cannot get rigify rig to bind to mesh I am trying to animate a pony. I have a bunch of weight groups for fur. I am trying to bind the rigify rig to the mesh just to make sure that everything is working before I move on into more advanced rigging setups for inverse kinematics and xmuscle systems. However, I cannot get the rig to bind with with the mesh, nor can I get the bones to bind with the mesh. Here is a link to the file if anyone can figure it out. I would greatly appreciate it!

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cjkv4yr6dkjk3it/test.blend?dl=0
I checked it, first problem, you have your rig parented manually with your mesh, when you try to use "Parent with empty or automatic weights (or other algorithm) you have to have your mesh and armature without any parent/child relation, so you have to delete the parenting.
Now you will be able to parent your mesh to your armature (first select your mesh, then your armature and use parent) manually painting the vertex, only manually, why? Because you have duplicated vertexes and non-manifold topology.
If you want to use automatic weight paint you have to clean your mesh first.

Any further questions, don't hesitate to ask me.