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Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions
Definitions | Issues | Case Studies | Ethical Responses | Christian Responses | Resources | Books | Links | Multimedia | In the News | Quizzes | Exam questions

Christianity and the Right to a Child

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Infertility

You should give an ethical response from:

You should also be aware of how the Bible is used in debates about fertility, and what churches teach.

The Bible and infertility

Although the technology behind modern infertility treatments is very recent, reproduction has always been vitally important to humans. 4000 years ago Abraham, from whom Judaism, Christianity and Islam descend, was promised numerous descendants by God. Unable to see how this was possible with Sarah, his elderly wife, he used Sarah's handmaiden as a surrogate mother.

The Bible may be used to support or attack the use of infertility treatments. In Genesis, God made humans and the first instruction he gave them was to 'go forth and multiply'. Many Christians argue that, as humans were made in God's image, we too may 'create', or use our God-given intellects to overcome infertility.

Alternatively, there are numerous sanctity of life passages that are used to argue against the destruction of spare embryos. Likewise, any Biblical teaching on marriage, the concept of a couple being 'one flesh' etc, can be used against the involvement of a third party donor.

Church Teaching

Specific church teachings are given in the GCSE revision guide (click here for excerpt). They include

"The human embryo has the right to proper respect. ‘Test tube babies’ are real babies not simple embryos to be manipulated, frozen or left to die.... Human beings are not be treated as a means to an end."      

The Roman Catholic Truth Society - 1985

In an address to Catholic doctors, Pope Pius XII condemned AID because a third person becoming involved in a marriage is like "mechanical adultery": the donor fathers a child (with his sperm) yet he has no responsibility to the child; and a process that isolates the sacred act of creating life from the marriage union is a violation of the marriage union (which alone is the way to create life). However, if the marriage act is preserved, then various clinical techniques designed to help create new life are not to be condemned."

Adapted from Modern Catholic Dictionary

The Society, Religion and Technology Project gives a detailed Christian response to many issues, including the genetic selection of embryos.

 

 

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