The Daily Telegraph reports on Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s condemnation of the Labour Government’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill.
The Catholic Church believes that life begins at conception. Therefore, any interference with that life from any point onwards is an interference with a human being. This view is completely at odds with the view of the secular world, which regards life as beginning at birth. Thus, Secularists have no problem with the use of embryos in stem cell experiments while the Catholic Church does.
Who is in the right? Well, that very much depends upon whether God exists and, if He does, whether He is the God of the Christians or not. Speaking as a Catholic, you may guess which side I am on.
For that reason, I believe that Cardinal Keith O’Brien is right, and not even being very controversial to describe the Labour Government’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill as being ‘monstrous’. For not only will the Bill allow embryos to be used for stem cell research, but fused with animal embryos. Frankenstein’s Monster indeed.
Supporters of the Bill speak with all the seductiveness of the sirens when they give their reason for their backing of the bill. They ‘believe hybrid embryos could lead to cures for diseases including multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease.’
There we have it. The embryos will remove suffering from the world. Who could possibly argue against that? Well, only those who do not see embryos as things and things to be used as one wishes.
Put in different terms – no one would allow their child, or parent for that matter, to be experimented upon for the sake of anything, disease or otherwise. That was the kind of thing that the Nazis did. And that is the matter for Catholics. Human embryos are human beings. They are children unbron. Thus, their use in experiments is Nazi in inspiration and a sin in realisation. Abuse of embryos must stop. Full stop.
The Telegraph reports that Catholic ministers in Gordon Brown’s Cabinet are considering resigning because Brown will not give them a free vote. Our prayers must go to those ministers as they face an extremely difficult decision. Perhaps they ought to resign, but could they do more good outside the Cabinet than within? I do not know the answer, but would suggest that they only ought to resign if they feel that the Government is so anti-Christian that it could never convert.
