What do Catholic theologians think about this topic? What consequences will it have in Catholic Morals?

Enrique

-- Enrique Ortiz (eaortiz@yahoo.com), June 29, 2000

Answers

Hello, Enrique.
[For anyone who is not aware of the subject of your question ... "The Human Genome Project (HGP) is a worldwide effort has "mapped" or identified the physical location of the 100,000 human genes located on the 46 human chromosomes."]

As with almost everything in life, what is now known (and will become known) about the human genome can (and probably will) be used for great good and also twisted for great evil. A motor vehicle can be used as an ambulance or as a getaway car in a robbery. A medical doctor may use his knowledge to save a life or to snuff it out. A rock can be used in the building of a house or in the stoning of police in a riot. This list could go on and on almost indefinitely.

The Church does not condemn outright the idea of "genetic therapy." I copied the following paragraph from an 1983 address by Pope John Paul II to the World Medical Association. You may want to read the whole address ("Dangers of Genetic Manipulation") at http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2GENMP.HTM
"A strictly therapeutic intervention whose explicit objective is the healing of various maladies such as those stemming from deficiencies of chromosomes will, in principle, be considered desirable, provided it is directed to the true promotion of the personal well-being of man and does not infringe on his integrity or worsen his conditions of life. Such an intervention, indeed, would fall within the logic of the Christian moral tradition ...". [Note: The pope's words refer to healing done to benefit an already conceived human being, not to pre-conceptive manipulation of genes in gametes (sperms and eggs), which is immoral.]

In "Donum Vitae" [Gift of Life], back in 1987, the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, wrote (with the pope's approval):
"Certain attempts to influence chromosomic or genetic inheritance are not therapeutic but are aimed at producing human beings selected according to sex or other predetermined qualities. These manipulations are contrary to the personal dignity of the human being and his or her integrity and identity. Therefore, in no way can they be justified on the grounds of possible beneficial consequences for future humanity.[33] Every person must be respected for himself: in this consists the dignity and right of every human being from his or her beginning."

The following, which may be influenced by human genome mapping, is also from "Donum Vitae":
"Techniques of fertilization can open the way to other forms of biological and genetic manipulation of human embryos, such as attempts or plans for fertilization between human and animal gametes and the gestation of human embryos in the uterus of animals, or the hypothesis or project of constructing artificial uteruses for the human embryo. These procedures are contrary to the human dignity proper to the embryo, and at the same time they are contrary to the right of every person to be conceived and to be born within marriage and from marriage. Also, attempts or hypotheses for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through "twin fission," cloning or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union."

At the Internet site of the American Bioethics Advisory Commission (a division of a totally dependable U.S. pro-life organization), Father Joseph Howard published a lengthy essay in 1998, entitled "In Vitro Fertilization, Biological Mammalian Cloning, The Current Status of the Human Genome Project, and Gene Therapy: Reflections of the Pontifical Academy of Science." A major portion of the essay has to do with the subject of the human genome. I have not read it yet, but I wish to do so, and I encourage you to visit it at http://www.all.org/abac/jch002.htm

If you don't want to read the whole thing, you can search the page for the word, "genome," and you will find the pertinent section at about the half-way point.

God bless you.
John

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), July 18, 2000.

u are stupid

-- timmy yurs (vnvnvn@aol.com), December 13, 2000.