I just watched one of the most moving films/documetaries of my life. It’s a film called March of the Penguins. It is particularly about the Emporer Penguins that mainly live and breed in Antarctica. I first want to preface my remarks here by saying that I highly recommend everyone watch this film. It is stunning in its sheer beauty of photography, but quite refreshingly, the story outshines its pictures.

There is no way I can ruin this movie for you if you haven’t seen it but I want to give a little background to it before I actually comment on what it means to me. The movie chronicles the life style and the breeding cycle of the Emporer Penguin. They live and breed in the most harsh envioronment on the planet earth. They walk for a little less than twenty days, almost if not more than seventy miles to the place where each one of them was born and have been born for thousands of years. The average tempreture there is around 80 degrees below zero with winds of over 100 miles per hour. They meet, mate and breed and endure 8 months of winter that exists nowhere on this earth. Once the mother produces the egg, she passes the egg onto the father for protection from the cold while she returns to the sea to feed. The father will guard the egg and go without food for over four months. The mother will walk the seventy miles or so to get food for herself and her egg. She has now walked 140 miles, basically starving, to get food for her young. Meanwhile the father will stand starving protecting the life of the newborn chick for another month while he himself is starving. During this time many of the eggs and or chicks will not survive. In fact some fathers themselves will not survive. The mothers meanwhile having made it back to the sea risk death themselves from the predators in the water that are hungry too.

The mothers who survive the second journey and have now filled their bellies with food must now make the 70 mile journey a third time. Upon their return, both parents help and nurture the chick until it can thrive outside the protective cover of their parents feet and stomachs.

During the next several months the sea ice begins to melt and both parents take turns returning to the sea feeding and caring for the newborn chick until finally the chicks can make it on their own. Finally, the parents return to the sea leaving their chicks behind for the last time never to see them again for 4 years. The chicks meanwhile will stand at waters edge for another month until finally, they jump into the water never to return to the breeding ground for four years.

There are many stories in nature that are similar to this but this one stands out for so many reasons. In an age where we have suicide bombers and parents that throw their children into garbage cans or do the most unspeakable things to their kids, here is a story of great love, dedication and sacrifice. Watching this film helped me remember that the hand of God reaches all creatures great and small. Somehow in His infinate wisdom he has given us an example of perfect love that even a child can understand. Maybe if more of us could watch this film, perhaps we would love our children more than we do, and the world would be a better place.