Posted on 12/12/2008 12:06:09 PM PST by annalex
Regarding the Instruction Dignitas Personae
In recent years, biomedical research has made great strides, opening new possibilities for the treatment of disease, but also giving rise to serious questions which had not been directly treated in the Instruction Donum vitae (22 February 1987). A new Instruction, which is dated 8 September 2008, the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, seeks to provide some responses to these new bioethical questions, as these have been the focus of expectations and concerns in large sectors of society. In this way, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith seeks both to contribute “to the formation of conscience” (n. 10) and to encourage biomedical research respectful of the dignity of every human being and of procreation.
Title
The Instruction opens with the words Dignitas personae – the dignity of a person, which must be recognized in every human being from conception to natural death. This fundamental principle expresses “a great ‘yes’ to human life and must be at the center of ethical reflection on biomedical research” (n. 1).
Value
The document is an Instruction of a doctrinal nature, published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and expressly approved by the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI. The Instruction therefore falls within the category of documents that “participate in the ordinary Magisterium of the successor of Peter” (Instruction Donum veritatis, n.18), and is to be received by Catholics “with the religious assent of their spirit” (Dignitas personae, n. 37).
Preparation
For several years, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has been studying new biomedical questions with a view to updating the Instruction Donum vitae. In undertaking the examination of such new questions, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith “has benefited from the analysis of the Pontifical Academy for Life and has consulted numerous experts with regard to the scientific aspects of these questions, in order to address them with the principles of Christian anthropology. The Encyclicals Veritatis splendor and Evangelium vitae of John Paul II, as well as other interventions of the Magisterium, offer clear indications with regard to both the method and the content of the examination of the problems under consideration” (n. 2).
Intended recipients of the document
The Instruction is meant for “all who seek the truth” (n. 3). Indeed, in presenting principles and moral evaluations regarding biomedical research on human life, the Catholic Church “draws upon the light both of reason and of faith and seeks to set forth an integral vision of man and his vocation, capable of incorporating everything that is good in human activity, as well as in various cultural and religious traditions which not infrequently demonstrate a great reverence for life” (n. 3).
Structure
The Instruction has three parts: “the first recalls some anthropological, theological and ethical elements of fundamental importance; the second addresses new problems regarding procreation; the third examines new procedures involving the manipulation of embryos and the human genetic patrimony” (n. 3).
First Part:
Anthropological, Theological and Ethical Aspects of
Human Life and Procreation
The two fundamental principles
Faith and human dignity
“It is the Church’s conviction that what is human is not only received and respected by faith, but is also purified, elevated and perfected” (n. 7). God has created every human being in his own image, and his Son has made it possible for us to become children of God. “By taking the interrelationship of these two dimensions, the human and the divine, as the starting point, one understands better why it is that man has unassailable value: he possesses an eternal vocation and is called to share in the trinitarian love of the living God” (n. 8.).
Faith and married life
“These two dimensions of life, the natural and the supernatural, allow us to understand better the sense in which the acts that permit a new human being to come into existence, in which a man and a woman give themselves to each other, are a reflection of trinitarian love. God, who is love and life, has inscribed in man and woman the vocation to share in a special way in his mystery of personal communion and in his work as Creator and Father… The Holy Spirit who is poured out in the sacramental celebration offers Christian couples the gift of a new communion of love that is the living and real image of that unique unity which makes of the Church the indivisible Mystical Body of the Lord Jesus” (n. 9).
The Church’s Magisterium and the legitimate autonomy of science
“The Church, by expressing an ethical judgment on some developments of recent medical research concerning man and his beginnings, does not intervene in the area proper to medical science itself, but rather calls everyone to ethical and social responsibility for their actions. She reminds them that the ethical value of biomedical science is gauged in reference to both the unconditional respect owed to every human being at every moment of his or her existence, and the defense of the specific character of the personal act which transmits life” (n. 10).
Second Part:
New Problems Concerning Procreation
Techniques for assisting fertility
Among the procedures which respond to problems of fertility are the following:
Techniques are morally permissible if they respect: “the right to life and to physical integrity of every human being”, “the unity of marriage, which means reciprocal respect for the right within marriage to become a father or mother only together with the other spouse” and “the specifically human values of sexuality” (n. 12), which require that the procreation of a new human person come about as a result of the conjugal act specific to the love between a husband and wife.
