What is the moral thing to do with "leftover" embyros?

[mapleoak]

I’m going to quote a poster from another thread, but the analogy is possibly the best one yet, and you should see the difference now, IF you allow yourself to be 100% honest.
Quote:
What if a building were on fire. Indside were 100 frozen embryos and a group of kids. You cannot save all of them. Which gets your top priority and why?

Why can’t you save them all? You grab the nitrogen tank with one hand and the group of kids with the other.

 

[Bear_Claw]

Yeah, I tried one more time, but it seems like you are just spewing CCC and “Church Teachings” all over the place.

It really saddens me to see so many people not thinking for themselves. Stop letting other people tell you what to think and what truth is. It’s a delusion.

This time I bow out for good.

 

[pickguard1]

We’ll all pray for your conversion, Bear Claw. God Bless You.

 

[Bear_Claw]

We’ll all pray for your conversion, Bear Claw. God Bless You.

No thanks, I REALLY don’t want to be told what to think. I use reason. I used to be where you are, and then I realised the farce.

Cheers.

 

[pickguard1]

Catholics aren’t told what to think. We are also asked to use our reason - which ultimately leads one with an honest search to the Truth. It just so happens that people who came before us have already gathered all that Truth into one place to make it convenient. Not necessarily easy, but convenient. The hardness of some truths comes about because we want to believe that each of us is somehow at the center of things.

I haven’t been where you are, but I have been close. It’s very lonely out there.

 

[Bear_Claw]

It’s very lonely out there.

On the contrary, for the first time I see the real world and not one that I’m being forced to see. It’s not lonely at all, you’ll see when you get here.

You can’t trust anyone. Go right to the source and see if he can make an arm grow back…

Cheers!

 

[st_lucy]

No thanks, I REALLY don’t want to be told what to think. I use reason. I used to be where you are, and then I realised the farce.

Cheers.

And I have been where you are now until I realized that no one in the crowd could come up with their own thought. You keep regurgitating the same old stuff, humans aren’t human until they look and walk like me. But when you finally wake up to that farce you will see that this just cannot be true.

I too will pray for you, that you will wake up from your deep sleep. Hopefully before it is too late.

 

[st_lucy]

On the contrary, for the first time I see the real world and not one that I’m being forced to see. It’s not lonely at all, you’ll see when you get here.

You can’t trust anyone. Go right to the source and see if he can make an arm grow back…

Cheers!

But you see you must be trusting in someone or else you cannot come to any conclusions. There is always a source you must trust in.

 

[Bear_Claw]

And I have been where you are now until I realized that no one in the crowd could come up with their own thought. You keep regurgitating the same old stuff, humans aren’t human until they look and walk like me. But when you finally wake up to that farce you will see that this just cannot be true.

I too will pray for you, that you will wake up from your deep sleep. Hopefully before it is too late.

Honestly, I can say the same about the church and regurgitating.

Here’s the difference.
The church’s regurgitation comes out of a book that everyone reads and accepts and quoted ad nauseum.
Our community’s “regurgitation” is actually from free thought that is encouraged, theories tested and attempted to be proven wrong until no more debunking can be done to it.
So, the “regurgitation” is actually the result of theories that stood the test of debunking by the very crowd you mention. We try to prove our theories wrong.
It’s free thinking, not taking whatever you read for granted.

Please, don’t pray for me, rather pray for the amputee I saw at the train station this morning for his leg to grow back. I’m sure he’ll be happy if that happened, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

Thanks for the thought though

 

[Bear_Claw]

But you see you must be trusting in someone or else you cannot come to any conclusions. There is always a source you must trust in.

Yup, I answered that in the last post, but here it is again:

“Our community’s “regurgitation” is actually from free thought that is encouraged, theories tested and attempted to be proven wrong until no more debunking can be done to it.
So, the “regurgitation” is actually the result of theories that stood the test of debunking by the very crowd you mention. We try to prove our theories wrong.
It’s free thinking, not taking whatever you read for granted.”

 

[judechild]

Bear Claw apparently thinks **trusting **someone is the same thing as giving them control over you; this is not the case. The precepts and teachings of the Church are meant to guide a person, not to make a person a mindless idiot. Has anyone who’s ever driven up a mountain noticed the guard-railing that runs along the outside edge? I see the teachings of the Church like that rail; they guide our free will and thought so that we don’t do something that could hurt us or others (like, say, mass murder of infants for research). For the record, I was born an atheist, but God gave me faith at a very early age and I gradualy became convinced of the authority of the Church. But the fact that the Church guides our conscience **does not mean **she demands us not to think. God gave us reason so we would use it; and we do.

Now, can we please get back to the main question, which was (in case you forgot): What is the moral thing to do with “leftover” embyros? I want to know more about this “Prenatal adoption” mentioned waaaaay back in the 7th response. Any thoughts?

 

[pickguard1]

I think, as it stands right now, there doesn’t yet exist a moral way to proceed with all the spare embryos.

1: can’t intentionally use/kill them for science
2: can’t use in vitro fertilization-takes out the marital act
3. can’t “let them thaw” and die a natural death - this amounts to intentional killing of the embryos, in my opinion. It would be like letting a newborn infant lay on a table after birth until it starved, or died of exposure.

