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Human intervention in
the created order
7. To begin with, we would
like to deal briefly with a fundamental question that, generally, is posed by
the different religious traditions, albeit with different accents: this
concerns the possibility itself that man may licitly intervene in the realities
that exist in the universe in general and, more particularly, in those things
that concern animals.
In view of the more
specifically theological nature of such a question, we deem it useful to offer
a short summary of the Catholic position on this question, applying the
language and the methods proper to theological anthropology.
By what right can
humans, whom God created as female and male, and whose full human dignity must
be recognized at every stage of life, intervene in the created order, perhaps
even modifying some of its aspects? What criteria must be adopted and what
limitations must be introduced?
From imagery of the account of creation "in six days",(50) it is evident that God established a hierarchy of
values among the various creatures. Moreover, this hierarchy also emerges from
a rational consideration of the transcendent richness and dignity of the human
person.
Man, created "in
the image and likeness of God", is placed at the centre and at
the summit of the created order, not only because everything that exists
is intended for him, but also because woman and man have the task of
co-operating with the Creator in leading creation to its final perfection.
"Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it" (Gen
1: 28): this is the mandate that God gives to human beings,
"dominion" over the created order, in his name. In this regard, Pope
John Paul II writes in his encyclical "Laborem Exercens": "Man is the
image of God partly through the mandate received from his Creator to subdue, to
dominate, the earth. In carrying out this mandate, man, every human being,
reflects the very action of the Creator of the universe".(51)
This, therefore, is the
deepest meaning of the action of man in relation to the created universe:
certainly not that of arbitrarily "lording it over" the other
creatures, reducing them to humiliating and destructive slavery in order to satisfy
any whim that he may have, but to guide, through his responsible work, the life
of the creation towards the authentic and integral good of man (the whole man
and every man).
Certain documents of the
Second Vatican Council had already affirmed this truth. In "Lumen
Gentium", for example, we read: "Therefore, by their
competence in secular disciplines and by their activity, interiorly raised up
by grace, they (the laity) must work earnestly in order that created goods
through human labour, technical skill and civil culture may serve the utility
of all men according to the plan of the Creator and the light of his Word. May
these goods be more suitably distributed among all men and in their own way may
they be conducive to universal progress, in human and Christian liberty".(52) Also the decree of the Second
Vatican Council on the apostolate of the laity takes up this idea when it
asserts that "this natural goodness of theirs (of the realities that
make up the temporal order) receives an added dignity from their relation with
the human person, for whose use they have been created".(53)
In summary, therefore,
there should be a reaffirmation of the right and duty of man, according to the
mandate from his Creator and never against the natural order established by
him, to act within the created order and on the created order, making use as
well, of other creatures, in order to achieve the final goal of all
creation: the glory of God and the full and definitive bringing about of
His Kingdom, through the promotion of man. The words of St. Irenaeus of
Lyons still ring out with all their truth: "Living man is the glory
of God and man's life is the vision of God".(54)
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