The Dignity of Human Procreation and the Simple Case In Vitro Fertilization
Moral-Theological Debate in the Light of “Donum Vitae”
Summary
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
- Cover
- Title
- Copyright
- About the author
- About the book
- This eBook can be cited
- Table of Contents
- List of Abbreviations
- General Introduction
- Chapter One The Magisterium and Some Theological Opinions on Artificial Procreation
- Introduction
- A. Magisterial Teachings on Artificial Procreation Prior to Donum Vitae
- 1.1. The Teaching of Pius XI: Casti Connubii, 31 December 1930
- 1.2. The Teaching of Pius XII
- 1.2.1. Address to the International Congress of Catholic Medical Doctors, 29 September 1949
- 1.2.2. Allocution to the Italian Catholic Union of Midwives, 29 October 1951
- 1.2.3. Allocution to Participants at the Second World Congress on Infertility and Sterility, 19 May 1956
- 1.2.4. Allocution to Participants at the Seventh International Congress of Haematology, 12 September 1958
- 1.3. The Teaching of Paul VI: Humanae Vitae, 25 July 1968
- 1.4. Opinions of Some Theologians
- B. An Overview of the Instruction Donum Vitae
- 1.1. The Instruction’s Three Lines of Argument against Artificial Fertilization
- 1.1.1. The Principle of Inseparability of the Conjugal Act
- 1.1.2. The “Language of the Body” Argument
- 1.1.3. The “Begotten-Not-Made” Argument
- 1.2. Moral Principles of Donum Vitae
- 1.2.1. The Life of the Human Being
- 1.2.2. Marriage as the Only Licit Context for Procreation
- 1.2.3. The Dignity of Human Procreation
- 1.2.4. Biomedical Technology as a Gift in the Service of Life
- 1.2.5. Donum Vitae on the Simple Case IVF-ET
- 1.2.6. Relationship between Moral and Civil Law
- Synthesis of the Chapter
- Chapter Two Moral-Theological Arguments in Favor of the Simple Case of Homologous IVF-ET
- Introduction
- A. The Critique of Donum Vitae
- 1.1. An Overview of Its Argumentation against the Instruction
- 1.2. Narrowness in Its Range of Consultation
- 1.3. The Alleged Physicalism or Biologism of Donum Vitae
- 1.3.1 Adequate Consideration of the Human Person
- 1.3.2 Hierarchy of Values of the Human Person
- 1.3.3 The Body as Instrument of the Human Person
- 1.4. Inadequate Use of Its Natural Law Methodology
- 1.5. Summary
- B. On the Conjugal Act and Its Understanding by the Dissenting Theologians
- 1.1. An Overview
- 1.2. On the Principle of Totality and the Conjugal Act
- 1.3. On the Moral Object and the Principle of Inseparability of the Conjugal Act
- 1.4. On the Doctrine of Double Effect and the Conjugal Act
- 1.5. Summary
- C. Begotten-not-Made
- 1.1. An Overview
- 1.2. The Simple Case IVF-ET as Life Enhancing
- 1.3. The Simple Case IVF-ET Technology Accords with Human Dignity
- 1.4. The Simple Case as an Imperfect Act Not an Immoral Act
- 1.5. Summary
- Synthesis of the Chapter
- Chapter Three In Defense of Donum Vitae’s Arguments against the Simple Case of Homologous IVF-ET
- Introduction
- A. The Anthropological Argumentation of Donum Vitae
- 1.1. An Overview of the Argumentation Methodology
- 1.2. Argument Based on the Natural Law
- 1.3. The Unity of the Human Person Adequately Considered
- 1.4. The Human Role in Procreation and the Logic of Donum Vitae
- 1.5. On the Moral Object of the Simple Case IVF-ET
- 1.6. Summary
- B. The Dignity of Human Procreation
- 1.1. An Overview of the Argument on the Dignity of Human Procreation
- 1.2. The Unitive-Procreative Significance of the Conjugal Act
- 1.3. The Conjugal Act: Its Unity and Plenitude
- 1.4. The Conjugal Act: A Personal Act of the Couple
- 1.5. Summary
- C. The Child Is Begotten, Not Made
- 1.1. An Overview of the Argument
- 1.2. The Child as a Gift of God in Marriage
- 1.3. An Instrumental Logic of Productivity Implied in the Technology
- 1.4. The Child Is Not a Means of Fulfilling Parents’ Desire
- 1.5. Summary
- Synthesis of the Chapter
- General Evaluation and Conclusion
- 1. The Context of the Research
- 2. The Status of the Simple Case IVF-ET
- 3. Some Basic Points of Agreement between the Pros and Cons on the Simple Case
- 4. The Debate on the Simple Case Prior to Donum Vitae
- 5. The Debate after Donum Vitae
- 6. The Divergent Anthropologies and Approaches to the Simple Case
- 7. The Conjugal Act as the Most Fundamental Principle for the Rejection of the Simple Case
- 8. Other Principles against the Simple Case
- 9. Intentionality Is Not Sufficient in Itself to Justify the Use of the Simple Case
