Comment & Debate
Evangelium vitae. The Gospel of Life. Pope John Paul II. 1995 – “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you” (Jer 1:5): the life of every individual, from its very beginning, is part of God’s plan. Job, from the depth of his pain, stops to contemplate the work of God who miraculously formed his body in his mother’s womb. Here he finds reason for trust, and he expresses his belief that there is a divine plan for his life: “You have fashioned and made me; will you then turn and destroy me? Remember that you have made me of clay; and will you turn me to dust again? Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese? You clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews. You have granted me life and steadfast love; and your care has preserved my spirit” (Job 10:8-12). Expressions of awe and wonder at God’s intervention in the life of a child in its mother’s womb occur again and again in the Psalms. 35
How can anyone think that even a single moment of this marvellous process of the unfolding of life could be separated from the wise and loving work of the Creator, and left prey to human caprice? Certainly the mother of the seven brothers did not think so; she professes her faith in God, both the source and guarantee of life from its very conception, and the foundation of the hope of new life beyond death: “I do not know how you came into being in my womb. It was not I who gave you life and breath, nor I who set in order the elements within each of you. Therefore the Creator of the world, who shaped the beginning of man and devised the origin of all things, will in his mercy give life and breath back to you again, since you now forget yourselves for the sake of his laws” (2 Mac 7:22-23).