The penguin dad

الْوَدُودُ

al-Wadūd · The Loving, who is loved

Antarctica is the coldest place on Earth. In winter the sun hardly rises at all. The wind howls across the ice, colder than the inside of your freezer.

And in the middle of it all stands a penguin dad, holding an egg.

He is an emperor penguin, the biggest penguin in the world. The penguin mum laid the egg and passed it to him very carefully, from her feet to his. Then she walked all the way to the sea to find food.

Now the dad has a job. He balances the egg on the tops of his feet. He tucks it under a warm fold of feathery skin, like a cosy pouch. If the egg touched the ice, even for a moment, it would freeze.

So he stands. Day after day, week after week. He does not go to the sea to eat. He does not even lie down. For about nine weeks, all through the dark winter, he keeps his egg warm.

When the storms come, thousands of dads huddle together in a big crowd. They shuffle slowly round so that everyone gets a turn in the warm middle.

At last, there is a crack, and a tap, and a fluffy grey chick peeps out. Soon after, the mum comes back from the sea, with food for the chick.

Why does the penguin dad do it? He does not get paid. He does not get a medal. He just keeps his chick safe, because that is what he was made to do.

Muslims have a Name for God that is about love. It is al-Wadūd, the Loving. It means God loves His creatures, and it also means He is the One who is loved. His love is not like a swap, where you get love only if you are good enough. It is warm and steady, like the penguin dad’s feet in the storm.

The Qur’an says: “He is the Forgiving, the Loving.” In the Hebrew Bible, God says to His people: “I have loved thee with an everlasting love.” And Christians often say, from the New Testament: “God is love.”

So who keeps you warm? Who stands with you when things are hard? And who could you keep warm?

Watch together

▶Penguins Huddle To Keep Their Eggs Warm | Natural World: Penguins Of The Antarctic | BBC Earth · BBC Earth

Emperor penguin dads huddle together to keep their eggs warm, from BBC Earth.

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