Recently, we received positive feedback on some "truths" we have been bringing forward these past few months. In particular we make reference to the working of the pill and contraception.

A question was raised whether in-vitro fertilisation was an acceptable option for conceiving a baby. This procedure is not acceptable.

It involves the fertilisation of many ova to ensure one surviving and the subsequent destruction of the "extra" embryos - each a unique human life. The Pope recently re-enforced the Church's stance on the procedure as unethical, unacceptable and immoral.

Most Catholics who want to live a Godly life may not understand when life actually begins. Knowing this would enable us to work out these moral issues on our own. We need only understand that life begins at conception.

This is when the sperm (from the father) and the ovum (from the mother) unite and are fertilised. At this moment the life cycle for a human person begins.

The following quiz is an interesting way of learning when and how life begins.

Questions:

1. You started swimming and doing back flips:

1. When your mom was 6 months pregnant
2. 9 weeks
3. 8 months
4. Forget the back flips; you can't even do a good belly flop.

2. If you kept growing all 9 months at the same rate as you grew during your first 2 months, you would have been born as big as:

1. The Jolly Green Giant
2. An M-1 Tank
3. A pair of over fed elephants

3. When did you most likely feel pain for the first time?

1. When they cut your umbilical cord
2. When your mom was 9 weeks pregnant
3. After a big lunch in a cafeteria

4. By the time your mother was 8 weeks pregnant, you were:

1. A tiny speck smaller than the period at the end of a sentence
2. A miniature human with arms, legs and a heartbeat
3. A ball of cells the size of a marble

5. Your says you started to kick and poke her:

1. 3 months into pregnancy
2. At 4 months
3. Never mind when you started, when are you going to stop?

6. Five Months into the pregnancy you got a lot of hiccups because:

1. Your mom was pigging out on pickles, ice cream, pizza and sardines
2. You swallowed amniotic fluid
3. Your diaphragm was being formed
4. You couldn't find a bag to put over your head

7. Before you were born, your skin was:

1. As wrinkled as a California raisin
2. As waxy as a statue from Ripley's Believe it or Not museum
3. Both of the above

8. When did you start using your brain?

1. When your mom was 8 months pregnant
2. When she was 45 days pregnant
3. If you still haven't started using your brain, go to the next question

9. When was the colour of your hair determined?

1. At fertilisation
2. 3 months into pregnancy
3. Only your hairdresser knows for sure

10. Five months before you were born, your heart pumped enough blood every day to:

1. Overflow a coffee mug
2. Fill half a tank of a compact car
3. Fill an Olympic size swimming pool

11. When did you first start looking like either a boy or a girl?

1. The seventh month of pregnancy
2. The end of the second month
3. When the doctor announced to your parents "it's a .."

12. If your mother smoked while she was pregnant, you may have been born:

1. Overweight and overdue
2. Underweight and premature
3. With yellow teeth and a nagging cough

13. How premature can a baby be born and still survive?

1. 4 weeks early
2. 8 weeks early
3. 16 weeks early

14. When did you begin to look like your mom and dad?

1. When your mom was 6 months pregnant
2. When your mom was four months pregnant
3. Who cares when it happens - does anybody know a good plastic surgeon?

Answers to quiz

1. 2. At 9 weeks you can swim a mean backstroke. Your favourite technique was a little backwards walk, leading with your head.

2. 3. It's a good thing you slowed down after the second month, or your birth weight would have been 14 tons. Let Daddy try bouncing that on his knee!

3. 2. By 9 weeks all the structures necessary for pain sensation are functioning. You would try your hardest to avoid the source of pain.

4. 2. About 8 weeks after conception, all systems were go: skeletal, nervous, digestive, circulatory and respiratory. The only job left was to refine what you already had.

5. 2. At only a couple of months you started to shake, rattle and roll, but you were too little for mom to notice. By 4 or 5 months, however, she swore you had a black belt in karate.

6. 2. Not only does amniotic fluid make a cushy "water-bed", but it is also full of glucose (sugar). Swallowing the fluid was a good practice for your digestive system.

7. 3. About halfway through the pregnancy, you had lots of nice skin but not too much fat to fill it out. That's why premature babies look wrinkled; they need more "meat on their bones". The wax-works effect was caused by the vernix, a thick whitish cream which covered your skin to protect it from amniotic fluid.

8. 2. Electric brain waves have been traced as early as the sixth week. What do you suppose you were thinking about?

9. 1. At fertilisation, each parent contributed approximately 50,000 chemical "instruction sheets" (or genes) that determined not only what you will look like, but also your health, talents, tastes, athletic abilities, intelligence, allergies, and more.

10. 2. 4 months after conception you were pumping 6 1/2 gallons of blood each day through a body about as long as your hand is now. And it was your blood, not your mother's; you never shared her circulatory system. You may even have a completely different blood type.

11. 2. You were either male or female from the point of fertilisation, but it took about 60 days for parts to be recognisable. Thanks to modern science, parents can now see the sex of their unborn baby with the help of an ultra sound machine by about 4 months. At last, they can answer the age-old question: "What colour should I paint the nursery?"

12. 2. A smoking mom sends nicotine, carbon monoxide, carbon acid and wood alcohol right down the line to her baby. Smoking 2 packs a day reduces a baby's birth weight by 10% - which can seriously reduce the infant's chances of survival.

13. 3. With modern technology, babies as young as 22 weeks after conception, weighing 14 oz., have survived premature birth. You would need a lot of medical help, but would fight like a champion to hold on to life. (From fertilisation to birth is normally 38 weeks).

14. 2. During your fourth month, you grew to the grand height of 6 inches and began to resemble your parents. At 10 weeks you had a unique trait that may interest the FBI some day - fingerprints. Nobody ever had or will have the same set.

Quiz courtesy: Human Development Resource Council, Inc. www.hdrc.org

Need more information or have comments? Please feel free to contact us at Emmanuel Community - 628-1064, 628-1586.