Fr. Reese S.J. tries to sound reasonable about the destruction of human beings for research and offers some proposed restrictions.
1. Embryos for research cannot be bought and sold. Embryos should not be created for the sole purpose of research. They should only come from excess embryos produced at fertility clinics that are scheduled to be destroyed anyway.
2. Before using human embryonic stem cells, researchers should show that the research they are doing cannot be done with non-embryonic stem cells.
3. Research using embryonic stem cells should aim at advancing toward the goal of using only non-embryonic stem cells in regenerative medicine. In other words, once the process of developing adult stem cells for treatments has been shown to be safe and reliable, any research in embryonic stem cells should be able to move seamlessly into the use of adult stem cells leaving the ethical problems behind.
These rules will not satisfy those who find any use of embryos ethically objectionable, but it will indicate that the Obama administration is trying to find some middle ground that gives some respect to the many Americans who find such research repugnant. In short, if science shows a way out of this ethical dilemma, we should follow it.
The way he writes reminds me exactly of his time as America Magazine editor. Where both sides of “an issue” were presented where one side is the teaching of the Church. He writes like he has no dog in the fight, as a distant observer. That the discussion the murder of innocent human beings for the purpose of research is like discussion which type of soda you prefer. It is also rather silly to expect science to show us a way out of the “ethical dilemma.” We can’t just let innocents be murdered while scientists figure this out. Moral guidance needs to be given to those who get caught up in research and not the morality of what they are doing. For Fr. Reese I guess you can do evil for some good as long as you suggest some restrictions along the way.
It is rather silly for Fr. Reese to even suggest restrictions to President Obama who voted for infanticide rather than having even the remotest threat against Roe v. Wade.
Ed Peters weighs in about the Fallacy of the Mean and goes on to say:
Some Founding Fathers thought slavery should be protected throughout the country, others thought it should be made illegal everywhere. So they compromised, and made half the States slave, half free. We all know how that one turned out, don’t we?
I believe that no embryonic human being should be experimented upon, let alone killed. The Obama administration believes that they all can be treated so. Reese suggests we settle our differences by only experimenting on and killing “the extra ones”. How one squares Reese’s compromise with the absolute prohibition against deliberately taking an innocent human life (Evangelium vitae, 57) I have no idea.
And yes, I know they’re (almost certainly) “going to die anyway”, and not like you or I are “going to die anyway.” But that does not mean that these tiny people should die by my hand, or with my dollars.
As we look for a way out of Complication No. 658 that follows in the wake of separating sex from procreation, we’re going to need better options than ‘just-kill-some-of-them’.
22 comments
Well, I perhaps fall on the side of Fr. Reese S.J’s attempt at pragmatism. I suspect that his moderate proposal will still be spun by the left as crazy right wing Christian weirdoness. I’m concerned that so-called “embryonic” stem cell research will soon become fetal stem cell research. I find it somewhat disconcerting that people will grind up human babies for purported medical advances….
If ever there is a massive famine, they could rationalize eating babies, too.
Hey! They already ran up food prices for the poor by politicians and tree huggers pushing ethanol and refusing further oil drilling, coal and nucular power, the evil geniuses!
I thought Fr. Reese was too busy managing Catholics for Sebelius to bother himself about embryonic stem cells.
I really don’t understand this so-called “reasonable” approach. It’s just being “lukewarm” – and we were warned that the lukewarm would be spit out.
I wonder: would Fr Reese have been in favor of Dr Mengele’s experiments?
I mean, follwing limitations #1, those Jews were scheduled to die in the gas chamber anyway. And those experiments could only be done on living humans.
Something has gone horribly wrong in our national hierarchy when a Catholic priest can write openly in favor of genocide with impunity from ecclesial sanctions.
1. Jews for research cannot be bought and sold. Jews should not be created for the sole purpose of research. These Jews should only come from the excess populations that are scheduled to be destroyed anyway.
2. Before using Jews, researchers should show that the research they are doing cannot be done on actual human beings (which Jews are not).
3. Research using Jews should aim at advancing toward the goal of no longer using Jews for research purposes. In other words, once the process of researching on Jews for treatments has been shown to be safe and reliable, any research in Jews should be able to move seamlessly into the use of actual humans leaving the ethical problems behind.
These rules will not satisfy those who find any abuse of Jews objectional, but it will indicate that the Hitler administration is trying to find some middle ground that gives some respect to the many Americans who find such research repugnant. In short, if science shows a way out of this ethical dilemma, we should follow it.
Wasn’t ESCR one of the Pope’s four non-negotiables? The catholic socialist justice/lib theo dissidents (included the USCCB) ignored the Pope in November. Why would he feel the need to try to rationalize it now?
Obama-worshipping, catholic imbeciles could not possibly care less about abortion, ESCR, the sanctity of marriage, or parental (not teachers’ unions’ and sodomites’) control over (not) their children’s education.
BECAUSE Obama’s works of mercy* overdshadow his less salutary crimes against God and man.