- 10. The Simple Case Offends against the Dignity of Human Procreation
- Bibliography
- Magisterium and other Statements from the Holy See
- Primary Sources
- Works on the Simple Case
- Publications on
- Secondary Sources
- Theological Works on in Vitro Fertilization
- General Theological Works
General Introduction
The gift of a child is a blessing from God and the fruit of conjugal union. Experience reveals that many couple desire to have a child in their marital union but this aspiration is not always realized in every marriage, perhaps due to certain pathological problems in the reproductive systems of either one or both of the spouses. Infertility in marriage can bring real pains and anxieties to any marriage. Hence the quest of couples to go all-out employing every possible medical means to overcome their condition is understandable, but deserves more importantly a moral guide. On 29 September 1949, Pius XII in his discourse to the Fourth International Congress of Catholic Physicians, condemned artificial insemination by husband (AIH) and in a similar discourse in 1956 extended the proscription to human in vitro fertilization that was then only a prediction. His action gave an indication to the wrongfulness and rejection of any form of intervention on human generation that separates procreation from the marital sexual act. The Pius XII’s attention to the question of human artificial fertilization was a follow up to the response of 26 March 1897. At that time, the Holy Office, with the permission of Leo XIII, gave an emphatic NO answer without qualification to the question: “May artificial insemination of a woman be done?”4 It seems theologians were not quite sure of the reason for the Vatican’s negative response but presumed the involvement of the condition of masturbation to be the reason.5 Up until the declaration made by Pius XII, artificial insemination by husband excluding masturbation was considered in theological discussions as an open question. Indeed, Pius XII was eloquent and consistent on this matter and repeated this teaching in 1951 and 1956 and in most of his discourses to relevant associations of medical professionals. He went further to assert that the condemnation of artificial insemination does not foreclose any means that could help couples in the performance of the conjugal act or assists the conjugal act normally performed to achieve its natural purpose. To this end, homologous artificial fertilization was in principle left open and the question on substitution and assistance to the conjugal act emerged. The Pope’s intervention on the issue was impressive but could not resolve completely the controversy because another concern arose. The matter at stake was: what constitutes the nature of assistance or substitution as medical intervention on human procreation? Theologians would engage themselves in this debate for the next decades after Pius XII.
Twenty years after Pius XII’s first declaration on the question of intervention on human procreation, the encyclical letter Humanae Vitae of Paul VI in 1968 argued strongly against the deliberate separation of the unitive and procreative meanings of the conjugal act based on sound reasoning and divine revelation taking into consideration the nature of the person and of his sexuality. While this argument was employed in that document to illustrate the intrinsically evil nature of contraception, the same principle properly applies to artificial insemination or artificial fertilization in vitro. By reason of seeking procreation outside the conjugal act, artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization is judged to be illicit. A decade after the release of Humanae Vitae, Louise Joy Brown was born at the Oldham district hospital in England as the first surviving so-called “Test Tube Baby” in history. Many people hailed this development as a triumph in biomedical research. Since then, innumerable numbers of children are reported being born through IVF-ET. However, this procedure of human fertilization has remained a controversial subject and a matter of concern among moral theologians and religious bodies, individuals, biomedical professionals as well as governments. Varied responses have been expressed about this so-called groundbreaking achievement of the British team of Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe.
