Will emerge for the rest of my life

Earlier this week I read a news article that really touched the inner depths of my emotions.  It was about a very special baby who recently celebrated his first birthday.  

What’s so special about that?

Well this special baby was born missing a large part of his head and skull and most of his brain.  He wasn’t expected to survive more than a few days after he was born last year.

Little Jaxon Buell was born with a birth defect called anencephaly.  It’s a defect that occurred because the beginnings of his nervous system formed incorrectly while he was growing in his mother’s womb.

One of the things I read that really touched my heart was about how Jaxon is actually talking and teaching himself how to communicate in his own way.  Like a normal baby, he cries when he’s hungry.

Jaxon’s condition is extremely rare because he has a combination of both a small head, malformed brain and no brain hemispheres.  He and his parents face the sad prospects of no known cure.

I can’t help but wonder how many parents wouldn’t have been brave as Jaxon’s parents were in choosing life for their precious little birth-defect baby.  In the abortion-on-demand world in which we now live, perhaps some would have chosen an abortion to spare themselves of the misery witnessing a birth-defect baby.

Truly Jaxon’s parents believe, as does this middle-aged man, that life begins at conception and ends at a natural death only God knows when that’ll be.  I admire Jaxon’s parents for their powerful witness of the sanctity of life.

Another thing that touched my heart deeply was reading what Jaxon’s father said about the experience of being his father.  He shared how Jaxon's tiny footprints will have a lasting impression on this world, and that little Jaxon has already touched and inspired more lives in one year than most of us ever will in our lifetime.  

Dad also added that thanks to Jaxon’s life, he is better, blessed, grateful and one proud father.

Thinking about how life would be without a brain is unimaginable and makes me privately reflect in disgust about the times I do not use my brain and intelligence to their fullest potential for benevolent purposes.  Like times when I allow my thoughts to loiter in the depths of malcontent, idleness, negative thinking and other malevolent states of mind with no lasting intrinsic value. 

I hope in this private reflection, brought on by learning about little Jaxon Buell whose life with all its challenges is nonetheless a precious gift from God, that a better me with better thoughts and use of my brain will emerge for the rest of my life.

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum