Highlights from the talk given by Dr Norman Ford SDB at the Stem Cell Debate in Washington at the Catholic University of America on 4 October 2004.
The biblical texts and the early Christian tradition, taken as a whole, portray God as actively present throughout the human formative process, and especially for the creation of each human being’s spiritual soul.
In biblical times it was simply taken for granted that any assault upon life in the womb was an offence against God and a rejection of the divine gift of life.
Biblical texts show they stand for a culture of prenatal life and provide strong theological grounds for saying that human embryos belong to God their Creator and for claiming that they have intrinsic value, worthy of absolute moral respect.
Respect for human embryos is based on the divinely conferred natural active potential of their genome to direct and organise continuous development and growth from conception to birth and to adulthood in accord with the Creator’s plan. The formative process of the developing embryo is naturally linked to its terminus, ie, a human being with a rational nature, a subject of inestimable worth and personal dignity, made in the image of God. All this, in my view, suffices to justify a duty of absolute respect for human embryos. The embryo is good in itself and endowed with moral inviolability.
If a materialistic philosophy is adopted, reference to humans made in God’s image and the sanctity of human life fades out of focus and utilitarianism moves to centre stage. Utilitarianism has a place in ethical decision making, but not as the fundamental criterion of morality, which is based on what is truly good for person(s) in accord with their natures. What is immoral in itself cannot be justified by good consequences: the end does not justify the means .
The moral inviolability of human embryos excludes research using human embryonic
(ES) cells obtained by the destruction of embryos. Ethically it makes no difference whether embryos are formed by IVF or cloning. The fact that excess frozen embryos are allowed to perish in any case does not justify killing live embryos for research or therapeutic purposes. It would be even worse to create embryos that are destined to be destroyed.
Any use of ES cells obtained by the destruction of human embryos would imply tacit approval of, or collusion with, their destruction. Researchers, then, should abandon using pluripotent ES cells, and concentrate on ethical alternatives such as adult stem cells, and especially pluripotent stem cells from placental cord blood. These have recently been discovered in Germany by Gesine Kögler and colleagues.
Dr Norman Ford SDB,
Director, Caroline Chisholm Centre for Health Ethics, East Melbourne
Co-author of Stem Cells.Science, Medicine, Law & Ethics , Norman Ford SDB, Ed. and Michael Herbert, St Pauls Publications, Strathfield, NSW, 2003.
Web site : www.chisholm.healthethics.com.au
1