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Posted on 01/31/2008 1:34:58 PM PST by NYer
Take plain 'ole genetics, for instance. So many behavioral and personality aspects and characteristics are being treated as based on genetics or epigenetics. And then there are chemicals from diets and malformed body parts (organs, glands, etc.). On one level, those things probably do influence personality, behavior, temperment, etc., but there's danger in ascribing everything to chemical reactions.
There's more to humanity than hormones and neurotransmitters.
It’s my personal belief that man will cross the red line one day with all this human cloning stuff and that is when the end of the world will be.
No one, not even the Pope, knows the meaning of the word ‘dignity’ but we use it all the time. Some kind of verbal ornament.
Raw science does not shatter human dignity. What people do with it does though. How they go about practicing it can also do it.
Bob Dylan wrote a song about it.
Dignity.
Bob knows.
Help us out. What IS dignity?
Bob knows a lot more than he lets on.
Mankind crossed a line when Satan tempted with the words “ye shall be as Gods.” They were cast out of Paradise.
Clearly, to play God would be to place the future of your soul at risk. The Pope is in the business of delivering as many of these souls to Paradise as possible. Therefore, we should not play God, we should not fiddle around with God’s Creation in such a manner, and the Church’s teaching on abortion/euthanasia/contraception/embryonic stem cells is so clear in this area, it baffles me that more people do not understand it.
Of course, there are those who do not worry about the fate of their soul, because they do not believe. I pray that God tears down the imperfect walls these people have constructed around their hardened hearts (I say imperfect, because humans aren’t perfect, and God will find a way to bring your walls down).
Sorry, but your definitions although multitudinous are not even in the ballpark except for #6 which indicates the direction for further research.
First of all, I’m against all government research that has no direct military applications. That said...
What exactly does it mean to “play God”? Change what God made? Last time I checked that’s how humans thrive, changing their surroundings. Why is changing ourselves such a huge leap?
If I can’t have a child the ‘natural’ way, I’m glad science can help. If I have a genetic defect that takes a pill to cure, why wouldn’t I take it. If I can have my heart cloned when the ticker is running out on the one I have, why wouldn’t I do it? Because it’s ‘playing God’? All I see is another excuse for some people to tell others how to live their lives. If no ones individual rights are being violated then no one has the right to tell another what to do.
Tell us. What does “dignity” mean? Or are you proposing that it has no meaning: ain’t no such thing?
No, I will not tell. It is used in various learned works where the meanings given as above have no meaning whatsoever. It shall remain a secret sign of recognition among the seekers.
I’m not saying that all science or all pharmacy is playing God. I have a degree in Chemistry myself. What I am saying is that we as human beings should not control life in such a way. If we attempt to concieve, it is God’s will if it happens. Otherwise, adoption is a very noble thing. And concerning death, God will call us home when He decides. Natural conception to natural death, that is God’s way.
In these cases, no one seems to care whether or not the unborn’s rights are being violated. Or whether or not people considered to be in a “vegetative state” are having their rights violated.
God bless the Pope. Ave Maria.
In a lot of ways, the punishment of man’s sin is found in the sin itself. i.e., I don’t think there’s one single line in the sand that will precipitate the end. But the continuing dehumanization and collateralization of life will lead to greater and greater acts of inhumanity and atrocity as societal “norms”.
Some may argue that the 20th century may never be paralleled in the kind of worldwide savagery that spanned two world wars, the concentration camps, the gulags, S.E. Asia, Africa, etc. But those were all atrocities committed during war, power consolidation, and general upheaval. We’re talking about normal, “civilized” society with a scoreboard of aborted babies that would make your run of the mill political tyrant blush. When Hitler experimented on human beings, it was ghastly. When society demands it today, it’s “progress”. That’s the qualitative difference: The 20th century featured perverted, heartless individuals; today we have a perverted, heartless society. That’s the price of sin, and God doesn’t have to lift a finger for us to suffer unspeakable punishment.
God Bless the Pope.
Dignity, in the religious sense, is the irrevocable quality of man being made in the image of God (i.e., infused with a soul). Nothing a man does can forfeit his right to be treated with this dignity in mind because the soul is ever-present. Thus what one does to the least among us, they do that unto God Himself, as well.
Just sayin’.
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