The Blog

Happy New Year and, more importantly, a blessed solemnity of Mary the Mother of God!

Andrea Solario, Madonna With the Green Cushion

The body is noble because the Son of God, in assuming flesh, did not do so by appearing in the full bloom and blossom of manhood. He thought so much of it that He took His Body from the body of a woman: “He took birth from woman” (Gal. 4:4). Like every body that He made, His, too, drew nourishment from her body and blood; like all children of men, was nursed at her breasts and remained with her for thirty years in obedience. It is thanks to a body that the world could see God in the form of a man; it is thanks to a body that this God-man could utter the sweetest word that has rung down the corridors of history: “Mother.” (Ven. Fulton Sheen, Three to Get Married)

“Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed” (Lk. 11:27) Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of death. Amen.

A voice is heard in Ramah, lamenting and weeping bitterly: it is Rachel weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted for her children, because they are no more. -Jeremiah 31:15

Today, December 28, the Church remembers the “Holy Innocents” who lost their lives in Bethlehem shortly after Christ’s birth.

Then it was all boys age two and under who were put to death at the hands of King Herod and his soldiers because of Herod’s fear of the prophecy of the Messiah. Now over 4,000 innocent children of both genders lose their lives every day in this country because of abortion. And let’s not forget the unknown number of innocent lives sacrificed on the altars of science and reproductive “rights”.

Much like the Holy Innocents of yesterday, the murder of today’s innocents is also blessed by our Government.

As we remember the Holy innocents of yesterday, perhaps we should also request their intercession and appeal to God’s mercy on behalf of the millions of innocents being slaughtered here and around the world today.

We rejoice in the glory of Jesus Christ, who conquered the enemy not by force of arms but with a white-robed army of children! -Lauds 12/28

**image of ‘Slaughter of the Innocents’, Duccio di Buoninsegna

This is a classic post, from Msgr. Charles Pope on “Bioethics and the Birth of Christ”:

As we approach Christmas we ought to ponder the magnificence of human conception, gestation, birth and life. Even as we extoll the birth of Jesus, we also do well to acknowledge the awesome and mysterious truth that every human person emerges not merely from a biological process, but from the very mind and heart of God, from his will and as an act of his love. None of us are here by accident.

He goes on to discuss the many ways that God’s sovereignty over human conception and life are usurped or ignored in modern times via In Vitro Fertilization, irreverence for sexuality, abortion, and rejection of the disabled and the imperfect. Read the whole thing.

In recent decades the creation of new human life has become nothing more than a biological formula — a science experiment, rather than the mysterious fruit of a loving act between husband and wife.

“When life is merely a technology to do with as we please,” Msgr Pope writes, “it is not long before we end up in some pretty dark places.”

Since the creation of human life has been taken out of the womb and into the science lab we’ve seen some pretty dark stuff: women exploited and abused, babies bought and sold on the black market…

And now we are moving closer and closer to genetically-engineering our children and, consequently, altering the genetic future of humanity.

Let us remember

In Gaudium et Spes we read: “[O]nly in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light” (22)

By His Incarnation, Christ intimately united Himself to the entire human race and showed us the incomparable value of every human person from the very beginning and reminded us that God alone is the author of all human life.

While we are called to cooperate with Him in the mystery of creation, the initiative, says Msgr. Pope, is always God’s. We do not have the authority to take matters of — either the beginning or the end of — human life into our own hands.

I’m always amazed when people try to come up with a religious argument for supporting the destruction of nascent human life. I’ve heard the “abortion isn’t mentioned in the bible” line and, of course, the excuse that some fathers of the Church thought ensoulment was delayed till a few weeks after conception.

That’s why I love today’s feast commemorating the Immaculate Conception, a doctrine that was verified by the Immaculate Virgin herself.

God did not choose to purify the womb that would carry His son at some random point in her development outside the womb like, say, her presentation and dedication in the temple or at the Annunciation, both of of which would have seemed appropriate or reasonable. Rather, he chose to preserve the sinlessness of the Mother of God from the very moment of her conception inside the womb of St. Anne.

This, like the Incarnation itself and the scene at the Visitation when the unborn John the Baptist leaped for joy in the womb of St. Elizabeth, illustrates the significance and the sacredness of all life before birth from its very beginning.

Let us pray on this day that such innocent life may once again be preserved and protected in our Nation through the intercession of this Immaculate Mother, Patroness of our Land.

O, Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!

Img: St. Anne Conceiving the Virgin Mary, Jean Bellegambe.