* Sending 25 movie DVD’s to Basil Paterson’s blind kid who is similarly destroying the State of New York; expropriating about 8 years’ volume of the US money supply to fund the Dem vote-buying machine; destroying the unjust private property economy and replacing it with Cuba/NKorea style trickle up poverty, dependency, and desperation for all; establishing (HR 645) concentration camps for the traitorous kulaks (who survive the massacres) that desperately cling to the seditious opinion that the Obama regime doesn’t own all property in the USA; etc.
LCB. I thought about doing a word subsitution exercise as you did, but yours is much better. Nicely done.
Adagio. Do you have any idea what you’re talking about? Your distinction between the “embryo” and “fetus” makes as much sense as someone saying, “Well, I’m okay with experimentation on children, but I worry that it will lead to experimentation on adolescents.”
Can Fr. Reese’s suggestions be read as counselling the lesser evil rather than endorsing the lesser evil?
”Soykent Green is PEOPLE!!!!!””
If you use the link, the “fr” disappears fron the by line of the article. Significant to say the least.
Can Fr. Reese’s suggestions be read as counselling the lesser evil rather than endorsing the lesser evil?
I’ll assume you meant “greater evil” at the end.
The answer is no. 1.). He does not indicate that ESCR is wrong. It’s a deafening silence. Referring to it merely in terms of “those who find their use objectionable” stinks like pigs. 2.) It is possible to accept incremental positions, but what his proposal is is no reduction at all. Incrementalism is acceptable if elimination is the goal, and he doesn’t share that goal per my first point. 3.) Lesser-evil arguments go to the principle of double-effect. But double-effect (or “ends”) can only be invoked if the means are good or at least morally neutral. ESCR as a chosen act is wrong, period. So the lesser-evil argument won’t fly.
I thought for a moment that I spoke too soon on my second point. That his proposal indeed could lead to elimination. Then I read him again:
They should only come from excess embryos produced at fertility clinics that are scheduled to be destroyed anyway.
Not only does my point 2 stand, but this part that I missed on the first reading shows just how fogbound he is.
What is your position on in vitro fertilization procedures?
I’ll assume you meant “greater evil” at the end.
No, I meant “lesser evil.”
To counsel the lesser evil is to try to talk someone who is going to commit an evil into committing a lesser evil instead.
I’m not sure what the state of the question on the morality of counselling the lesser evil is now (a hundred years ago, “the opinion which consider[ed] such a course justifiable [was] probable and [could] be followed in practice“), but I don’t think it relates to the PDE in the way you sketch it.
If there is no room to compromise on the School of the Americas then there is no room to compromise on embryonic stem cell research.
It was wrong for assassins and death squads to kill the San Salvador Jesuits, Fr. Reese’s brothers in St. Ignatius, and it is wrong now to kill the Embryos, Fr. Reese’s brothers in Christ.
Where, oh where, are the liberal voices on this? Where is the outrage?
I don’t understand “excess embryos”. Those are “excess people” (as LCB pointed out). I don’t understand how a priest can speak like this.
It is really time for Bishops to reel people like this in. Enough is enough.
What is your position on in vitro fertilization procedures?
I don’t know if that question was directed at me, but in case it was, I agree with the Church’s position:
2377 Techniques involving only the married couple (homologous artificial insemination and fertilization) are perhaps less reprehensible, yet remain morally unacceptable. They dissociate the sexual act from the procreative act. The act which brings the child into existence is no longer an act by which two persons give themselves to one another, but one that “entrusts the life and identity of the embryo into the power of doctors and biologists and establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person. Such a relationship of domination is in itself contrary to the dignity and equality that must be common to parents and children.”168 “Under the moral aspect procreation is deprived of its proper perfection when it is not willed as the fruit of the conjugal act, that is to say, of the specific act of the spouses’ union . . . . Only respect for the link between the meanings of the conjugal act and respect for the unity of the human being make possible procreation in conformity with the dignity of the person.”169
Tom, Ok, I see where I misread you. “counselling”, but not “endorsing”. I’d still say no based on his utter silence on the nature of ESCR (point 1). Even if he was clearly in line with the immorality of ESCR, I still don’t see how it could fly as it is too close to, “well if you are going to rob banks anyway, don’t load ammo in the gun so you don’t hurt anyone.” That’s not how appeals to lesser evil work.
Concerning how Fr. Reese S.J. tries to sound reasonable about the destruction of human beings for research and offers some proposed restrictions.
There is a foundation of truth which states that you can do no harm for the greater good. The end does not justify the means. If that were true, Hitlers desire to create a master race could be justified, no mater the cost, just as abortion could be justified in order to solve the problem of an unwanted pregnancy. What are people that accept use of human embroys thinking? All human live begins with the formation of a human embryo. The embryo is the first cell of a human live, that is how all human beings began. How can we justify the creation of a human embryo (the conception of a new and unique human life) with the intent to destroy it for the sake of another human life.
I ask this question in utter naïveté:
What happens to the frozen embryos WHO are not implanted?
Thanks!
Kate — from whatI understand of the process, they remain frozen until their donors desginate when to dispose of them.
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