embryo adoption

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reidtgang

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What are the churches teachings on embryo adoption and are there church writings on this subject.
 
But wouldn’t adopting an embryo mean IVF has to be a part of this?
 
yessisan said:
But wouldn’t adopting an embryo mean IVF has to be a part of this?
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No, it means IVF already took place and a tiny human person exists.

Again, the Church has not given any definite teaching, although moral theologians and ethicists have been discussing it for several years.
 
1ke said:
No, it means IVF already took place and a tiny human person exists.

Again, the Church has not given any definite teaching, although moral theologians and ethicists have been discussing it for several years.
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Duh! I should have just thought about it myself. That’s why it’s in-vitro fertilization… sorry, I had a duh moment here 😃
 
yessisan said:
But wouldn’t adopting an embryo mean IVF has to be a part of this?
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Those are the embryos which result from IVF but are not implanted in the woman who sought the procedure.

Usually the unused embryos are frozen until the ‘parents’ decide to have more children or to have them destroyed. Some women volunteer to adopt these embryos to save them from the latter fate.

Since our Church teaches that creation of embryos in this way is immoral, the practice of adopting them is controversial.
 
As I understand it theologians tend to take one of two positions:
  • that implanting an embryo in a woman’s uterus is inherently sinful (it’s against natural law and/or it’s a form of adultery/fornication) and thus adoption of the embryo to save its life is not permissable.
  • adopting an embryo created by IVF and implanting into a woman’s uterus is an act of rescue and should be allowed in such cases.
 
SMHW said:
As I understand it theologians tend to take one of two positions:
  • that implanting an embryo in a woman’s uterus is inherently sinful (it’s against natural law and/or it’s a form of adultery/fornication) and thus adoption of the embryo to save its life is not permissable.
  • adopting an embryo created by IVF and implanting into a woman’s uterus is an act of rescue and should be allowed in such cases.
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How could saving a life be evil or sinful especially if the vatican already recognizes the life exists. :confused:
 
If they still have the archives for CA Live broadcasts, do some searching there. A few months ago, a moral theologian did some interesting discussion on CA live re this topic.
 
Sierrah said:
How could saving a life be evil or sinful especially if the vatican already recognizes the life exists. :confused:
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I’m a black and white kinda guy, but darned if I can solidfy an opinion on this one. (which is VERY unlike me)

Most attacks against embryo adoption are poorly framed. By the logic often used, one couldn’t adopt the child of an unwed mother either since she obviously conceived via fornication. The circumstances surrounding the conception are irrelevant to the sanctity and value of the life that comes about from it.

HOWEVER, we DO need to recognize that we have a very poor understanding of the subtleties of marital intimacy. Some prominent students of the Theology of the Body have surmised becoming pregnant via means other than natural conjugal love between man and wife might be inherently incompatible with the marital union. Its thick and hard to understand, but it shouldn’t be dismissed. We live in a culture that says sex is just a good time, but we know they are dead wrong. Sex is so much more and we just don’t yet know the dangers that lurk in initiating a pregnancy without it.
 
The adoption of such embryos creates/maintains a market for them. The more people who are willing to adopt these children, created by others who have no moral consideration for their actions, the more the industry will be encouraged to keep doing this. Every time an embryo is adopted, someone makes money. It doesn’t just jump into a woman’s womb on its own - it takes specialists, drugs, hospital, etc. It is still encouraging the industry - and that is wrong.

~Liza
 
As a physician and practicing catholic I believe that the arguments
that human life starts at conception is rather frivolous.
The human embryo remains an embryonic stem cell as long
as it does not take the next step: Nidation = transplant into
a well prepared ( suited) Uterus. Just like any other human cells in a human body it is alive and retains the possibility to transform itself into a full human fetus or any human tissue under proper guidance from instructional hormons and other controlling enzymatic molecules.
If any human cell is restored back to its embryonic status, it has
no special moral charecteristics,making it different from an embryonic stem cell.
tommathew60@gmail.com
 
A physician you may be, but maybe you’d like to define “practicing Catholic for us”.

Thank you for admitting the presence of life in the embryo:
Just like any other human cells in a human body it is alive
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…

…but at what medical school did you learn this pseudoscience…
and retains the possibility to transform itself into a full human fetus or any human tissue under proper guidance from instructional hormons and other controlling enzymatic molecules.
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…it is not just like any other cell in the body and you should know that; all of the other cells in the body contain only the DNA of the woman; half of the embryo’s DNA comes from the father.

Besides, how can you first equate the embryo with an embryonic stem cell and at the same time insist it is the same as any other cell in the body? Are all body cells stem cells?

Pray tell how nidation, magically alters the properties of what you term an embryonic stem cell? We may be simple folk on this board, but we are not simple-minded? Pop quiz: at the state of nidation, how many cells make up an embryo? Is it accurate to use the singular when referring to the cell makeup of the embryo before nidation?

I will be charitable and assume that you are confused, because a “practicing Catholic” would certainly not mean to mislead brothers and sisters.
 
