This morning on the way into work listening to NPR, they were predicting that the Senate would pass a bill expanding stem cell research, as indeed it has. I have begun to part company with President Bush on several of his policies, however, I am very pleased that he has promised to veto this bill. There are other feasible options for stem cell research that do not involve the destruction of a human embryo. And even if there were not, or even if the other options do not prove as optimal, there are some costs that are too great to pay. I say this not having a relative struck down by a disease that might be mitigated by stem cell therapies, but I hope my position would remain the same even if I did.
What struck me the hardest this morning, though, was the fact that the story mentioned that there were 400,000 embryos that were in storage as a result of being extras in fertility treatments. I have not really been paying attention, but where was the church when such procedures were being considered, procedures which involve the procurement of a large number of eggs, which are fertilized, sorted for hardiness and gender, I believe, and then which are planted in batches so that some or one of them will be successfully implant. These are all statistical measures to raise the chances of success. This is why fertility treatments sometimes result in multiple births, like the septulets (?) in Iowa several years back. The family was very thankful to God for their miracle children, and yet they had already had a child before the treatment.
Well, what happens to the extra embryos? Well, they are frozen and then destroyed when not wanted anymore. Unless, the supporters of stem cell research say, they are used to generate stem cell lines, then they can be put to a life affirming use.
I do not buy that argument, but what troubles me most is that somehow fertility treatments do not receive greater scrutiny and censure in the church, or at least this sort. The pain of infertility and misscarriage is somewhat closer to my heart, and still such treatments are not warranted and cheapen life, even while attempting to meet a noble goal. There are some costs that are just too great, and there are other options, two of them are named Matthew and Emilie, my lovely nephew and niece from Guatemala, now residing in San Antonio with sweet Maddie.
I apologize for the shrill nature of this post, but the situation is very sad.
________
Here is an excerpt from and a link to an editorial that rather makes the case more eloquently.

�[T]he president and his supporters have, perhaps unwittingly, called into question the practice of IVF.�
And just why should it be the task of Christians to baptize the current practice of in vitro fertilization in this country? It is very strange that Christians should be exceedingly alert to the dangers of technological control and mastery in some realms of life, yet so uncritically approving here.
Why should we not raise questions about the routine production of more embryos than will be implanted, or about the selection of certain embryos (and selection against others) when deciding which to implant? Should Christians simply acquiesce in the view that reproduction is a private project aimed at producing a child �of one�s own,� and, increasingly, a child of a certain (desired) sort? One wonders what we will think, then, when we bring these children of �our own� for baptism and are asked to relinquish them.