I find this a circumstance of questionable ethics and motives bordering on necrophilia or a worship of the dead. It's horrible her husband died but it's just as horrible to go against God and Nature and create a child which could not exist and who will have no father with full knowledge of this key point before conception!
I'm horrified at how many see this as some kind of selfless, loving tribute and don't think of the fatherless child she's brought into the world.
She got the child she wanted, I only pray she remembers the child's welfare along the way.
When you go down the path of what human science can enable you need to challenge yourself on the morality and ethics involved and wonder if you should take that path. There are few places more tempting than the frontiers of fertility science which have brought us such barbarism as vanity children for single mothers, RU-486 and even the callously termed "selective reduction," en-mass abortions when too many implanted embryos appear viable.
Thinking of the unconceived fatherless child, the "right" answer would have been to thaw the sperm and accept the reality of her husband's death and their inability to produce a child within their marriage epoch just like generations of widows before her. If she still wanted a child she could seek a new mate or consider a foster care or adoption situation.
While I agree with you that there is an ideal circumstance for procreation (mother and father in comfortable circumstances etc.) I disagree that this is “abomination”. This mother chose to give birth and to bear the child of the man she loves. I cant imagine she would ignore any obligation she has taken on with this child. It was a thought-out decision on her part.
Like it or not, artificial procreation is a fact of our modern culture and, and as in any other gift we have been given, it can be abused. I don’t believe this case is an abuse.
God bless this widow and the son of this hero.
...and now I know why I fight an uphill battle every time I try to convert my agnostic friends to Christianity.
Of course, I'd disagree with you.
sw