VATICAN CITY, FEB 27, 2006 (VIS) - Benedict XVI today received participants in the general assembly of the Pontifical Academy for Life which is currently considering the theme of "the human embryo prior to implantation."
The Pope described the theme as "fascinating, but difficult and arduous given the delicate nature of the subject being examined and the complexity of epistemological problems concerning the relationship" between experimental scientific data and reflection on anthropological values.
After recalling that Holy Scripture "expresses the love of God towards all human beings even before they take form in the mother's womb," the Holy Father affirmed: "The love of God does not distinguish between the newly-conceived infant still in its mother's womb, the baby, the youth, the grown adult or the elderly, because in each of them He sees the sign of His own image and likeness."
"This limitless and almost incomprehensible love of God for man reveals to what point human beings are worthy of love in themselves, regardless of any other consideration, be it intelligence, beauty, health, youth, integrity and so on. Human life is a good thing, always and definitively."
Benedict XVI went on to make it clear that "in man, in all men and women, whatever their stage or condition of life, there shines a reflection of God's own reality. For this reason, the Magisterium of the Church has constantly proclaimed the sacred and inviolable nature of each human life, from conception to natural end. This moral judgement also holds at the beginning of an embryo's life, even before it is implanted in the mother's womb."
Referring to research into the origins of life, "a mystery which science will be able to illuminate ever more clearly, though with difficulty will it decipher it altogether," the Pope indicated that "those who love truth must be aware that research into such profound themes puts us in the position of seeing and almost touching the hand of God. Beyond the limits of experimental methods, at the confines of the area that some call meta-analysis, where sensorial perception and scientific tests are neither enough or even possible, that is where the adventure of transcendence begins."
AC/HUMAN EMBRYO/... VIS 20060227 (370)
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