Oct. 29, 2014 By Suzanne Pietropaoli Our new grand-niece was born yesterday afternoon. Within half an hour, courtesy of her p She has also been born during Respect Life Month, observed by U.S. Catholics every October. All unknowingly, this beautiful, tiny, new human being embodies the theme of this year’s observance: “Each of us is a masterpiece of God’s creation.” This is not an idle claim, but a solid scriptural truth. In fact, it is the foundation of our identity, of our irreplaceable value, and of our incalculable dignity. How could it be otherwise when we have been created as sons and daughters of the most high God, who delights in us every bit as much as Amelia’s parents delight in her? From the beginning, this has been so. In the creation story of Genesis 1, we read something utterly extraordinary. After creating the heavens and the earth and all that is in them, God says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them.” Then or now, this claim cannot be made for any other creature. Human beings, and we alone, are made in the image of God himself. Made like God, we are able to think and able to love; we have also been endowed with the freedom and the will to choose for or against these goods. But written into our very nature is a hunger for authentic love, and for the God who is love. The God who has revealed himself as a Trinity of loving persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—has created us to share forever in his own free, permanent, faithful, fruitful love. This calling, this destiny, shapes our lives. Consider the cry of the psalmist (Ps. 8): “What is man that you should be mindful of him, or the son of man that you should care for him? You have made him little less than the angels, and crowned him with honor and glory. You have given him rule over the works of your hands, putting all things under his feet.” There is mystery here, and something more. How can we even imagine the value God places on each one of us, to have made us little less than angels and to have crowned us with honor and glory? We are not some sort of anonymous product, mass produced for no particular purpose by an indifferent but powerful being. Rather, the creator of the universe, who has chosen to create each of us, calls us by name and reminds us (Is 43): “You are precious in my eyes, you are honored and I love you.” Amelia and every baby, indeed every human person, bears this indelible imprint of the glory of God. The richness of this knowledge can comfort and inspire us, challenge and change us. It can even move us to pray with Psalm 139: “I give you thanks that I am fearfully, wonderfully made.” The theme for the 2014 observance of Respect Life Month is “Each of Us is a Masterpiece of God’s Creation.”
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roud grandfather, we were looking at a lovely photo of Amelia Grace and her parents. Amelia has been born to loving parents, and into the warm embrace of a huge extended family. 