Fertilization 101

ChelseaBioethics, Fetal DevelopmentLeave a Comment

Will the bastardization of science never end?

No doubt you have heard some abortion advocates oppose initiatives to define human personhood as beginning at the moment of conception by claiming that such legislation would give human rights to an egg – nevermind the fact that that egg must be fertilized by a human sperm, in which case it completely ceases to be an egg. You will also recall that last week I mentioned that a court in South Korea has ruled that that human embryos left over from fertility treatment are not life forms and can be used for research or destroyed.

FertilizationNone of this is new, of course. Abortion rights advocates have been denying that the unborn is human life for decades now. And we’ve been defending science and nature (not to mention the precious lives of our unborn brothers and sisters) for just as long. We know that human life begins at conception/fertilization and abortion/ESCR advocates really only deny the fact for political and not scientific reasons. But we can always use a little Fertilization 101 refresher. From Patrick Lee and Robert P. George at National Review Online:

In normal fertilization, many sperm penetrate the corona radiata of the ovum (a layer of follicle cells surrounding the ovum). Then, typically only one sperm will penetrate the zona pellucida (a film of glycoproteins surrounding the oocyte) and reach the oocyte. The sperm’s membrane then fuses with the actual membrane of the oocyte. This fusion triggers changes in the oocyte (or rather, what was the oocyte) so that (a) the membrane of this new cell undergoes a rapid polarization, and (b) a calcium wave is produced throughout the new cell’s cytoplasm so that the zona pellucida hardens over approximately 30 minutes and repels penetration by sperm. These facts indicate that what is living at this point is not an ovum.

With the fusion of the sperm and the ovum, the tail of the sperm is lost, and the membrane surrounding the head of what was the sperm joins the surface membrane of the former oocyte, creating a single, continuous membrane. This allows cytoplasmic factors derived from the ovum to affect the nuclear contents derived from the sperm — for example, new types of histones begin to be associated with those chromosomes, modifying the behavior and interaction of the molecules in these chromosomes. This shows that the sperm has ceased to be.

At this point, the genetic material from the ovum (the female pronucleus) and the genetic material from the sperm (the male pronucleus) are both contained within a single new cell, are being moved toward each other, and will eventually intermingle. This is the point just after the fusion of the membranes of the sperm and the ovum, when the ovum and the sperm cease to be, and a new organism — a whole human organism — comes to be. Could the sperm still be retrieved from inside the ovum? No, because the sperm no longer exists. At best, the male pronucleus could be extracted from the zygote (the new, one-celled organism). The result would not be a sperm and an ovum, but only nuclear material from a zygote on the one hand, and a disabled embryo (or perhaps the death of the embryo) on the other.

Read the whole thing, which is a response to a student’s assertion that it is possible to extract the sperm after fertilization. For further reading, check out Prof. George’s book Embryo: A Defense of Human Life on the nature and rights of human embryos.

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P.S. Is it bad that talking about fertilization automatically makes me think about the opening scene from Look Who’s Talking? I could only find a clip of it in spanish. Happy Friday – enjoy! 😉

NCBC Offers 24/7 Free Emergency Ethics Consultation

ChelseaBioethics, Embryonic Stem Cell Research4 Comments

Thanks to Gerard Nadal for pointing out the National Catholic Bioethics Center’s free 24 hr. consultation service. From their website:

The National Catholic Bioethics Center regularly provides consultation services for institutions and individuals on critical issues which affect Catholic identity in health care.

Institutional issues are related to the faithful observance of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and may include resolving complex issues of cooperation in Catholic hospital mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures. Many of these requests come from bishops, leaders in Catholic health care, policy makers across the country at the highest levels, as well as from offices of the Holy See.

The Center’s most active ministry, however, is to individuals who regularly take advantage of our free email and telephone consultation services – including a 24/7 emergency service – when faced with difficult and pressing decisions regarding the medical care of loved ones. Staff ethicists receive over 1,000 such requests annually.

An NCBC ethicist is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week at 215-877-2660. This kind of thing could come in very handy for families facing difficult medical decisions, especially with regard to end of life care.

I don’t know a whole lot about the NCBC myself except that one of my favorite people in the world, Fr. Tad Pacholczyk, Ph.D. is one of their contributors. He is as smart and as solid as they come in defending human dignity and ethics in biotechnology. Having followed Dr. Nadal’s writing for some time now, I’m fairly certain that he would not pass along something like this that thought wasn’t 100% in line with Church teaching, especially in the area of life sciences. However, I am a little concerned about the NCBC’s judgment in light of this disappointing story about Ave Maria University/Town creator Tom Monahan possibly selling part of his interest in the land around the university in order to allow the Jackson Laboratory biotech firm to build a research facility on the site.

