What do different Christians think about the personhood of the
human embryo?
STUDENT PACK
1. Consider these introductory issues:
a) What is PERSONHOOD?
b) Why is the issue of PERSONHOOD significant in discussions of IVF, abortion,
contraception and other early human life issues?
c) What makes someone/something a PERSON?
2a. Views of different denominations and thinkers on the personhood of the
early human embryo
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In your small group, read and discuss the text you are allocated:
o The Catholic Church
o The Church of England
o Bryant & Searle: Life in Our Hands.
o John R Ling: When Does Human Life Begin? See, especially, chapter 2 (pp.
7-15) of the pdf at: www.christian.org.uk/resources/publications/medicalethics/
o Peter Saunders: The moral status of the embryo.
At least one of your group will need to take notes on the discussion. You should
nominate someone (or a couple of people) from your group to be a spokesperson
and feed back to the class a summary of what you have read and your group
responses to these questions:
o When does this text suggest personhood begins?
o Why does this denomination / thinker argue this? How do they arrive at this
understanding of personhood?
o In what way is this a convincing argument?
o What are the limitations of this stance? Do you find it convincing – why? If not,
why might others find its conclusions appealing?
You should give reasons for your answers, referring back to your text to back up
your statements.
2b. Arguing the case FOR or AGAINST the personhood of the early human
embryo
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Again, you will be studying in small groups. Your task is to create a persuasive
leaflet or poster which attempts to argue the case, within a Christian framework,
for EITHER the developing human being possessing personhood from
fertilisation, OR from implantation. Your document, however, is going to have an
added level of interest – it will be interactive and will use a new form of
technology that your audience may not be familiar with: Augmented Reality.
This is provided by LAYAR and is fully explained on their website:
www.layar.com.
Part of your task, then, is to become familiar with this yourself and use it to its
best advantage with your leaflet / poster. The interactive element means that the
leaflet looks like a normal information document but, when scanned with a
smartphone/tablet, allows the reader to link straight through to further information
sources on the topic. You decide which information sources to point your
audience towards. You can get ideas from the ‘further resources’ section and
your own explorations. You might want to find YouTube videos, academic
articles, news articles, websites and more.
You will present the result to the class at a time to be decided by your teacher.
Each group should present leaflets to their classmates for the purposes of
revision, either individual copies or by way of display in the classroom.
You will need to work really well as a team to achieve this task, particularly
because it has two layers: the information on the physical leaflet itself AND the
interactive, web-based information you are directing the reader towards.
Make sure your group has the following materials:
o student instruction packs (this document);
o the denomination / thinker texts from activity 2a;
o the Thinkpiece by Cherryl Hunt;
o access to a computer;
o at least one smartphone / tablet per group (download the LAYAR app –
Android or iOS).
Build your team:
o Consider the skills you have in your group. You will need to work out who is
most comfortable with public speaking, researching, creative design,
technology, persuasive writing etc., so that you use your team effectively.
o One or two of your team should take responsibility for the digital aspect of
your leaflet. They will need to learn how to use the LAYAR technology
(through www.layar.com) and upload the team’s work. However, remember
that the physical document needs to be finished before you can add the
interactive material;
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Make a plan of action before you start, as this will save you time later on, and
allocate tasks. Make sure everyone knows what they need to achieve by the end
of the lesson/day/week or before you next meet as a group.
Make sure you communicate as much as possible. Think through the
perspective of the person or group you are representing and who their audience
is. You could choose to focus on a particular audience (school groups, the
general public, law-makers, families, teachers).
Build into your discussion some mention of the implications for early human life
issues such as abortion, stem cell research, saviour siblings, cloning and IVF. In
other words, if one accepts the stance you are arguing for, what is the knock-on
effect for people who request an abortion or try to conceive using IVF, for
example?
Use different kinds of research in your team’s work, e.g., design a brief
questionnaire that could be used to survey people’s attitudes to early human life.
Consider the context of the sources your team investigates: what are the
underpinning beliefs of those who produced the materials?
Consider the potential challenges to the perspective you are presenting. For
example, how do the issues of non-implanting blastocysts, natural abortion
(miscarriage), twinning and chimaeras have an impact on your argument?
Bear in mind the perspective of the other groups, too. Your argument would be
stronger if you could counter-argue their points through your work.
Additional Resources:
 Here are some resources you might find useful when trying to put together your
leaflet / poster. It is really important to use these resources critically. Is what
they say true? When were they written and are they out of date? Are they biased
or trying to convince you of something? Are they understating important
perspectives related to this issue or sensationalising the issue? Have they
missed out points which you think are really important?
 Try to use a variety of media in your digital content such as text, video, images,
news articles, surveys, academic articles. You are not limited to using the
resources below. Make sure you read through / watch everything you choose to
include to check that it really is suitable!
Variety of Perspectives on Personhood:
 www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2004/july/7.24.html?start=5
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personhood
 www.personhoodusa.com/ (Pro-life)
 www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCNz95E-3Wg (Peter Singer)
Christian opinions:
 www.thatreligiousstudieswebsite.com/Ethics/Applied_Ethics/Abortion/abortion_ch
ristian.php
 www.churchofengland.org/our-views/medical-ethics-health-social-carepolicy/hfea.aspx
 www.churchofengland.org/media/1262609/gs1511.pdf
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Intervention by the Holy See at the Special Committee of the 57th General
Assembly of the United Nations on Human Embryonic Cloning 2002:
www.vatican.va/roman_curia/secretariat_state/documents/rc_segst_doc_20020923_martino-cloning_en.html;
See the Thinkpiece by Cherryl Hunt.
Biblical texts often used in the debate (use Bibles or use www.biblegateway.com):
 Genesis 1.26-27; 2.5-9; 9.1-17;
 Exodus 20.1-17;
 Deuteronomy 5.1-21;
 Job 10.8-12;
 Psalm 139.13-16;
 Ecclesiastes 11.5;
 Isaiah 49.1-6;
 Jeremiah 1.4-8;
 Luke 1.26-45.
General Sources:
Ethics of abortion and the status of the embryo:
 www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eQdC42V0L4 (Westminster Debate 2013)
 www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/abortion/
 www.thatreligiousstudieswebsite.com/Include_TRSW/Sections/abortion.php
 www.philosophicalinvestigations.co.uk/
Stem Cell Research Ethics:
 www.wellcome.ac.uk/About-us/Policy/Spotlight-issues/Human-Fertilisation-andEmbryology-Act/Stem-cell-basics/WTD040077.htm
 www.bbsrc.ac.uk/stemcellsresource/
IVF Ethics:
 www.youtube.com (search 4ThoughtTV IVF)
 www.rsrevision.com/Alevel/ethics/