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Is Wanting a Child “Soul-less Scientism”?

by Gabrielle on December 2nd, 2007

I was just remarking to my husband that with all of the hullaballoo over stem cell research and focus on pro-life/anti-choice activism, it seems as if the organized church has kind of turned a blind eye to in vitro fertilization and other assisted reproduction techniques. Oh sure, the Catholic Church sees such things as “gravely evil acts” but I really haven’t heard a lot of outcry from my former fellow churchgoers. At least not recently. Could it be that IVF has slipped under the radar of evangelists, clergy and other religious leaders who are usually so vocal about anything involving female sexuality and reproduction?

I’m not complaining.

I found this article from the Associated Baptist Press, which I found to be fairly written and sincere in its exploration of ethical issues surrounding ART:

“No clear ethical line exists when it comes to fertility treatments,” said Jonathan Tran, a Baylor University ethics professor. “Rather than ethics not being able to keep up with technology, it’s more the case that technology creates its own ethics.”

The article goes on to explore the ethics of embryo adoption - the donation of unused embryos created during the IVF process to another infertile couple.

In a Boston Globe column, Susan Crockin, a reproduction and adoption lawyer, said that forcing “adoption frameworks” onto frozen embryos elevates one religious doctrine — conservative Christianity — over others.

“Changing the vocabulary to blur the distinction between four- to eight-cell embryos and born children — by naively or intentionally using terms like ‘embryo adoption,’ ‘pre-born children’ or ‘microscopic Americans’ and those who create them ‘parents’ — is not only legally wrong, but…bad public policy,” she wrote.

As a former Catholic and a present infertile, I am constantly annoyed by the “It’s god’s will” comments that clutter news articles that focus on infertility. Yet I am fascinated by this discussion and the ethical, political and as Ms. Crocklin notes, public policy questions that it raises.

While Ms. Elliott does a nice job of presenting facts and balancing her article with points and counterpoints, a recent lecture by Dr. Leon Kass at the Manhattan Institute sounds pretty nihilistic in his assurances that we are already headed towards hell in a hand basket because of…

“The Pill. In vitro fertilization. Surrogate wombs. Cloning. Genetic engineering. Organ swapping. Mechanical spare parts. Performance–enhancing drugs. Computer implants into brains. Ritalin for the young, Viagra for the old, Prozac for everyone. Virtually unnoticed, the train to Huxley’s dehumanized Brave New World has already left the station,” Kass said.

Damn, Dr. Kass, you’re kind of throwing everything but the kitchen sink into your analysis there, aren’t you? At least that is how www.lifesite.net presents it. I plan on reading the full text of doc’s October 2007 lecture because I want to know more about the “soul-less scientism” that he feels is pervading our modern world.

I don’t think wanting a child is soul-less. In fact, it’s quite the contrary.

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