I think one poster had the most viable option (although it is not yet scientifically/medically possible) and that is consider that each embryo is similar to an extremely premature baby (which they are, in fact - just not naturally “born”) and work towards developing some sort of “artificial womb” like an incubator system currently used for preemies, to help the embryos develop. Don’t know if it’s possible, but hey, I think it would be a moral solution to bringing these babies to full development.

Other than this, I don’t know…

 

[pickguard1]

Does anyone know what the outside limit of time is that an embryo can be frozen and still survive - i.e. be “reanimated”?

-huh, I just realized that using the word “reanimated” is really about as incorrect a word as one could use, since the original meaning of to “animate” means to be given a soul (from the latin “anima” (please correct me if I’m wrong!). Anyway, these embryos have ALWAYS had a soul, so could never be “re” animated, just unfrozen.

 

[jmcrae]

I think one poster had the most viable option (although it is not yet scientifically/medically possible) and that is consider that each embryo is similar to an extremely premature baby (which they are, in fact - just not naturally “born”) and work towards developing some sort of “artificial womb” like an incubator system currently used for preemies, to help the embryos develop. Don’t know if it’s possible, but hey, I think it would be a moral solution to bringing these babies to full development.

And then what? At some point, someone has to adopt all of these kids.

Bearclaw, I believe in the Church’s teachings on this issue for purely selfish reasons - I strongly prefer to live and work among a group of people who believe that it is always a bad idea to murder me, for any reason whatsoever.

But if my friends and colleagues are finding reasons to kill and harvest other people, there’s not much stopping them from doing the same to me.

 

[pickguard1]

jmcrae;4933458 And then what? At some point, someone has to adopt all of these kids.

That is, of course a difficult question. I would hope there would be enough charitable Catholic (and non-catholic for that matter) families that would be willing to adopt these children.

But…If the technology existed, when is the moral time to begin incubating the embryos? Immediately for all of them? Only if someone has committed to adopting that embryo? First one created, first one incubated?

That’s the problem with this whole in vitro/artificial insemination stuff - there are SO many subsequent moral dillemas created by the first immoral action.

 

[judechild]

But…If the technology existed, when is the moral time to begin incubating the embryos? Immediately for all of them? Only if someone has committed to adopting that embryo? First one created, first one incubated?

That’s the problem with this whole in vitro/artificial insemination stuff - there are SO many subsequent moral dillemas created by the first immoral action.

Yah, those questions do pose problems, but ones I’d definitly prefer to have instead of this “new limbo”.

 

[magdelaine]

No thanks, I REALLY don’t want to be told what to think. I use reason. I used to be where you are, and then I realised the farce.

Cheers.

You’ve never read Thomas Aquinas, have you? Summa Theologica? Because if there is one thing the Catholic faith is compatible with, it’s reason. It is one of the “reasons” I love it so! You can test the faith and teachings of the Church every day in every way, just like it happens on these forums, with no fear. I think it’s very liberal/ad hominem of you to just say “you don’t use reason” or “you’re all just robots” without actually offering any evidence.

I have seen very little, if any, “because the Church says so” on this thread.

But if you say that Catholics don’t care about logic, with no proof except to the contrary, well I guess you just know better.

 

[joeflow]

I think, as it stands right now, there doesn’t yet exist a moral way to proceed with all the spare embryos.

1: can’t intentionally use/kill them for science
2: can’t use in vitro fertilization-takes out the marital act
3. can’t “let them thaw” and die a natural death - this amounts to intentional killing of the embryos, in my opinion. It would be like letting a newborn infant lay on a table after birth until it starved, or died of exposure.

I think one poster had the most viable option (although it is not yet scientifically/medically possible) and that is consider that each embryo is similar to an extremely premature baby (which they are, in fact - just not naturally “born”) and work towards developing some sort of “artificial womb” like an incubator system currently used for preemies, to help the embryos develop. Don’t know if it’s possible, but hey, I think it would be a moral solution to bringing these babies to full development.

Other than this, I don’t know…

The irony of it all, in order to do enough research to create such a device, several embryos would have to be killed in the process, more than likely.

 

[jmcrae]

The irony of it all, in order to do enough research to create such a device, several embryos would have to be killed in the process, more than likely.

Yeah, good point.

You know, right now, I’m tending to agree with the person who said, thaw them all out, baptize them, and then let God take them in His own time.

And then, of course, never do such a stupid thing ever, ever again.

 

[pickguard1]

The irony of it all, in order to do enough research to create such a device, several embryos would have to be killed in the process, more than likely.

Hadn’t thought of that - then again, if that technology could be developed, maybe by then, the ability to develop it could be done independently of the embryos…just maybe.

However, If the technology was developed, and had to be tested, wouldn’t the desire of the test be to keep the embryo alive and allow it to develop? If, during the course of that testing, the embryo died, it wouldn’t be the same as ESCR, because that death would be an unintentional thing. I just think that the risk to the life of the embryo would have to be countered by the amount of good that could come of the technology - just like all other medical treatments have to be justified. If that’s the case, an embryo dying this way wouldn’t be a moral evil. Preemies die all the time while being incubated (I don’t know if this is the right term), but the fact that they do doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be.