Research at the Jackson Lab includes finding “better contraceptive methods” and there is some evidence to suggest that they engage in or at least provide services supporting embryonic stem cell research. Both of which would be problematic for any Catholic institution to be associated with. However, when Monahan reportedly consulted the NCBC about the Jackson Lab they had saw absolutely no moral objections to the research facility.

I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t give me much confidence in the reliability of their consultation services. Am I wrong? I hope I am. I hope there’s something I’m overlooking – or that hasn’t been revealed – regarding their decision in this case.

Andrea Bocelli Tells a “Fairy Tale” About Abortion

ChelseaAbortion, video3 Comments

It is worth contemplating here that, had his mother taken the advice of her doctor, not only would Bocelli himself not be alive today, but neither would his two children and the world would have been deprived of the great gift he has of bringing to life the beautiful music that God often uses to attract souls. See On Beauty’s Relation to Truth

Abortion: it takes away much more than it gives – if it gives anything at all.

Pope’s June Prayer Intention: Respect Life!

ChelseaPrayer, Pro Life1 Comment

Respect Life

Our Holy Father’s prayer intention for the month of June:

That every national and transnational institution may strive to guarantee respect for human life from conception to natural death.

Let’s pray for this every month!!

TOB Tuesday: The Trinity and the Heart of Marriage

ChelseaLove, Religion, Sex, Sexuality, Theology of the Body, TOB Tuesday6 Comments

TrinityThis Sunday Catholics celebrated the feast of the holy Trinity, three Persons in one God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – existing in an eternal exchange of love. From all eternity the Father makes himself a gift to the Son and the Son receives this gift and makes Himself a gift back to the Father in return. This love between the Father and the Son is so perfect, so powerful that it is an entirely other eternal Person – the Holy Spirit.

The book of Genesis (1:27) tells us that humanity was created in the image of this God, which means that:

Man becomes an image of God not so much in the moment of solitude as in the moment of communion. He is, in fact, “from the beginning” not only an image in which the solitude of one Person, who rules the world, mirrors itself, but also and essentially the image of an inscrutable divine communion of Persons. (JP II, November 14, 1979 – TOB 9:3)

Now, human beings “commune” in many different ways, but the image of the life-giving love of the Trinity is most evident when a husband and wife become “one flesh.” Only in this mutual gift of self – body and soul, freely committed to one another in a covenant of God’s making – is the love between man and woman, like the giving and receiving of love between the Father and the Son, capable of bringing forth new life. This is what is at the heart of marriage and this is why, no matter how much they may love each other, two people of the same sex can never be sacramentally married as far as the Church is concerned.

Erin Manning recently had a very good essay breaking down, in purely biological terms, why same sex “marriage” is not possible:

A same-sex couple cannot engage in sexual intercourse. They can, of course, perform a variety of sex acts on and with each other, but none of those acts has ever been considered to lie at the heart of what marriage is (and, indeed, some of them are forbidden even to married people from a Catholic moral perspective). But that act which alone among human acts is potentially capable of creating a new human life is not an act which they can engage in together.

One cannot be married if one is not capable of engaging in the marital act. This is not meant to be an insult to people afflicted with same-sex attraction, but to preserve the sanctity of the marriage covenant and the central act of married love.

Do go over and read all of Erin’s post on this subject – great stuff!

In Memoriam 2010

ChelseaDeath, Prayer, War1 Comment

Wishing you a safe and happy Memorial Day and, please, amid your boat rides, barbecue and beer, but be sure to stop at some point and remember what this day is really about.

For all those who have lost loved ones in battle I pray, in the words of Abraham Lincoln:

that our heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

For our fallen soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines past and present, known and unknown (including military chaplains); for those who died in battle and for the many veterans and other service men and women we have lost over the years:

Eternal rest, grant unto them, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon them.
May they rest in peace.
Amen.

No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (Jn. 15:13)
Gettysburg
Image: Incidents of the war. A harvest of death, Gettysburg, July, 1863

Faces of the Fallen – an up to date list of U.S. troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan
RIP Darin Thomas Settle
Adopt a Platoon

Korean Court Rules Embryo is Not A Life Form

ChelseaEmbryonic Stem Cell Research, video3 Comments

Under the dictatorship of relativism absolutely nothing is absolutely true…not even basic science. Case in point (h/t Wesley Smith):

South Korea’s Constitutional Court has ruled that human embryos left over from fertility treatment are not life forms and can be used for research or destroyed, a court spokesman said Friday.

