This isn't new ground we are plowing here. I'm recapping it because I want to make an application. The foundation is simply that we have a view of the world which entails God's role as a central figure in everything. God is responsible for everything, including the creation of man, which means that man is a particular kind of creature. Man is a creature with a soul.
Animals have souls, too, but man's soul is different.
Man's soul has the imprint of the Creator. The Scriptures identify the fact that we're made in the image of God, and that somehow our non- physical selves, our souls, bear a likeness to God that nothing else in Creation bears. This is what gives us special value. But the Scriptures don't spend a lot of time talking about what this means. If you recall in Genesis 9, after the flood, capital punishment was instituted for the first time.