It is God that is the Giver of life

Fr. IRENEUSZ SKUBIŚ

Life is an act of God’s creative power. Lord God is the Creator of life; he is its Giver. We look at life, a living cell and admire its excellence. Each cell is unique, both a plant cell and an animal cell, but the human cell is the most extraordinary and wonderful one. But we are to speak about man’s life, about the fact that it is a creation of God. Man was created in the image and likeness of God. We all know it and speak about it. But we should also realise that when we reflect on life we approach God closely. Living God is behind the wall of life. It is him that by creating life shows that life exists since he defined himself, ‘I Am who I Am’ (Exodus 3:14). When we look at life we can see that it is a wonderful God’s idea. Contemporary man, dealing with life, makes a certain interference in God’s plan of salvation; he understands life his own way. Thus he takes risky actions violating this beautiful, unexplainable life in its full expression. And then one can say that life cries. We imagine a child crying. It defends itself by crying. A child is born crying and with its cry it enters the reality of the world. When a child cries his parents know he needs something important. This cry of a little child is something very essential and meaningful since it shows as if the extraordinary weakness of human being that defends the value of life; defends its sanctity. God used weakness to show his power… Lord God wants to tell us that as people we must feel great fear and awe facing child’s cry. He orders us to turn back because there are limits of man’s interference in these uniquely delicate areas of essential matters connected with him. Reality can be brutalised so easily, can be tested and the holy rights concerning the most important matters can be trampled. On the one hand, we have the great gentleness of God the Creator and on the other hand, we have such ruthless activities of man who is only an accidental being. Here the sin of atheism, i.e. sin of rejecting God, the Creator of heaven and earth, sounds in a particular way. We have actually accepted that the sin of atheism is only the attitude of some people and it is nothing special when someone says, ‘I am a non-believer.’ Unfortunately, this attitude is connected with the conviction that man can also enter the world that is the domain of the Creator. Can one do that without any consequences?…’ I Am who I Am.’ This is the way God defined his existence in the world and it is as if the simplest definition but at the same time it expresses the definition of God’s Essence in the fullest way. The fact that he is belongs to his essence. He is the Creator of life and this life is the strongest testimony of his existence. Living creatures and this smallest trace of life – cell, is the greatest testimony of God, is the light that illuminates ways to God. That’s why it is so important to us to have the awareness that every life is holy because it was created by God who is Holy, Powerful and Immortal. It means that life deserves the biggest respect and one should honour life to the greatest extent. The world and human existence depend on man’s attitude towards life. Perhaps we should shout to contemporary people, ‘Do not dare to destroy life that is holy’… Man can trample God’s plan of salvation. Man can reject faith in God the Creator and can tell God, ‘I do not recognise you. I think that all things that were created, including cells, happened accidentally, by themselves.’ But the reason shows us that there is some huge eternal order, that there is a world of mutual dependences, that the principle of causality, which says that all that is in our view of the world has its cause, functions. Perhaps those who have rejected God in their lives will laugh at the principles that St Thomas Aquinas reminded people of in such a rational way. Nevertheless, the extraordinary facts we observe in the life of nature, and above all the fact of life itself, living cell, living man, is a sufficient proof of God’s existence. St Irenaeus said, ‘Gloria Dei vivens homo’ – The glory of God is a person who is fully alive.’ Let us remember these words very firmly.

"Niedziela" 12/2011

Editor: Tygodnik Katolicki "Niedziela", ul. 3 Maja 12, 42-200 Czestochowa, Polska
Editor-in-chief: Fr Jaroslaw Grabowski • E-mail: redakcja@niedziela.pl