The New York Times (12/13, A6, Goodstein, Povoledo) reported, "The Vatican issued its most authoritative and sweeping document on bioethical issues in more than 20 years on Friday, taking into account recent developments in biomedical technology, and reinforcing the church's opposition to in vitro fertilization, human cloning, genetic testing on embryos before implantation, and embryonic stem cell research." According to the Vatican, "these techniques violate the principles that every human life -- even an embryo -- is sacred, and that babies should be conceived only through intercourse by a married couple." The 32-page document, "titled Dignitas Personae, or The Dignity of the Person, was issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's doctrinal office, and carries the approval and the authority of Pope Benedict XVI."
On its front page, the Washington Post (12/13, A1, Stein, Boorstein) reported that the statement "triggered intense debate...about some of the most contentious issues in modern biological research, including stem cells, designer babies, cloning, and a host of techniques widely used to prevent pregnancy, and to help infertile couples have children." The Post noted that, although "many of the arguments in Dignitas Personae...have been made before by Pope Benedict XVI and his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, a church 'instruction' from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is far more authoritative, and made a number of new declarations. It reflects the Vatican's desire to focus attention on ethical questions raised by a new generation of technologies that are becoming increasingly common in the United States and elsewhere."
The instruction also stated that these "practices go against the 'fundamental principle' that the dignity of the person must be recognized from conception until natural death," the AFP (12/13) added. Commenting on the document, Bishop Rino Fisichella, secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said "the new instruction virtually enshrines the embryo not only as a human being, but also as a whole 'person' with all the philosophical and legal consequences that such recognition might entail." Because "the techniques condemned by the Church are legal in many countries and widely practiced, the new document says Catholic researchers have the duty to distance themselves from a 'gravely unjust legal situation, and to affirm with clarity the value of human life.'"
Nevertheless, "the Vatican is also saying...that it approves of some forms of gene therapy, and encourages stem cell research using adult cells," the AP (12/13) noted. In addition, "it says parents could in good conscience inoculate their children with vaccines produced with cells derived from aborted fetuses."
According to the document, stem cell research is also permissible if the tissue is obtained from "umbilical cord blood or fetuses that have died naturally," the U.K.'s Telegraph (12/13, Beckford) reported.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (12/13, Rodgers) pointed out that the instruction "takes a cautious approach to efforts to halt the passing of defective embryonic genes to future generations, and to some attempts to produce embryonic-type stem cells without harming embryos." And, "it discourages, but does not flatly prohibit, 'embryo adoption,' in which couples seek to rescue someone else's embryo from a fertility clinic freezer."
Notably, the document "broadened the definition of abortion by classifying the 'morning-after pill' and the drug RU-486, which blocks the action of hormones needed to keep a fertilized egg implanted in the uterus, 'within the sin of abortion,'" the Chicago Tribune (12/13, Brachear) reported. One cardinal said that he "welcomed the instruction as a helpful guide for theologians, medical personnel, researchers, and married couples trying to plan families, but grappling with the morality of miracles rendered possible by modern science."
USA Today (12/13, Grossman), Bloomberg News (12/13, Krause-Jackson, Lauerman), BBC News (12/13), the U.K.'s Guardian (12/13, Hooper), Scientific American (12/12, Borrell), and the Washington Times (12/12, Duin) also covered the story.
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