🙂 Dear practicing catholic, I do not plan to change your mind or
convert anyone to my way of thinking. I have also no intention to
anyone
my credibility as practicing Catholic.Each one of us may have our own defenition of it. We all answer before God as we
understand our surroundings with the Gifts given to us. I was not
naive,when I wrote about my understanding of embryonic stem cells that I may touch some sensitive nerves. A tree is also live. You may say it is a lower form of life. Who makes the grading of different lives? What are the criterions for such difference.Because
the cattle have lower life forms, we are allowed to kill them and
eat them? A grain of wheat has life within it. The carbohydrate and other nutrients stored in it is not meant for you or me.The hen
lays her eggs not for fullfilling our nutritional needs. A fertilized egg is not unique for humans. Many ferilized eggs and even misformed fetus are rejected by the mother’s woumb. Amazing that it even has sensors ans scans over the product it carries and recognizes even anomalies such as fetal hydrocephalus or down syndrom
and try to dismiss and dispel “naturally” the misformed (misassembled) products … just amazing. With advance in the
medical science we intervene and “save” the misformed 'human
lives" and allow them to be mistreated for life after they are
born.
I willingly accept your ridicules and anger. During this lent, I hope you will have opportunity to read the answers our Lord gave to Pilate.“I came to testify to the Truth; Everone who belongs to the
truth listens to my voice”.Every one of us who is endowed with
intellect,is suppsed to seek truth. Infact God is Truth.In the form of God made man we have the privilege of knowing Truth,though
in Essence truth is infinite as God Himself/Herself is …
Blessed Lent … tommathew60@gmail.com
 
tommathew60 said:
As a physician and practicing catholic I believe that the arguments
that human life starts at conception is rather frivolous.
The human embryo remains an embryonic stem cell as long
as it does not take the next step: Nidation = transplant into
a well prepared ( suited) Uterus. Just like any other human cells in a human body it is alive and retains the possibility to transform itself into a full human fetus or any human tissue under proper guidance from instructional hormons and other controlling enzymatic molecules.
If any human cell is restored back to its embryonic status, it has
no special moral charecteristics,making it different from an embryonic stem cell.
tommathew60@gmail.com
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Perhaps I am confused, for I am no physician. Is not the definition of conception, the combination of sperm and egg and the fusing of the two half-strands of DNA into a new and totally unique one? Once past this state, is not the embryo a distinct organism from either of its parents? How then can one rationally NOT define this as the genesis of human life?

You seem to rest your case on the recent discovery that mature human cells can be altered and returned to the embryonic state, which you claim makes them morally do different than a brand new embryonic stem cell. I guess I’d just have to point out that unlike a newly conceived baby, such a stem cell WOULD be genetically identical to the person from whom it came and, thus, is arguable still a part of his body, not a new and distinct human being.

Calling something frivilous does not make it so.
 
I believe you are partially correct. When you say that a (skin0)cell
is returned to its embryonic state, it will be a clone of that person,from whom that particular cell is obtained. Yes you are totally confused when you say that the egg and sperm are two half strands of DNA. The regenerations of new DNA happen all the time in living
cells. The cell death and cell regeneration happen to living beings
in this fashion. But this happen most of the time in already transformed cells like skin cells. The fusion of sperm with egg is
not conception.Conception is the next step after nidation in the Uterus of the female ( as in humans) The fusion of egg with sperm,
on the other hand is called “fertilization”. Here two haploids of
chromosomes ( very different from DNA strands) i.e.23 fully formed
chromosomes each ( I am now talking only of humans) join to form complete 46 chromosomes of human cell nucleus. The stem-
cell thus formed is named “omnipotentent”. It has the potential of differentiating itself to any or all of the human tissues.We do not know yet, whether stemcell raised from an already differentiated cell
has this potential. Under proper conditions it may differentiate
itself into any or all human cells. Many of what I said are avail-
able on different internet sites.The catholic answers has issued
its direction not to continue this discourse after this reply. If you
like to contact me directly, you have my email address.
God’s Blessings !
 
The thread isn’t locked, so I suppose the warning you got revolved around using this forum to assert the ‘frivolousness’ of Catholic moral teaching. That’s a no-no. Asking questions is fine, making negative assertions isn’t.

I’m confused when you say that DNA regneration takes place all the time. I have been given to understand that the chromosomes in my skin cells, heart cells, hair cells, liver cells, etc are all identical (which is why one can catch a rapist by matching cells in his semen to those inside his cheeks or blood). When an egg is fertilized, the rsulting DNA is entirely distinct from any of the cells in the parents. Seems to me that everything after that is merely a change in developmental stage, not a change in identity.

If your warning prohibits replies, please PM me.
 
I doubt that embryo adoption would make a “market” with enough demand to perpetuate the production of “extra” embryos in the IVF process. First of all, how many people are willing to adopt born children, let alone go through the medical procedures necessary for embryo adoption?
In my opinion, embryo adoption from “unused” embryos is in no way sinful. As mentioned earlier, how can it be a sin to protect an innocent human life? Perhaps the manner of their coming to be was sinful on the part of the parents and doctor, but that does not mean it is their (the child’s) sin to bear. Just as children that are conceived through rape are born innocent, so do children born from embryo adoption. As for the adultery issue, it doesn’t follow. Again, it is adultery for the couple who sought IVF treatment, but not for the loving and compassionate couple that seeks to give life to a child who would most likely be killed otherwise. There are millions of these children in cold storage at any given moment, and some have been suspended there for ten years or more. Eventually, many people decide to stop paying for the cold storage fees, and the embryos thaw out, thus destroying them.
Strangely, I have read about couples who assert that their frozen embryos are “just cells”, but feel that it would be wrong to simply let them thaw. I wonder why? Also, I’ve heard that now it’s an issue in divorce courts: who gets the embryos or who has to keep paying the fees? Whose “property” are they?
We should pray for the souls of all these little ones and for those couples and medical professionals who engage in the sinful practice of IVF.
Just think, if the Holy Virgin Mary had closed her own womb to the gift of Life, where would we be today? And since Christ was a fully formed Person at the moment of His reception into Mary’s womb, can it not be compared to embryo adoption?
 
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