In vitro fertilization and the deliberate destruction of embryos
The experience of recent years has shown that in all techniques of in vitro fertilization “the number of embryos sacrificed is extremely high” (n. 14). Even in the most technically advanced centers of artificial fertilization, the number is above 80% (cf. footnote 27). “Embryos produced in vitro which have defects are directly discarded”; a increasing number of couples “are using artificial means of procreation in order to engage in genetic selection of their offspring”; of the embryos which are produced in vitro “some are transferred into the woman’s uterus, while the others are frozen”; the technique of multiple transfer in which “the number of embryos transferred is greater than the single child desired, in the expectation that some embryos will be lost… implies a purely utilitarian treatment of embryos” (n. 15).
“The blithe acceptance of the enormous number of abortions involved in the process of in vitro fertilization vividly illustrates how the replacement of the conjugal act by a technical procedure…leads to a weakening of the respect owed to every human being. Recognition of such respect is, on the other hand, promoted by the intimacy of husband and wife nourished by married love… In the face of this manipulation of the human being in his or her embryonic state, it needs to be repeated that God’s love does not differentiate between the newly conceived infant still in his or her mother’s womb and the child or young person, or the adult and the elderly person. God does not distinguish between them because he sees an impression of his own image and likeness.. Therefore, the Magisterium of the Church has constantly proclaimed the sacred and inviolable character of every human life from its conception until its natural end” (n. 16).
Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI)
Intracytoplasmic sperm injection is a variety of in vitro procreation in which fertilization in the test tube does not simply “take place on its own, but rather by means of the injection into the oocyte of a single sperm, selected earlier, or by the injection of immature germ cells taken from the man” (footnote 32).
This technique, which is morally illicit, causes a complete separation between procreation and the conjugal act” (n. 17). It takes place “outside the bodies of the couple through actions of third parties whose competence and technical activity determine the success of the procedure. Such fertilization entrusts the life and identity of the embryo into the power of doctors and biologists and establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person” (n. 17).
Freezing embryos
“In order to avoid repeatedly taking oocytes from the woman’s body, the process involves a single intervention in which multiple oocytes are taken, followed by cryopreservation of a considerable number of the embryos conceived in vitro. In this way, should the initial attempt at achieving pregnancy not succeed, the procedure can be repeated or additional pregnancies attempted at a later date” (n. 18). The freezing or cryopreservation of embryos “refers to freezing them at extremely low temperatures, allowing long term storage” (cf. footnote 35).
“Cryopreservation is incompatible with the respect owed to human embryos; it presupposes their production in vitro; it exposes them to the serious risk of death or physical harm, since a high percentage does not survive the process of freezing and thawing; it deprives them at least temporarily of maternal reception and gestation; it places them in a situation in which they are susceptible to further offense and manipulation” (n. 18).
With regard to the large number of frozen embryos already in existence the question becomes: what to do with them? All the answers that have been proposed (use the embryos for research or for the treatment of disease; thaw them without reactivating them and use them for research, as if they were normal cadavers; put them at the disposal of infertile couples as a “treatment for infertility”; allow a form of “prenatal adoption”) present real problems of various kinds. It needs to be recognized “that the thousands of abandoned embryos represent a situation of injustice which in fact cannot be resolved. Therefore, John Paul II made an “appeal to the conscience of the world’s scientific authorities and in particular to doctors, that the production of human embryos be halted, taking into account that there seems to be no morally licit solution regarding the human destiny of the thousands and thousands of ‘frozen’ embryos which are and remain the subjects of essential rights and should therefore be protected by law as human persons” (n. 19).
The freezing of oocytes
“In order avoid the serious ethical problems posed by the freezing of embryos, the freezing of oocytes has also been advanced in the area of techniques of in vitro fertilization” (n. 20).
In this regard it needs to be stated that while the cryopreservation of oocytes is not in itself immoral, and is employed in other medical contexts which are not the subject of this document, when it takes place “for the purpose of being used in artificial procreation” it is “to be considered morally unacceptable” (n. 20).
The reduction of embryos
“Some techniques used in artificial procreation, above all the transfer of multiple embryos into the mother’s womb, have caused a significant increase in the frequency of multiple pregnancy. This situation gives rise in turn to the practice of so-called embryo reduction, a procedure in which embryos or fetuses in the womb are directly exterminated” (n. 21).
“From the ethical point of view, embryo reduction is an intentional selective abortion. It is in fact the deliberate and direct elimination of one or more innocent human beings in the initial phase of their existence and as such it always constitutes a grave moral disorder” (n. 21).