In its ruling Thursday the court upheld an existing law allowing the use of leftover embryos for research. The law also allows fertility clinics to dispose of frozen embryos five years after fertilisation treatment is completed.

“The ruling means that human embryos that are in their early stage and are not implanted into a mother’s womb cannot be seen as human life forms,” the spokesman, Noh Hui-Beom, told AFP.

The ruling came after a group of 13 people including pro-life activists filed a petition with the court against the current bioethics law, which allows the use of leftover embryos for research.

I told you the stem cell debate was becoming more and more unscientific. This all reminds me of this interview with Princeton professor of molecular biology Lee Silver who says that embryos are no different than the skin cells on your arm:

The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Lee Silver
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Fox News

Apparently one doesn’t have to have a whole lot of common sense to be a professor at Princeton. Of course, really, the idea that embryos are not human life has more to do with politics than science. It is just a way of manipulating public support for human cloning and embryonic stem cell research – the consequences of which are devastating for the future of humanity.

Related:
Stealth Legislation to Federally Fund Human Cloning

Added Inspiration

ChelseaReligion, Suffering2 Comments

The Inspiring Story of Garvan Byrne, posted earlier today, also reminds me of something Pope Benedict wrote in his second encyclical, Spe Salvi:

It is not by sidestepping or fleeing from suffering that we are healed, but rather by our capacity for accepting it, maturing through it and finding meaning through union with Christ, who suffered with infinite love. (37)

…and this passage from 1 Peter that was the first reading at Mass this Monday:

In this you rejoice, although now for a little while you may have to suffer through various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire, may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Although you have not seen him you love him; even though you do not see him now yet you believe in him, you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, as you attain the goal of faith, the salvation of your souls.

Perseverance through suffering prepares us for the joy of eternal life.

The Inspiring Story of Garvan Byrne

ChelseaDisabled, Hope, Suffering14 Comments

I don’t think it matters how handicapped you are or how sick. You always succeed in something. God gave us each a gift. –Garvan Byrne March 20, 1973 – April 16, 1985

After watching these videos and hearing the words of the delightful young Garvan Byrne, terminally ill and handicapped from birth, I am reminded of something Fr. Jaques Philippe wrote in his book Searching for and Maintaining Peace:

In all suffering there is a germ of life and of the resurrection, because Jesus is there in person.

There is a shorter, edited version, but I do suggest watching the entire thing if you have time:

It is so hard to believe that he was only 11 years old when this interview was conducted. The whole world should know about this extraordinary boy!

I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. (Mt.11:25, Lk. 10:21)

TOB Tuesday: Homosexuality

ChelseaChastity, Gay Marriage/Homosexuality, Sex, Sexuality, Theology of the Body, TOB Tuesday3 Comments

Gay RightsSince Congress is considering repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell this week – possibly by Thursday – I thought this was a good subject for today’s TOB Tuesday post. In a column for Catholic Exchange’s Theology of the Body Channel, Robert Colquhoun explains the Church’s teaching on homosexuality while respecting the sensitivities of those afflicted with same sex attraction:

There has been a very widespread campaign to normalize same sex attraction to pass it off as something normal and natural. The world gives those who experience same sex attraction a stark choice: either stay in the closet or come out and embrace your same sex attraction. What about an alternative to these choices? For Christians who experience same sex attraction, many feel alienated by what their faith tells them about same sex attraction: either they are damned or should experience extreme isolation. In our highly sexualized culture, a life without sex seems unimaginable.

The Catholic Church states that those who experience same sex attraction should be treated with ‘respect, compassion and sensitivity.’ (CCC2358). John Paul II in his writings talked about the personalistic norm: that the only adequate response to the human person is love. Love desires the best for another person. The Catholic Church is often attacked for its stance on homosexuality because it is seen to be intolerant. However, it is false compassion to condone homosexual acts. The Catechism states, “Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.” (CCC 2359).

Please, do read the rest!

I also encourage you to read this short post from Jenny Senour Uebbing on why the Catholic Church cannot (as opposed to will not) recognize same sex marriage.

It is important to remember that the Catholic Church does not condemn the homosexual person. In fact, she has a very loving ministry to those individuals to help them live the universal call to chastity and holiness. Visit the Courage Apostolate for more information.

Other resources:
–Ascension Press has a new talk from Christopher West: The Case Against “Same-Sex Marriage”: Protecting the True Meaning of Marriage
–Catholic Audio blog has audio of a talk by Dr. Janet Smith called Homosexuality: Why Not