Today we are in a difficult position. The media, doctors, those with parents who have diseases such as Parkinson's are crying "why don't you use those embroyos, the ones left over from abortions to find a cure?" And if one says "No" then the pro life movement get accused of heartlessness.
Is it necessary to use embroyos for this reaearch? No. You can use the umbilical cord which does not involve the destruction of the fetus/embroyo/unborn child, but that, however, is what the researchers do not want. No! These children were never meant to be born according to their reasoning and besides it would be good service to those getting up in years. After all, we do value our elderly, don't we?
Well what about the woman who cannot bear children. Those aborted children could have been allowed to grow and as soon as they were born, given for adoption.
There is another matter. Think of the woman who's parents, husband, or boyfriend presumes that she would not be a good mother. "Give up your fetus for the Stem Cell Research program. You'll be doing a good thing." or what about the girl on welfare (color does not matter, just lack of income and opportunity),being in the future, pressured to go to the nearest Stem Cell Center to donate her embroyo. Who do you think will benefit? And what about the future? How would you feel (I am talking to those women who cannot get pregnant or did not have fertility treatments available to them at the time) if years later, the doctor says "thanks to Stem Cell research, we can now cure your present disease (whether it be cataracts, heart disease, breast cancer, or whatever.) How do you think she will feel, knowing that such research denied her the child she always wanted.
Right now the Canadian Government is trying to pass a law through the Senate (it having passed by the House of Commons)that allows that any embryo left over from fertility clinics to be used as research. Now that brings up another problem. What would be their status since they were unprotected? What if one researcher allows a certain number to mature? Would he or she experiment on them when they reach the nine month stage? What about the two year stage? Would they be put in cold storage ala Coma until a suitable candidate becomes available? Would all our efforts to eliminate slavery be put in vain because of this? Would these unprotected be used as spare body parts or forced to work at unpaid labor, not being regarded as humans because they were meant for research? At least in the old days when convicts volunteered to be used in research in lieu of a life sentence or the death penalty, they knew the risks. These embyros did not volunteer.
These sound like Science Fiction, the type one reads in stories Do Androids have Electric Dreams?, but science fiction in many cases, becomes Science Fact.
Do you really want to sacrifice our future? Do we really want to cause the young to hate the elderly. To have the future society sacrificed for the benefit of the other? Do you really want to sacrifice the young for the benefit of the old?
Human Embryo research has been touted as a panacea to cure or lessen the effects of such diseases as Parkinson's disease. However, one must not forget that the embryo is the unborn baby. Focus on the Family in an article states its opposition to this practice. See CitizenInk Research-Human Embryo Research/Fetal Tissue Experimentation as does Dr. Gertrude Murphy. See Fetal Tissue and Embryo Research and the American Life League Fetal Tissue Research. These are just a few of the articles which for copyright reasons, I have only posted the links. The embryo becomes a commidity and what happens in countries like Canada where the unborn is unprotected by law? (There, if a woman drinks to access and takes drugs during her pregnancy, the medical authorities cannot persuade her to give up her bad habits to protect her baby. I don't know why they do this. There are those in my country who desperately want someone mentally and physically handicapped born so they can say, "oh we're wonderful people, look if those babies hadn't been born with several mental retardation, we could not have had someone helpless to donate our money to, or volunteer our time. Lets give ourselves a pat on the back.")
You cannot make or cause someone to make mentally or physically handicapped children so that you can boast of your charitable deeds.
They do not know if this will be successful. Thousands and thousands of embryos may be sacrificed and who knows how many couples will be denied children through adoption because of this. It would be tragic indeed for a man with Parkinson's Disease who years before went with his wife several times to try to adopt a baby and was refused because there were none, be offered the fetal stem of an unborn baby to cure his disease. It would also be tragic if there were no other methods available. God help us from such a future
When a couple goes through all the fertility treatments or even if they are unable to do so, adoption is an option. Today, however, married heterosexual couples are assaulted on two sides in their bid to get that perfect gift that most families take for granted.
Back in the sixties, single girls sprouted that since they loved their boyfriends and had that feeling inside of them, they should keep their babies. I remember one magazine showing a single woman walking with her 'love child' along a beach. Both were sans clothing, emphasizing that they did not need material comforts and that her love of the child was superior to that of a 'mercenary' couple who had all the materials a child would have, but no love. (Oh she was an actress who made quite a bundle of money and the nurse or nanny, plus the other servants were not in the camera range.)
