Posted on 06/01/2024 12:47:17 PM PDT by JSM_Liberty
Months after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos had the same legal status as children, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination is set to vote on whether to take a stand against in vitro fertilization.
Alabama Chief Justice Tom Parker cited verses from the Bible and Christian theologians in his Feb. 16 concurring opinion that sparked national debate and left lawmakers scrambling to keep the state’s in vitro fertilization clinics running. Parker argued that the court was merely enforcing a principle that has “deep roots that reach back to the creation of man ‘in the image of God,’” Parker said, quoting the Book of Genesis. He also quoted a Bible verse in which God told the prophet Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.”
When the Southern Baptist Convention meets in Indianapolis June 9-12, members are expected to vote on several resolutions, including one that would condemn IVF because it creates more embryos that can be implanted. The resolution states embryos would be left frozen and “unquestionably destined for eventual destruction.”
“In Vitro Fertilization most often engages in the destruction of embryonic human life and increasingly engages in dehumanizing methods for determining suitability for life and genetic sorting, based on notions of genetic fitness and parental preferences,” the resolution reads. “We call on Southern Baptists to love all of their neighbors in accordance with their God-given dignity as image bearers and to advocate for the government to restrain actions inconsistent with the dignity and value of every human being, which necessarily includes frozen embryonic human beings,” the resolution continues.
There are less than 13 million Southern Baptists, the denomination’s lowest number since the 1970s, but it remains the nation’s, and state’s, largest Protestant denomination. The SBC has 753,653 members in 3,164 Southern Baptist-affiliated churches in Alabama.
“Southern Baptists believe that Christians should in general oppose IVF because by its very nature it separates procreation from sex and treats children as products rather than people,” SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission wrote earlier this week. “It is morally ambiguous enough to be problematic and should be discouraged as a matter of wisdom and prudence.”
However, Southern Baptists believe “children, no matter how they were conceived or even where they are located (in or outside the womb), are full image bearers of God and possess inherent dignity and worth. No discussion, debate, or decision on the ethics of IVF can or should ever diminish the value of children created through this process.”
Around the time of the Alabama IVF ruling, Andrew T. Walker, a professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, called for the adoption of an official resolution addressing IVF at the SBC’s next convention. “When you consider the moral goods that Scripture holds as inseverable for where conception ought to occur, IVF is ruled out,” Walker posted on X.
Walker and R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, proposed the resolution, The New York Times reports.
Walker told The Times he could not predict how the proposed resolution would be received.
“What remains to be seen,” he said, “is how well understood IVF is, which our resolution seeks to remedy. But I trust Southern Baptists to do the right, noble, and consistent thing when all the facts are known.”
Good.
They are either people or they aren’t.
IVF destroys newly conceived children. Unless that is avoided it is not ok.
Our pastor touched on this awhile ago when preaching against abortion. The soul begins at conception. He brought up IVF. He said while it is wonderful that technology has advanced that can allow a couple to have a child they otherwise could not have - it is the dozens(?) of other children that are left in test tubes or discarded that makes it sinful.
The big issue at the Indy assembly will be the vote on the Law Amendment regarding female pastors.
The timing sucks, though. The Dims can use this in this election year to say, “Them darn Christian nationalists are trying to ban poor, distressed people from their medical assistance in making babies”.
there is nothing wrong with IVF, the issue is when they discard unused fertilized embryos
Mixed feelings on this.
I love the idea of helping women (real women) conceive when some physical condition prevents them. But I HATE them destroying the multiple embryos when more than one takes. I’d rather see them requiring them to be implanted one by one. Keep doing it until one takes.
And the leftover embryos, I’d like to see those no longer be the property of the parents if they no longer want them. Some way of giving up control so that if they say they’re unwanted, they can be donated to women with even greater physical problems.
“there is nothing wrong with IVF,”
Yes, there is. https://www.catholic.com/video/why-is-in-vitro-fertilization-wrong
Honestly, the procedure is still unsettling to me but their approach seems to address your concern. And I now have wonderful grandchildren that I wouldn't have had otherwise.
I dont care one whit about what the Catholic church says on the subject.
IMO if no embryos are discarded and all are implanted, there is nothing ethically wrong with it. To say otherwise is to argue that no medicine should be taken for anything, and only faith healing should be used.
“IMO if no embryos are discarded and all are implanted, there is nothing ethically wrong with it.”
Your opinion doesn’t matter. Your opinion doesn’t decide ethics.
“To say otherwise is to argue that no medicine should be taken for anything, and only faith healing should be used.”
That’s as asinine as thinking your opinion decides ethics. IVF is not medicine. It’s a procedure and it leads to immoral and unethical actions.
If I take one egg and combine that one egg with sperm from her husband and then insert that fertilised egg in the mother the egg came from that does not lead to immoral and unethical actions.
The couple is married, they both used their own sperm and egg, and no eggs were discarded. Nothing unethical about that situation.
“...that does not lead to immoral and unethical actions.”
It’s immoral and unethical in itself.
“The couple is married, they both used their own sperm and egg, and no eggs were discarded. Nothing unethical about that situation.”
It’s inherently unethical and immoral. In itself. somethings are always wrong. This is one of them.
And discarding embryos is inherent to IVF:
Why Discarding Embryos Is Inherent to the IVF Process:
https://www.medpagetoday.com/obgyn/infertility/108932#:~:text=Weinerman%20said%20that%20a%20lot,opt%20to%20have%20them%20discarded.
You’re supporting a process that leads to baby killing.
And more Christians are seeing the problem: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/06/12/ivf-southern-baptist-convention-evangelical-00162994
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.