Family & Life

Towards a Creative Response to Infertility—Irish Bishops December Meeting : 1st Dec 06

Key issues addressed in Towards a Creative Response to Infertility

In December 2001, Bishops made a submission to the Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction (CAHR). In our initial response to the report of the Commission in 2005, bishops focused primarily on the issue of respect for the right to life.

The document, Towards a Creative Response to Infertility, published by Veritas in recent days on behalf of the Episcopal Conference, is a more substantial response, and includes an analysis of the each of the 40 recommendations made by the CAHR. The bishops agree to a greater or lesser extent with nine of the recommendations, but disagree (vehemently in many cases) with the other 31 recommendations.

The bishops begin by identifying a number of principles which for Catholics, are non-negotiable, and which underpin the approach of the Catholic Church, among others, to issues of human procreation. These are:
_ respect for the right to life and bodily integrity; _ respect for the family; _ respect for the meaning and purpose of human sexuality.

While the Church does not ask the State to legislate in accordance with her teaching, the bishops point out that the inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and the political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the State: they pertain to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his or her origin. Among such fundamental rights one should mention in this regard:

- every human being’s right to life and physical integrity from the moment of conception until death; - the rights of the family and of marriage as an institution and, in this area, the child’s right to an identity of origin (ie that the essential natural link between the life giving role of parents, and their responsibility of care, would be upheld).

Bishops believe that there is indeed a need for legislation to control the technology of assisted human reproduction. We are no less certain that any new legislation which would permit these fundamental rights to be eroded would ultimately be contributing to a serious decline in the standards of justice and equity in every aspect of our civil society.

Key issues addressed in Towards a Creative Response to Infertility

* The right to life:

The Catholic Church rejects as totally unacceptable the recommendation of the CAHR that: “The embryo formed by IVF should not attract legal protection until placed in the human body, at which stage it should attract the same level of protection as the embryo formed in vivo.”

Once fertilisation is complete, the organism has become a human being. There is nothing else it can be. It continues to develop and grow, of course. But all development or change necessarily involves some continuity; something in which the change takes place. This ‘something’ is the human individual. It has its own genetically unique body. It has its own substantial form, the human soul, which is its first principle of life. It is this principle of life which facilitates and directs the development of the person throughout the lifetime of the organism.

While recognising that biomedical research is an essential element of healthcare and contributes to the saving of human lives on a daily basis, the bishops point out that the right to conduct research is not an absolute right. Irrespective of what positive law may decide, human embryos – as genetically distinct individuals of the human species – have natural rights which cannot be ignored. The goodness of research is vitiated when, as a necessary pre-condition, it requires the destruction of human embryos.

The bishops welcome the recommendation that embryos should not be generated specifically for research purposes, but go on to suggest that the recommendation is illogical. Bishops point out that either embryos are entitled to have their right to life respected, in which case this recommendation is appalling, or they are not so entitled, in which case there is no reason for the restrictions. The illogicality of the recommendation is a result of the Commission’s never having faced up to the fundamental question of the status of the embryo. The value of an embryo is not dependent on why it was generated, on the purpose which we assign to it or on how we feel about it.

* Right to family:

In most cases of AHR, the CAHR recommends that the gestational mother (or “birth” mother) be recognized in law as the mother of the child and that her partner be recognized as the father. By contrast the commission recommends that, in the case of surrogacy, the child should be recognized as that of the commissioning couple. The bishops point out that the net effect of these recommendations is to suggest that children are property, the control and ownership of which can be agreed between adults, in a manner approved by law. We argue, on the contrary, that children are persons in their own right, whose primary purpose is not the fulfillment of their parents.

* Cloning:

The bishops argue that the distinction made by the CAHR between “therapeutic” cloning and “reproductive” cloning is a totally spurious one, which has no basis in fact. Bishops wish to point out that human cloning, irrespective of its ultimate purpose, would always be reproductive in that the immediate result of cloning would be the generation of a human embryo. Any distinction between ‘therapeutic’ and ‘reproductive’ cloning is purely spurious.

* Freezing of embryos:

Although it proposes that appropriate guidelines should be put in place by the regulatory body to govern the freezing of excess healthy embryos, the CAHR also recommends that , service providers should facilitate users who wish to avoid any treatment that might result in the production of ‘surplus’ embryos.

The bishops consider that many of the ethical difficulties which arise in assisted human reproduction result from the decision to produce so-called ‘surplus’ embryos. Bishops have some reservations about the terminology here. While some embryos may be surplus to the requirements of the couple, we don’t believe that any human embryo can really be considered as surplus because each embryo is primarily for itself and not for anyone else.

One of the key issues in the recent case of frozen embryos (Roche v Roche et al) was whether the embryo can be regarded as “unborn” in the sense meant by article 40.3.3. of the constitution. The CAHR suggests that it is not clear whether protection applies from fertilisation or from some subsequent point in the process, and argues that clarity can only be sought either from the Supreme Court or by way of constitutional referendum. Bishops point out, however, that the Supreme Court can only ‘clarify’ in the very questionable sense of interpreting the words of the Constitution in the light of what it believes or imagines to be ‘prevailing ideas and concepts’, but not in the sense of determining what the people intended when they enacted the Constitution and its amendments.

* Critique of the pre-suppositions underpinning the report of the Commission for Assisted Human Reproduction:

The chairperson of the CAHR makes it clear that: “the Commission sought to put forward a framework broad enough to be generally acceptable to all individuals and groups in society.” The bishops wish to highlight that this statement does not take account of the fundamental question as to whether some ethical/moral principles form part of the foundation on which society, however multicultural, is built. The Commission begins its deliberations by accepting that everything is a matter for political compromise. Some of the implications of this assumption become clear as the document proceeds to draw conclusions.

* NaProTechnology:

Bishops devote two pages of their document to a presentation of NaProTechnology. This is an approach to the treatment of infertility which seeks to make use of the natural procreative process and which has been used very successfully to treat even couples who have had multiple unsuccessful IVF procedures. The beauty of NaproTechnology is that it is couple centred, it respects the meaning of human sexuality, and does not place the embryo at risk. The bishops conclude by saying: “We would strongly recommend that funding be made available for further research into the potential of natural procreative therapies and for the further development of existing NaProTechnology services.” Irish Bishops' Conference, St. Patrick's College, Maynooth, Co Kildare.Tel: (01) 505 3000 Fax: (01) 601 6413 Email: bdrumm@catholiccommunications.ie Website: www.catholiccommunications.ie

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Family & Life

Towards a Creative Response to Infertility—Irish Bishops December Meeting : 1st Dec 06

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