Couples Ask: What?s Wrong With In-vitro Fertilization?

NCR ^ | August 8-14, 2004 | Tim Drake

[NYer]

“Though it is true that sometimes it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil or in order to promote a greater good," it is never lawful, even for the gravest reasons, to do evil that good may come of it (18)—in other words, to intend directly something which of its very nature contradicts the moral order, and which must therefore be judged unworthy of man, even though the intention is to protect or promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of society in general.”

HUMANAE VITAE

Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list

[Carry_Okie]

Thank feminism for infertility.

Early promiscuity leading to an abortion or clamydia = 25-50% drop in fertility.
Complete college = 22.
Get advanced degree = 25.
Start career = 30.
Meet hubby, get settled = 35.

The result? Two kids, max, and a society on the wane. My wife works in an in-vitro clinic and sees it all the time.

Never mind who raises those kids with mommy too busy and too dependent upon that second income to do that job. This is why I home school my girls to have completed two years of college in two majors by the time they are 18.

[Puddleglum]

I'm glad to hear this topic brought up. In-vitro is the pandora's box for lessening the value of human life. It leads people like the un-distinguished junior senator from Massachusetts to support stem-cell research because human life has become a commodity and procreation a "nuance."

[freeangel]

I can never quite figure out why couples feel the need to have "their own" baby in circumstances like the Epolites when there are so many children in need of adoption.

[Salvation]

Thanks for the ping! Good article.

[NutCrackerBoy]

Thanks for posting.

I suggest avoiding abbreviation, especially of the source, when forming the thread. When people are scanning thread headers, The National Catholic Register is 1000 times more information than NCR.

[HRoarke]

Does your wife see the couple doing in vitro as evil? I doubt it. The Church can have a position on this but certainly doesn't need to put out a bunch of selective statistics and propaganda.

I see the absolute good that in vitro can produce every single day. Anyone that calls that evil is an a**hole.

[Xenalyte]

The process for the collection of sperm often necessitates masturbation, which is itself immoral.

Yo Catholics, true or untrue? I'd always heard the jokes, but I had no idea it was Church dogma.

[WVNan]

Interesting article. I don't know that I've ever seen this issue addressed before. I believe that the ethical arguments against in-vitro left out the most important one. The sin for which Satan was cast out of Heaven was "usurping God's authority." In-vitro fertilization comes very close to that in my opinion (of course that is just my opinion). My son and his wife had to seek help after more than two years of trying, but it was the "enhancement" help with a drug. Result: a beautiful grandaughter for me. A gift from God.

[steplock]

Ahh - so it is all the Catholic Church's fault that they did not follow the teachings of the church and got burned?

Let's say you do not believe in G_D at all ... go back and review everything that is forbidden to to in the Old Testament where in comes to food, living conditions, etc.

You will find a 100% safe and healthy way of life. The bans on certain goods protected the people from different parasites (shellfish & pork) for example and other potentially fatal diseases. The rules on life - no homosexuality protected them from the scourge facing them today (AIDS, and all the other self-caused diseases) - rules on marriages, spousal support, children, you name it - the Bible's teachings were there and they were followed back then on faith - today you can follow it and proveable through science!

So to the ACLU, liberals, leftists, and yes, even libertarians can follow the teachings of the Christian Bible and not feel "religious" if that really bothers them. They will live a much healthiers and happier life being moral and clean.

[Xenalyte]

Does the couple doing in vitro have a plan for raising every embryo that results? If not, then yes, the procedure is evil. Anything that results in the creation and destruction of life is evil.

For the record, I think IVF and AI are also astoundingly selfish.

[Redbob]

Reminds me of our experiences at the Vanderbilt fertility clinic in Nashville - no diagnosis, just an indication of when to show up, big check in hand.

After many months of increasing frustration, we simply quit, enormously disatisfied with the lack of either results or explanations.
And for my part, I hated their attitude toward me, the male part of the equation, who they treated almost like a bystander, more like a necessary evil than someone trying to start a family.

I found their attitudes at best callous, and often downright humiliating.

[usafsk]

May God help you all. What a sad state of affairs and misrepresentation of the IVF process. I'm currently in my home office, with the product of two successful IVF procedures stomping around outside with our adopted daughter. My wife is a successful software consultant who left work to stay home with the kids. She had health issues in traditional conception that prevented us from conceiving without IVF.

The point the Catholic church and the rest of you miss is that the process of eggs not implanting is natural and occurs in every woman engaged in conjugal conception. We did not do a "reduction", nor did we freeze any eggs. All eggs were implanted in each case. The actual success rate for IVF in these circumstances is much higher than the article states. I'm pro-life, but my wife left the Catholic church over this issue.

Now, those who oppose IVF and cherish life so dearly, what would you have me do with my children?

[usafsk]

Such a statement begs the question, how many adopted children do you have?

[HRoarke]

How about implanting every fertilized egg? Does that qualify as a plan?

Why would you characterize them as "astoundingly selfish"?

[HRoarke]

Working in my own home office right now...same stomping going on here as well, although only one.

I couldn't agree more with your statements. The misrepresentation in this article is the worst part. What a bunch of crap.

Medical issues on our end as well...

[usafsk]

What is selfish about IVF? I just need to understand what is selfish about it? We implanted all of our embryos, and more than half fertilized.

[freeangel]

Since you ask--one. I was thirty six and in vitro was offered to us also, but we felt that, perhaps, God had another plan for us. Six months later we became very happy parents of our adopted som.

[LonghornFreeper]

>>This is why I home school my girls to have completed two years of college in two majors by the time they are 18.

Even taking every AP test that is offered (which I pretty much did in high school, I skipped music theory and a couple of other BS subjects) you won't get two years of college credit in two different majors, unless they are BS majors like liberal arts. I technically had over 75 hours of credit starting college (more than two years worth) from AP, but most of those don't help me any in my engineering degree. I will be able to make it out in three years thanks to AP, but had I followed my original plan and double majored in physics, it would have taken four.

Homeschooling is nice and everything, but there is just no way a parent can teach college level physics or engineering as well as a good professor can (unless that parent is a physicist or engineer themself, but then I seriously doubt they would be staying at home). Also, you have alot of years unaccounted for in your little time table. If you get an advanced degree at 25, which is about the right age, then you will start your career at 26, unless you are an idiot. And many people meet and get married in grad school, so your age of 35 for marriage makes no sense.