "I'll see you up there."

"Nobody knows what Heaven is like, but it's very hard for me to conceive of a place of pure bliss without the presence of the animals and the people who have so richly blessed us in this life," he said.

"And even though no one knows what Heaven is like, I can honestly say, without any false modesty, that my dogs are much more deserving of being there than I am."

Mike Smith is a reporter at the Montana Standard with an emphasis on government and politics.

Government and Politics Reporter