Preimplantation diagnosis
“Preimplantation diagnosis is a form of prenatal diagnosis connected with techniques of artificial fertilization in which embryos formed in vitro undergo genetic diagnosis before being transferred into a woman’s womb. Such diagnosis is done in order to ensure that only embryos free from defects or having the desired sex or other particular qualities are transferred” (n. 22).
“Unlike other forms of prenatal diagnosis…, diagnosis before implantation is immediately followed by the elimination of an embryo suspected of having genetic or chromosomal defects, or not having the sex desired, or having other qualities that are not wanted. Preimplantation diagnosis…is directed toward the qualitative selection and consequent destruction of embryos, which constitutes an act of abortion... By treating the human embryo as mere ‘laboratory material’, the concept itself of human dignity is also subjected to alteration and discrimination…Such discrimination is immoral and must therefore be considered legally unacceptable…” (n. 22).
New forms of interception and contragestation
There are methods of preventing pregnancy which act after fertilization, when the embryo is already constituted.
Even if such interceptives may not cause an abortion every time they are used, also because conception does not occur after every act of sexual intercourse, it must be noted, however, that “anyone who seeks to prevent the implantation of an embryo which may possibly have been conceived and who therefore either requests or prescribes such a pharmaceutical, generally intends abortion”. In the case of contragestatives “what takes place in reality is the abortion of an embryo which has just implanted… the use of means of interception and contragestation fall within the sin of abortion and are gravely immoral” (n. 23).
Third Part:
New Treatments which Involve the Manipulation of
the Embryo or the Human Genetic Patrimony
Gene therapy
Gene therapy commonly refers to “techniques of genetic engineering applied to human beings for therapeutic purposes, that is to say, with the aim of curing genetically based diseases” (n. 25).
From the ethical point of view:
Human cloning
Human cloning refers to “the asexual or agametic reproduction of the entire human organism in order to produce one or more ‘copies’ which, from a genetic perspective, are substantially identical to the single original” (n. 28). The techniques which have been proposed for accomplishing human cloning are artificial embryo twinning, which “consists in the artificial separation of individual cells or groups of cells from the embryo in the earliest stage of development… which are then transferred into the uterus in order to obtain identical embryos in an artificial manner” (footnote 47) and cell nuclear transfer, which “consists in introducing a nucleus taken from an embryonic or somatic cell into an denucleated oocyte. This is followed by stimulation of the oocyte so that it begins to develop as an embryo” (footnote 47). Cloning is proposed for two basic purposes: reproduction, that is, in order to obtain the birth of a baby, and medical therapy or research.
Human cloning is “intrinsically illicit in that…it seeks to give rise to a new human being without a connection to the act of reciprocal self-giving between the spouses and, more radically, without any link to sexuality. This leads to manipulation and abuses gravely injurious to human dignity” (n. 28).
The therapeutic use of stem cells
"Stem cells are undifferentiated cells with two basic characteristics: a) the prolonged capability of multiplying themselves while maintaining the undifferentiated state; b) the capability of producing transitory progenitor cells from which fully differentiated cells descend, for example, nerve cells, muscle cells and blood cells. Once it was experimentally verified that when stem cells are transplanted into damaged tissue they tend to promote cell growth and the regeneration of the tissue, new prospects opened for regenerative medicine, which have been the subject of great interest among researchers throughout the world” (n. 31).
For the ethical evaluation, it is necessary above all to consider the methods of obtaining stem cells.
Numerous studies, however, have shown that adult stem cells give more positive results than embryonic stem cells.
Attempts at hybridization
“Recently animal oocytes have been used for reprogramming the nuclei of human somatic cells… in order to extract embryonic stem cells from the resulting embryos without having to use human oocytes” (n. 33).
“From the ethical standpoint, such procedures represent an offense against the dignity of human beings on account of the admixture of human and animal genetic elements capable of disrupting the specific identity of man” (n. 33).
The use of human “biological material” of illicit origin
For scientific research and for the production of vaccines or other products, cell lines are at times used which are the result of an illicit intervention against the life or physical integrity of a human being.
[01914-02.01] [Original text: English]
| Dignitas Personae (The Dignity of a Person) |
| Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith |
| Dignitas Personae, an Instruction on ethical issues arising from biomedical research, was published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 12 December 2008. The Instruction defends the life of unborn human beings, created in the image of God, and provides guidance on how to respect human life and human procreation in our scientific age.
|
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Though this is from the Catholic Church, it deals with universal truth regarding true human dignity.
