She Is Beauty

The guest last week on Life on the Rock (I typically listen to the program on podcast the week after it airs) was Eric Genuis, a composer and concert pianist. I was previously familiar with his work only in connection to the Passion meditation performed by Radix (Doug Barry acting with Eric Genuis providing live musical accompaniment).

Toward the end of the program, Eric discusses some of his charitable involvement, and his enthusiasm for working with the pro-life movement. It turns out that some of his motivation comes from his own daughter.

I have a daughter with Down syndrome. She’s five years old. I call her the Master of Disaster. There is nothing in my house she can’t break. I promise you that. She’s a beautiful little girl. Through abortion, most – a high percentage, over 90 percent of these children – when detected early, they are aborted, and it just breaks my heart. I cannot tell you the gift this child is. If you gave me a magic wand, I wouldn’t change her for the world. This girl is love itself. She is beautiful.

I talk about her at every concert, because you know there’s going to be someone in that audience who has a relationship in the future – some cousin or aunt or uncle – that may end up with a child or know somebody who may be pregnant with a child who has Down syndrome or with other defects. You realize we are made in the image of God. That alone gives us dignity, not what we accomplish. But my daughter has the same dignity. She’ll never be a beauty queen, she’ll never be a rocket scientist, but she is beauty, just inherently because she is made in the image of God. And so, I think more than ever, we have to really fight for life now.