The magnificence of life is really too wonderful too describe. But I found this description some years ago which summons reverence by its very ability to baffle the mind:
MIRACLE OF LIFE– Consider the miracle of the human body. Its chemistry is just as extraordinarily well tuned as is the physics of the cosmos. Our world on bothsides of the divide that separates life from lifelessness is filled with wonder. Each human cell has a double helix library of three billion base pairs providing fifty thousand genes. These three billion base pairs and fifty thousand genes somehow engineer 100 trillion neural connections in the brain—-enough points of information to store all the data and information contained in a fifty-million-volume encyclopedia. And then after that, these fifty thousand genes set forth a million fibers in the optic nerves, retinae having ten million pixels per centimeter, some ten billion in all, ten thousand taste buds, ten million nerve endings for smell, cells that exude a chemical come-on to lure an embryo’s lengthening neurons from spinal cord to target cell, each one of the millions of target cells attracting the proper nerve from the particular needed function. And all this three-dimensional structure arises somehow from the linear, one-dimensional information contained along the DNA helix. Did all this happen by chance or do you see the hand of God?
Today, many of us march for life, here in Washington, on the West Coast, and in other communities. Today we ponder the great mystery that is expressed in the 139th psalm:
For it was you who created my being, knit me together in my mother’s womb. I thank you for the wonder of my being…Already you knew my soul my body held no secret from you when I was being fashioned in secret….every one of my days was decreed before one of them came into being. To me, how mysterious your thoughts, the sum of them not to be numbered! (Psalm 139 varia)
No human being is an accident, no conception a surprise or inconvenience to God. Mysteriously he knew and loved us long before we were ever conceived, for he says, Before I ever formed you in the womb I knew you (Jer 1:4). And, as the psalm says above, God has always known everything we would ever do or be.
It is often mysterious to us why human life is, at times, conceived in difficult circumstances such as poverty, times of family struggle or crisis, or even conceived with disability and disadvantage. But in the end we see so very little and must ponder the mystery of God’s reminder that many who are “last” now are going to be first in the kingdom (e.g. Matt 20:16; Luke 1:52-53).
So today, many will march, and all are called to remember the sacred lives that have been lost. We acknowledge our loss, for the gifts of these children and their lives have been swept from us as well. We pray for women who struggle to bring children to term and experience pressure to consider abortion. We pray for the immediate and sudden conversion of all support legalized abortion for any reason and for a dedication to assist women facing any difficulty in giving birth to or raising their children.
The following video is a shortened version of the masterpiece video called “Genesis” by Ramos David. It magnificently depicts fetal development. I have taken the liberty of adding a different music track since this is a shortened version. The Music is William Byrd: Optimam Partem Elegit (She has Chosen the Best Part), a text most fitting since we pray all mothers will choose life. The full length video is found in higher definition on YouTube by searching under “Genesis Ramos David”
A beautiful post and video … I’ve never seen photography like this before.
Beautiful, father! How anyone can see science (reason) as incompatible with religion (faith) I will never know. Science only proves just how great God is, and how unique and specially loved each one of us is. We have a higher chance of winning the lottery than of being born – and yet we were born and were called to be adopted sons of the Creator of the Universe; millions of worldly lottery tickets combined pale into insignificance in comparison to this!
God bless you, Father, and thank you for a wonderful meditation with which to begin the working week!
That video is so cool! I like the original one too. I am pregnant with my first baby and loved seeing that, especially the heartbeat. How amazing! Thank you!
The whole issue of abortion boils down to wether you wish to keep Gods commands or not.
God has forbidden [us] to kill [our] kids in the Sixth Commandment: “Thou shall not kill”
Wether or not you find life “amazing” is not really the issue. Keeping Gods commandments Is.
Furthermore “Abortion” is just a fancy way of saying “Murder”…..
Some of you will find these words offensive, no doubt. They are, however, the truth.
And the truth hurts. Therefore the whole abortion-debate is full of comforting lies.
But I am not.
Gabriel you see I had to edit your remarks and omit the whole center section of what you said. Please avoid personal attacks on your interlocutors who may not in fact be any of the things you say. Generalities are not helpful either. I realize and understand your impatience when it comes to euphemisms but simple provocation does not always do a very good job of moving the ball downfield either.
Yes, Gabriel, I am sure no-one on this blog disagrees at all with your views on abortion or how essential keeping the sixth commandment is. I for one was simply responding to Monsignor’s meditation on the “mystery and beauty of life”, as its title and the majority of the text emphasised. That was the issue which I was struck with. If anyone thinks life is “amazing”, and not as some empty expression of “niceness” but as a heartfelt recognition of the profundity of our call to being by our Creator, they are paying reverent tribute to God; and ultimately they cannot fail to find it repugnant (in proportion to how amazing they find it) that the murder of unborn life is so widespread and legally accepted. This goes without saying!!!
You blessed priest of God. Thank you for posting this eye opening realistic essay and meditation. You lead us as you follow Him. You are His disciple and we thank God for you. Liz
Liz,
You have a good heart. We must pray for our priest, it is they who consecrate the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ.
The video is so amazing to see. Seeing the development of the fetus make me realize how beautiful life is. Why are there people choose to abort babies instead of giving them life. The miracle that God made inside the mother’s womb.
Othe mammal have a similar and beautiful development, just like this. Why are we so unconsidered with other animals that we eat without any need, hunt for pleasure, used them as simple objects and in some cases torture them for our own amusement?
The miracle that God made inside the mother’s womb is so wonderful. God is truly a loving God.
Dear Nanette,
How beautiful said