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“[O]nly in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light” (Gaudium et Spes, 22)
As we celebrate the Incarnation this Christmas season it is a wonderful time to reflect on the meaning of human life for, as Vatican II goes on to say:
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“Christ…fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear” (ibid)
There are many things that the Word made flesh reveals to us about the mystery of humanity, but let’s just start with the very beginning. In 2004, Jill Stanek wrote a column for WND on The Embryonic Jesus Story:
Luke 1 tells about the first person besides Jesus’ mother and earthly father who recognized He was extraordinary – Jesus’ cousin John, while John was yet a fetus, and Jesus was but an embryo.
The New Testament accounts of the Annunciation and Visitation clearly reveal for Christians that not only does human life begin well before birth (as science also clearly supports and new technology allows us to see), but that God, when he sent His only Son to bless the whole world, uniquely blessed all human life from the very moment of its inception.
By His Incarnation, Christ intimately united Himself to the entire human race and showed us the incomparable value of every human person. Not only did Christ elect to take on our human nature, becoming like us in all things but sin, but he chose to begin his life on earth as the weakest and most defenseless among us, an unborn child. Because of this saving event we realize the splendor of all human life – including the unborn child and the unformed embryo.
Related and worth reading: A Christmas View of Abortion