1. The Actual Problem
On 22 February 1987, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), having received information from various Episcopal Conferences, individual bishops, doctors and scientists on the joys, confusions, anxieties and uncertainties regarding the new reproductive technologies, published the Instruction on Respect for Human Life in Its Origin and On the Dignity of Human Procreation (Donum Vitae)6 as a moral guide on the limits of interventions on human procreation. This Instruction proscribes as illicit procedures of artificial procreation that separate generation of human life from sexual intercourse including the so-called “Simple Case” IVF, i.e. a homologous IVF and ET procedure that is free of any compromise with the abortive practice of destroying embryos and with masturbation.7 By rejecting even the simple case IVF procedure, Donum Vitae is generally seen as reaffirming the forceful assertion of Pius XII’s teaching on the unity of the two aspects of the conjugal act; and specifically accepting the judgment of Paul VI in Humanae Vitae, that there is an unbreakable link between the marital sexual act and procreation willed by God the Creator which man cannot break on his own initiative. Some renowned Catholic theologians had thought that there would be exception to the simple case in the Church’s negative judgment of some reproductive technologies since they considered it less problematic and limited to those in a marital union. However, the Instruction did not spare the simple case but judged it to be morally wrong for the primary reason, at least, of separating procreation from marital sexual intercourse thereby lacking the perfection belonging to human procreation by nature. In other words, the simple case by seeking to achieve procreation outside the specific sexual intercourse of couple, objectively effects an analogous separation between the goods and the meanings of marriage and equally of the unity in the conjugal act. The Church’s judgment is informed by her conviction of the value of the intimate link between the unitive and procreative meanings of the sexual act based on the intrinsic unity of the human being as a bodily and spiritual creature. With this, the document reiterates the Church’s teaching on the principle of inseparability of the conjugal act in its unitive and procreative dimensions, stressing that every marital sexual act requires openness to procreation and no procreation is to be initiated or sought outside the marital sexual act. In its conclusion the document calls upon moralists and theologians to reflect profoundly on relevant teachings of the Magisterium and apply this teaching to guide especially those involved in human procreation. Soon after the release of this document, a number of varied responses started featuring in different ways in scholarly Journals and Pastorals to the Instruction’s invitation. Yet, important issues remained unresolved and required some clarifications and debates. Indeed, the teaching of Donum Vitae especially on the simple case IVF-ET evoked both affirmative and dissenting responses from within and outside the Catholic Church’s theological circles. What can be said to be the main contention regarding the procedure in question and the opinions of Catholic moral theologians and ethicists?
2. The Main Argument
The problem of the simple case is theoretical but with practical implications which we shall indicate in the course of this study. Irrespective of the negative evaluation or rejection of the simple case by the Magisterium, some Catholic moralists known by Elio Sgreccia as “Possibilists” still believe that the simple case could be licit, thereby contending that the Instruction’s conclusion is erroneous. The advocates of the simple case are concerned that the Instruction acknowledges the fact that the simple case as well as other forms of homologous IVF and ET procedures is not complicated by all that ethical negativity found in extra-conjugal procreation but it does not judge it worthy of human procreation. The basic reason given in the Instruction, which the dissenting theologians find inadequate is that it breaks the two intrinsically connected aspects of the conjugal act. Another problem is the ambiguity with which authors understand the simple case. While some authors talk of the simple case as a limited form of homologous IVF-ET and not yet in practice, still hypothetical, only possible in theory, others understand it in a broader perspective referring to any form of homologous IVF-ET performed in certain circumstances. This last part gives the impression that this procedure is already being performed. Generally, the clinical procedure of the simple case as described in theory is the same with that of standard IVF-ET currently in practice except in some aspects. Following the descriptions made by some scholars regarding the simple case IVF-ET, the general differences between this method and the standard IVF-ET could be found in the following aspects: (1) It does not involve masturbation; (2) Only limited embryos are fertilized and transferred; (3) It does not involve abortive practices; (4) The gametes are obtained in a “legitimate” way in the “context of marital love.”8 These are the basic clinical indications (in theory) of the simple case that differ from the standard IVF-ET. But, how simple is the so-called “simple case IVF-ET”? This poser underlines the basic arguments around this procedure.
3. Objectives and Doctrinal Relevance of This Project
What will engage us in this research is to find out what can be derived from the diverse theological responses to the Instruction Donum Vitae by studying the literature and materials that have emerged in respect of the Instruction’s conclusion on the simple case IVF-ET. In other words, this study is aimed at evaluating the moral-theological views of known Catholic authors on the problematic and hypothetic procedure of human generation – the simple case IVF-ET. In so doing, the moral tradition upon which each group of discussants is influenced by will be highlighted. Obviously, the work of this kind with relatively scarce bibliography and having the central problem of ambiguous terminological understandings among authors, poses extra challenges. The fact that this topic to our knowledge has not been treated or adequately discussed among Catholic theologians remains a strong stimulus for this project and indeed would make it more interesting and relevant. We need to state that before and after the instruction Donum Vitae, there has not been any monograph dedicated to this question of the simple case IVF-ET, at best there are only few articles.9 Curiously, the only scholarly work dedicated almost entirely to this problem might probably be the Journal of Philosophy and Medicine, volume 53 published a decade after Donum Vitae. The publication authored by Thomas A. Shannon and Lisa Sowle Cahill, lay Catholic ethicists10 is another response that is worthy of recognition.
