Since being sworn in on Jan. 21 of this year, President Donald Trump has signed several Executive Orders that have taken clear steps to give greater protection to the life of the unborn and to the right of consciences of American citizens.
The administration has done so by reinstituting the so-called Mexico City Policy which ensures that no U.S. taxpayer money supports foreign organizations that perform or actively promote abortion in other nations. By another Executive Order, the administration is renewing enforcement of the Hyde Amendment that for decades has protected taxpayers from being forced to pay for abortion.
Last week, however, President Trump signed a troubling Executive Order. Its purpose is to expand access to in vitro fertilization (IVF). The Catholic Bishops of the United States issued a statement in response, commenting, “As pastors, we see the suffering of so many couples experiencing infertility and know their deep desire to have children is both good and admirable; yet the Administration’s push for IVF, which ends countless human lives and treats persons like property, cannot be the answer.”
To understand this issue and why it is important as part of our Catholic faith’s deep commitment to the protection of the unborn and the respect for life, we need to recall the nature of the IVF procedure.
In IVF, a woman’s body is stimulated to produce a number of eggs which are then harvested and fertilized with sperm in a laboratory. Some of those embryos are then returned to the mother’s womb with the hope that at least one will grow to full term. Many of the transferred embryos will not survive. And the remaining embryos in the lab are either destroyed or frozen in cryopreservation. All the while, IVF procedures do not medically treat the underlying cause of a couple’s infertility.
As the statement of the Catholic Bishops noted, the suffering of couples experiencing infertility is real, and we share the pain of the spouses. But what still remains are questions of human dignity and God’s loving plan.
The basis of human dignity is respect for the sacredness of the life of every human person from conception to natural death because we bear the image and likeness of God. This means that every embryo created in the IVF process, including those who do not survive, those who are destroyed or those left in a continuing state of cryopreservation, are our brothers and sisters. Even if it is not intended, their dignity is violated because the IVF process sacrifices them for the child who is brought to term.
Additionally, God’s plan of creation is that a husband and wife collaborate with Him in the creation of new life intended to be with God for all eternity. The husband and wife, in an exclusive sharing of self, bodily and spiritually, use their gift of sexuality to deepen their union and bring forth that new life. In IVF, the conception of the child is separated from the spiritual and bodily intimacy of sexual union.
Fortunately, there are morally acceptable and extremely effective alternatives to IVF for couples who struggle with the pain of infertility. For example, Natural Procreative Technology offers medical and surgical treatments that cooperate with the reproductive system in identifying problems and sustain the procreative potential of the spouses.
By some reports, the effectiveness of this alternative method is as much as 20% higher than IVF when used after failed artificial treatments. When used as the initial treatment method, Natural Procreative Technology’s success rate is as high as 80%.
When morally acceptable medical technology fails, the Catholic community can assist couples to discern how they can live out God’s call of fruitfulness in their marriages. Fostering or adopting can be pro-life ways of helping vulnerable families and unwanted children.
Our Catholic commitment to the right to life and to human dignity is wide and consistent. As the Body of Christ, we must affirm the human dignity of children born using IVF. But we must also pray and study the issues which modern technology presents. With natural reproductive technologies, the Church promotes safe, effective, and morally acceptable means for sharing the gift of human life. Let us pray more couples use those means for their families.