Bookmarking for later reading.
Thanks for the ping.
You’re welcome, great article and explanation of Dignitas Personae.
The discussion covered both cosmetic changes (like eye color) and health defects (such as handicaps and vision correction). I did not see any distinction drawn between the two during that discussion.
Beside destruction of embryo, even in therapeutic use we should distinguish between a health defect and cosmetic improvements.
What would be the problem with making a genetic change, for cosmetic purposes, to a naturally conceived zygote? Is it the child's lack of choice that makes it immoral, or is it the change itself that is morally problematic?
If it's the cosmetic change itself that is immoral, does this also mean it would be immoral for me to shave every morning and afternoon of my adult life? Or for me to get some kind of advanced permanent laser hair removal? (Assuming that it was for purely cosmetic reasons and there was no health necessity for being clean shaven).
I see a difference here in genetic manipulation of a zygote versus shaving laser hair removal.
Technologically there is a huge difference. But what is the difference that makes one immoral, and the other (presumably) morally acceptable?
To answer my own question, I guess you could say it's wrong to make *some* permanent alterations without a person's consent. That is, if a trait is the type that can be altered later in life then it might be wrong to lock someone in to just one choice. Like in my facial hair example, I think you can argue that it would be wrong to deprive your unborn son of the choice to grow a beard, because as an adult he may decide that he'd like to have one.
Is that why the Church would oppose (most? all?) cosmetic genetic changes? Or are there other reasons as well?
I think that the change itself is morally problematic absent some disease. Therapy means that something is broken as compared to the divine design. For example, a heart valve is not where it is supposed to be. Cosmetic is when the human parent wishes to alter the design alrady given the child, for example stature or eye color.
When a human being is groomed, e.g. receives a hair cut or a shave, there is no interference in the design. God gave us tools with which we groom out children or ourselves.
It is sinful to interfere in the act of creation. It is not sinful to remove and obstacle, such as a disease, even on some stage of creation, or to alter appearance of the finished product, such as grooming.
I was pointing out that shaving, cosmetic surgery, etc., are quite different than the genetic and reproductive science discussed, and therefore leaning off topic.
remove and obstacle -> remove an obstacle
I think your reasoning here does affect the dignity of the person.
But my reading, and limited capacity, gives me a more complex view. You start with the basic morality - dignity of the person, the sanctity of life, natural law, not becoming God in governing human creation, etc. Applying these, you get into more complex guides on the science.
The way I see it, imperfectly and somewhat partially of course, is that intent comes in quite strongly also. I’d point to four points in the article above:
1) Before Implantation.
“Preimplantation diagnosis…is directed toward the qualitative selection and consequent destruction of embryos, which constitutes an act of abortion... By treating the human embryo as mere ‘laboratory material’, the concept itself of human dignity is also subjected to alteration and discrimination…Such discrimination is immoral and must therefore be considered legally unacceptable…”
2) Therapeutic, after licit pregnancy.
Procedures used on somatic cells for strictly therapeutic purposes “are in principle morally licit…
3) Genetic engineering to “improve” the human race.
With regard to the possibility of using techniques of genetic engineering to introduce alterations with the presumed aim of improving and strengthening the gene pool, it must be observed that such interventions would promote a “eugenic mentality” and would introduce an “indirect social stigma with regard to people who lack certain qualities, while privileging qualities that happen to be appreciated by a certain culture or society; such qualities do not constitute what is specifically human. This would be in contrast with the fundamental truth of the equality of all human beings which is expressed in the principle of justice, the violation of which, in the long run, would harm peaceful coexistence among individuals…
4) ‘Genetic Engineering’ in a larger scale.
“Finally it must also be noted that in the attempt to create a new type of human being one can recognize an ideological element in which man tries to take the place of his Creator” (n. 27).
If you look at questions with all of this in mind, I think answers to specific questions become more easily. If your motives and methods avoid the restrictions, then you are on more solid ground. An additional point, as far as cosmetics, is the risk to the child in order for what could be a trivial or vain purpose.
I worry more about the broader risks. As man becomes more powerful scientifically, he quickly outpaces his wisdom and morality. I don’t think we can or should make decisions affecting the orbits of the universe, the weather of the planet, or the creation and evolution of species. Or, if we do, we should be extremely wary. God and nature are full of unintended consequences for the proud and the vain.
So, I’m quite conservative on these issue; heck, I oppose cosmetic surgery except in extreme cases. :)
thanks for your reply..
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