It became common rather than rare for a single girl to keep her child. Top that off with women who aborted their children who decided that for some reason because "no one in the whole country, the whole continent, even the whole world' will love this child," and at the same time echoed this phrase, "there are many abandoned children in the world, adopt them!" as if by aborted their perfect unborn infant, they were saying, "when all the abandoned and neglected children are adopted and cared for, then we will deign to not abort our unborn babies, because then we know you are worthy to look after him or her." Putting themselves in the place of God who knows all and decides who should have a baby.
However, couples have been adopting children like that, not because they had to, but because they loved that particular child or children.
Now we have same sex couples saying the same cry, "there are many abandoned children in the world, adopt them!" and saying they should be allowed to adopt not only their partner's children, but the perfect baby because "when all the abandoned and neglected children are adopted and cared for, then we will deign you can adopt the perfect children with no medical or physical handicaps because then we know you are worthy to look after him or her. However since you are so busy with those handicapped children, we will adopt the perfect children," And "we unlike married couples do not have husbands who beat up their wives, who are workaholics, etc. Our partner and I stay at home with our children and he/or she does not go to work and only sees the child after five in the evening." They then forget that most couples are not like the few bad examples, preferring to tar the married couple with the same brush.
How hard it is for infertile couples to get children nowadays. If you have money, you can afford tests. If you do not have money, you have to go without. If you have insurance,a lot of infertiity treatments are not covered by medical insurance. Top it off with the stories that "you don't really love chlldren anyway," or "maybe God has a purpose,etc." Trouble is the last one leads to unanswered (in this life) questions concerning inherited conditions that may prove fatal, your parents dying young, lifestyle before marriage,etc. This also leads up to "Mary had diabetes and became blind, yet she has borne children," "or Bob has three children, yet he has Hodgins disease," or "Sheryl slept with the whole football team and yet now she has a daughter. Gave birth to her last week." The worse is believing that you are infertile or sterile because if you gave birth, you would get post partum depression comparable to that woman who drowned all her children or your temper would flare up and you would in a fit of rage kill your child, neglect him or her or some such thing.
We live in an imperfect world and God allows bad things to happen to even His own Children.
No one knows His purpose. It does not mean that you, if God did grant you a child, are going to have a son who is going to be the serial killer of the century worse than John Lacy.
Sometimes things do happen because of original sin. When Adam and Eve disobyed God, and listened to the serpent, original sin was let loose on the world with dire consequences.
God may consider that you would never harm a child, would never leave your baby in the car with the windows closed on a hot. God may know that you are very healthy and you would live to be over one hundred, and yet because of original sin, you will not get pregnant. Sin messes up lives. However, if you could not get pregnant — and it doesn't matter whether your ovaries did not produce eggs or when you were foolish, you got a disease and you either did not go for a cure or were prevented from getting a cure — there is always prayer. Especially you have to pray that you will not get an attitude of indifference towards children as well as for God to grant you and your spouse, children by natural means. You also must pray for God to give the emotional as well as the physical abilities that women who bear children have.
How one becomes infertile or sterile does not determine your love or hate of children or make you a bad father or mother. Yet women abort their children or men force women to abort their children, or parents force their own daughters to abort their children because "no one could be a better mother so I'd rather kill my own child" or the child is aborted because "his father was a louse and he or she is going to have the same personality, be the same dredge on society as his father." What a horrible burden to leave the child. What an excuse to kill him or her.
Now there are several reasons for infertility, a medical condition, a disease, or former conduct. It does not matter whether a man got mumps, had a low or no sperm count, or visited several prostitutes who never were checked for VD. None of this makes him a bad father. Consequently it does not matter if a woman was born with a medical condition, got a disease through no fault of her own, or slept around (in the past, not now), or was not given the proper care. And yet when scientists discovered what caused infertility, there was an increase in abortion. Women who were pregnant felt that when these women got Vd, syphilis, etc., they lost their ability to be good mothers and children are afraid of them, nor does giving a child up for adoption show that you wouldn't want to have or give birth to a child later. Often the girl had no choice, too immature, parents wouldn't help, forced to give the baby up because of parental pressure, too proud or ashamed to accept help, parents and relatives didn't volunteer help until after she signed the papers (probably common when girls were sent to Maternity Homes "visit to an aunt"),etc. Those who were infertile through no fault of their own - undeveloped ovaries, etc. loved children. So therefore, how one became sterile or infertile does not determine whether one will be a good adoptive parent for a child.
