With the wonder of modern medicine we have known for sometime it was to be a little boy we were expecting. A great-grandchild has come to our family. He arrived in the night last night. He lives in Nova Scotia so we won’t get to meet him in person for quite some time but we are over-the-moon happy to know he is here safely. As his mother said about a month ago, “It’s hard work making a human being.”! And the last month of waiting has been long for us, so I can only imagine how impatient the parents were these last few days.
A new generation, a new life, it is quite miraculous. Of course science can explain the process of procreation, but it is impossible to explain the welling up of emotion that comes when a baby is born. The delight, the wonder, the mystery, the awe, as we count ten tiny fingers and ten tiny toes, stare into two perfect eyes and trace the folds of tiny ears, kiss a button nose and watch little lips suckle for the first time. It is beyond science to explain the love that washes over, as a newborn steals your heart.
I read in the paper that expectant mothers that have fled Syria are giving birth in the refugee camps and at way-stations along the way. I wonder how it feels for them to hear the cries of life, as their infant takes breath for the first time. How does it feel to hold a baby when you have had to flee your home and have no home to go to?
Today we are saying prayers of gratitude for the safe arrival of our little one and prayers of intercession for mothers who give birth everywhere.
