Preliminary
Response of the Irish Catholic Bishops' Conference
to the
Report of
the Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction
The most basic of all rights is the right to life which is not qualified by considerations of race, sex, religion or age.
The common good is not simply the good of the state, or the good of the majority; it must take into account the good of all, collectively and individually, including human embryos.
A
human embryo is an individual human being. Every human person began life as an
embryo, and that life continues uninterrupted until death. Human rights derive
from the nature of the human person, and respect for the human person implies
respect for these rights. Human rights are, at the same time, constitutive
elements of civil society and its order. The uncontrolled application of
techniques of assisted human reproduction, as well as undermining the
fundamental rights of the individual, risks causing unforeseeable and damaging
consequences for civil society.
The
recent report made to Government by the Commission
for Assisted Human Reproduction raises many important issues, and it is our
intention to respond more fully to this report in due course. For the moment we
wish to refer particularly to that most basic of all rights, namely the right
to life, which is not qualified by considerations of race, sex, religion or
age.
The
Bishops wish to state quite categorically that the recommendation of the
Commission that “the embryo formed by IVF should not attract legal protection
until placed in the human body” is unacceptable. No commission report can
change the reality that the right to life belongs to all, irrespective of race,
sex, religion or age.
This
is not simply a matter of Catholic teaching. It concerns the common good of our
society. While it is a responsibility in which all citizens have a share it is
the specific responsibility of government, one which cannot be delegated to any
other agency or commission. The common good is not simply the good of the
state, or the good of the majority; it must take into account the good of all,
collectively and individually, including human embryos.
Advances
in genetics and embryology serve to confirm that every human embryo is an
individual human being. There is certainly no scientific or philosophical basis
for distinguishing between an embryo in the womb, and one in a glass dish or in
frozen storage. The recommendation of the Commission that “the embryo formed by
IVF should not attract legal protection until placed in the human body”
appears, therefore, to have a purely utilitarian and pragmatic motivation,
namely to ensure that embryos are available for research, and to allow for the
selective disposal of those embryos which do not measure up to certain
standards. The notion that “the end justifies the means,” if accepted in
principle, has implications which extend far beyond the issue of assisted human
reproduction.
The
Bishops urge legislators to continue to afford legal protection to all embryos,
irrespective of age or location. The Bishops note that such a decision would
have implications for other recommendations contained in the CAHR report. It
would preclude simply allowing embryos to perish or using them for research.
“All human beings, from their mothers’ womb, belong to
God who searches them and knows them and knits them together with his own
hands, who gazes on them when they are tiny shapeless embryos and already sees
in them the adults of tomorrow whose days are numbered and whose vocation is
even now written in the “the book of life”.
– Evangelium Vitae, 20
Note: Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life) is an Encyclical Letter of
Pope John Paul II and was published on