Be sympathetic and don't tell them how terrible your children are, how you hardly get a full night's sleep. They often wish they could stay awake wondering whether the baby's going to survive the night instead of worrying about their empty arms. Let them help you with the children. Don't assume that they have a talent elsewhere and because of that talent, God has blessed them in that area. There are mothers who are wonderful artists, writers, cooks. Being childless does not give one great financial blessings. Don't assume that because they cannot bear children, well they have a greater capacity of love for those children who are different from her ethnic background. It reminds me of the premise that infertile women would be wonderful at caring for the slow child, the child in a wheelchair, etc. So how could you trust them to care for those unfortunates when you cannot trust them to look after a normal baby? Above all do not assume that they do not have the capacity to care for children.
Recently I learned if a woman bears more than two children, she obtains a sacrificial gene or a hormone making it easier for her to put her children first and not be so selfish. I do not know whether this is having the extra mouths in the house, or something hormonal that happens after giving birth a number of times. If it is due to the latter, it would make it harder for couples to adopt and also more expensive if scientists develop a way to manufacture this particular hormone. I also hope that it does not give the excuse for more abortions. By the way, this also gives lie to the advice given to women who wanted more than one or two kids."you can't handle what you have, how can you handle another one?" Of course it could explain why women who have none or only one child are not as giving and therefore they cannot entirely be blamed for their situation as was what usually happens. Quote: "You're selfish" "Children will be a drag on your life." And not all woman who have none or only one child are that way because they're selfish, have talents to be employed elsewhere, etc. A woman who is infertile, can only hold a minimum wage job which she had to pound the pavement to get that work, does not get paid for the talents she has certainly was not denied children because of her great ability. She had none. And that leads me to the subject "The Will of Man."
In ancient times, men, especially, slaves, were made eunuchs, castrated either as a punishment or because they were told guard their master's harem. This was in the pagan world. The Israelites and later the Christians did not do it For women, in ancient times, a husband could go elsewhere and not come to the bed with his wife or if he were wicked, spill his seed. In later times, women were sent to nunneries.
From the 1960s on, abortion has increased. There are probably more people over the age of fifty five, and less people in the age range of thirty to forty. Sad to say, white people for lack of a better term, are the ones most likely to have abortions and the ones who are persuaded to - "you can only afford one child," "they cost too much," "you're lucky, no kids to look after and all that free time","children are such a bother." Strange I never heard an African American, a Chinese, or Indian, etc. say that to someone in their ethnic group who wants to and cannot have children. The Caucasian population in Europe and Canada is not replacing itself. In the later case, the only way we are getting more people is immigrants from non white countries. The Native Canadians, although they often cry genocide, are having children. But what about us? Is it because we waited too long, to want to be successsful before marriage? Is it because the Native Canadians start having children in their teens while most of us white people are discouraged from marrying or having children until we are financially settled. In an age of low wage jobs, and people paying off student loans, that often means waiting until one is past twenty five. Since abortion became common in the 1960s, there are many women in their fifties and sixties who never had a child during their marriage. If the word came out that most of the abortions are done on non-white people, then the cry would go up about racial genocide, even though they outnumber the Caucasian sub race in the whole world. Unfortunately in North America the monies paid out by those working in their child bearing or fertile period pay for the pensioners and even though some can work, it may be that society would resent the numbers who cannot and propose euthanasia. If the proportion of young people to elderly has not increased to a substantial level, society may propose and insist that certain of the elderly willingly commit suicide. Christians will not comply with the later and I am certain that society is not going to just kill off those who are pro abortionists or willingly had abortions when they were younger. They will deny treatment, make those wait until its too late for survival, those who wanted to or were denied children. This is a worse case scenerio of what could happen because of the demand for abortion.
What about immigration? If the majority come from countries where the main religion is more anti life or pro abortion, the chance of making abortion on demand illegal becomes more and more futile.
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