Life

I was born into a family of ten children. I was the third one. In my position, I was able to witness the arrival of many beautiful babies that I loved and protected as if they were mine. It was a blessed life.

I was eighteen-years-old when the last of my siblings was born in 1970. At that time, there were eight children under 12 at home. My home was good enough for all of us (my father had built us a house) and even though we were poor, we had food, we had shelter and we had God. We had a good life.

I was on my mother’s side as a young teenager every time she was pregnant, but I never realized it because she was extremely discreet and being a little “chubby” she was able to conceal it. She would not say anything, except to my father I guess, but the rest of us will learn of the new arrival just the day she left for the delivery at the hospital. Sometimes, it could be a strange life.

I only knew of my last brother’s birth a few months before. My mother was in a little distress; she was feeling a little overwhelmed with so many children already and that’s how I learned that she was expecting again. And I say a little because my mother never exaggerated. I think she was tired and not too happy. She had a busy life.

My father was a responsible man as I have never met one. He worked and provided for all of us. He built our house with the help of his brothers and was always looking for ways to improve our lives. I think my father was just perfect. Everything he created with his hands (from a wooden box to a house and everything in between) was a work of art. And yes, my father was a Christian who knew the Bible and worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. We had a safe life.

In all our distresses as a large family, I will never forget the face of my father every time a new baby came home. His face will illuminate with a glow from heaven when he saw his children for the first time. He was the happiest man on Earth. It was like if that eighth, or ninth, or tenth child was the first, the only one, to him. I believe that all the sadness and fears of my mother during her pregnancies, dissipated at the very moment her husband saw his new-borns because his face was a diamond to behold. It was a wonderful life.

At first, as I was growing up, I did not understand why my father was so happy, but through the years (almost every year) I started sharing in that joy and felt the love that surrounded us from birth. It is a vivid memory planted in my heart forever. It gives me life.

As time went by, I started questioning the wisdom of having large families, mainly because I was reading about new things available to women to avoid pregnancy. It was the time of the creation of pill contraceptives. I remember my reaction when the doctor who created this pill asserted that if he were a woman he would never take it. It was horrifying to me.

I even questioned the wisdom of my father, How could a man with so many children be so happy for one more? People around were looking at us like freaks in a circus. Women were told to avoid pregnancy and eventually to abort the fruit of their womb. And men did not care anymore. Life in the world became despicable and terrifying.

I became a teacher, got married and never got pregnant. I remember one day, early in my marriage, something came to me that made me feel extremely desirous of having a child. It was like deep in my heart I yearned for a child. I cried, I prayed (because I also know the Bible and worship the Lord Jesus Christ) but nothing happened. I never had a child of my own. I just thanked God and accepted my life.

Today, I have a new life. I am a 66-year-old widow witnessing the life of this world crumbling around. Children do not bring joy anymore to our society. There are mediocre leaders laughing, cheering and applauding at the prospect of killing children legally. These mediocre leaders only live to care about money, power and the destruction of the rest of us. They have chosen death. They have no life.

And I wonder, How can a mother-to-be destroy her own child? How can a man be so irresponsible to allow his child to be destroyed? How can people who seem to be intelligent get caught in the lies of the wicked and be able to destroy their own flesh? There are answers to these questions in the light of God, and everyone is encouraged to find them. These are the matters of life.

For now, just a word to the men and women who have allowed strangers to lead them in the way of destruction: change and choose life. Stop paying attention to the hypnotizing voices of the evil enchanters. Take a grip on your life. Turn around and start thinking for yourself. Seek and find the true life.

Men and women should understand that promiscuity and sexual gratification alone do not lead to happiness. It leads to pain, destruction, and regret. God commands His children to keep pure, to do good and to walk in the way of righteousness. Abortion and the killing of new-borns is evil, it is the way of death.

I know it is by the Grace of God that we are what we are, but God says that even the wild beasts care for their offspring. How much more humans should? It is a sad hour for our communities when many young men and women love the pleasures of the flesh before the safety of marriage and a home. They have not learned to nurture their lives.

As a child, I was blessed with a home where there were love, peace, and safety for each and every child God sent to it. A home with a man and a woman who cherished their children as gifts from God, each one different and unique but welcomed all the same. A home with no excess (and a few times scarcity) but we all were greeted at birth with exceeding joy. All of us have hidden within our hearts that joy shining on my father’s face as he smiled at us when we arrived into the world. That is life.