The earliest Catholic theologians who responded to the Instruction in various ways in support of the simple case IVF-ET would include Richard A. McCormick who describes the document as “unpersuasive” for condemning even the simple case.11 Other renowned advocates of the simple case include, Lisa S. Cahill, Anthony Shannon, Patrick Vespieren, Edward Vacek, etc. They feel that the negative judgment on the simple case would place Catholic couples and medical professionals in a state of dilemma and frustration as they struggle with the challenge of infertility. It is reported that at least four Catholic Universities (Nimegen, Lille, and the two Louvains) expressed their views against the Instruction’s judgment on the simple case and promised to continue providing in vitro fertilization for couples, this sounds like a protest! The chief administrator at Lille is said to have publicly doubted the moral evidence of illicity that he believes cannot be found in the document.12 These theologians argue that the marital union should be the only context to evaluate the morality of artificial procreation and not every act of conjugal sexual love. For them, conjugal act should be understood in the perspective that it embraces the totality of the marital union and the activities performed for the sake of this union.
Furthermore, there are numerous monographs on the standard IVF-ET published before and after Donum Vitae from which allusions are made to the simple case. William E. May is probably one of the first Catholic theologians to publish an article specifically on the simple case IVF-ET in which he defends the magisterial judgment. There are other known authors like Elio Sgreccia, Nicholas Tonti-Filippini, Janet Smith, Germain Grisez, Ignacio Carrasco De Paula, John Boyle, Martin Rhonheimer, Josef Seifert, Ángel Rodríguez-Luño and many more who have expressed views that are supportive of Donum Vitae’s position on the simple case as well, but not with specific works on this procedure.13
We find this work interesting and relevant because of our belief that the analysis of the arguments presented in this thesis will contribute to the understanding of the debate on the simple case and artificial procreation in general. The basic teaching of the Instruction on the simple case that we expound, will help readers to appreciate the doctrinal teaching position of the Church on the limits of intervention in human procreation. It is equally pertinent to remember that the Instruction Donum Vitae invites theologians and moralists for a deeper reflection on this problem and this research is no less a contribution in response to that call.
4. Methodology and Delimitation of the Work
The methodology of this thesis is expository, analytical and evaluative. Basic and general arguments employed by both those in support of the simple case and those in defense of the Instruction’s judgment are presented with headings connected to the main themes of each section. The methodology is such that the magisterial doctrines and theological opinions in the first chapter will set in place the main work upon which the pros and cons arguments will be treated respectively. The advantage of placing in the second chapter the arguments of the dissenting theologians will help us to feel the impulse and weight of their critiques against the magisterial teaching in Donum Vitae and respond adequately with the defending theological views favorable to the Instruction in the third chapter. In so doing, the work will clarify the teaching of the Magisterium as well as respond to criticisms arising from the dissenting theological views. Each of the chapters will have a synthesis. Since there are scarce specific articles on the simple case, perhaps because the problem is still evolving, the work will make some inferences and assumptions from general discussions on the standard IVF-ET and similar procedures since the simple case is a (theoretical) species of IVF-ET. Since the simple case is a theoretical procedure, the work is not focused on the clinical indications of this method but limited to the moral and theological debate within the Catholic circle. This implies that we shall not delve into the laboratory process of this technique but we will however give a brief description of its aspects in a footnote. We are aware of the legal, social and economic perspectives of the debate on this problem within and outside the Catholic Church, but our focus principally is on its moral and theological aspect.
Details
- Pages
- 248
- Year
- 2023
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9783631896761
- ISBN (ePUB)
- 9783631896778
- ISBN (Hardcover)
- 9783631893104
- DOI
- 10.3726/b20545
- Language
- English
- Publication date
- 2023 (June)
- Keywords
- Catholic theologians IVF
- Published
- Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien, 2023. 248 pp.
