President Barack Hussein Obama has announced that he is tossing out former President George W. Bush’s prohibition of federally-financed Stem Cell Research in favor of pouring millions into experimentation and research.
Does it really matter when human life begins? Many Christians, particularly Roman Catholics, Catholic-minded Anglicans, and some others, believe that life begins with inception, nine months before a new child of God draws an initial breath. This understanding undergirds the objection to abortion – which is seen as a form of homicide, perhaps murder. As the VI Commandment put it; Thou shalt do no murder. It is to be noted, however, that the U.S. Supreme Court has judged that to abort an unborn child is fully legal. But does that make it Morally Ethical?
Those who support Stem Cell Research make the point that experimentation and research may lead to finding a cure for diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, and other ail-ments. Perhaps so, but universities and scientists are already lining up to claim their share of the grants.
Former President Bush is an evangelical Protestant whose world-view reflects a Biblical understanding of the nature of human life.
That world-view is not that of pro-Stem Cell researchers – nor of Obama, despite his professed Christian belief and membership in that sectarian church in Chicago, much-discussed in the run up to the election. A verbal artful dodger, Obama can be expected to offer an articulate rationale for everything he does. There will be much talk about separating Science from Politics, whatever that means – but will experimenters now be free to create manufactured human-like beings for experimental scientific purposes?
Was President Bush bashed so often because of his Christian beliefs – inasmuch as the media are markedly secular-minded, even anti-Christian? Certainly it was a factor. Personally, I think he was concerned about how Stem Cell research would be misused. Scientific researchers, after all, are human beings – and we all are afflicted by original sin – that Christian insight and teaching pretty much rejected by the sophisticated elites of our time.
Downright atheistic politicians find it difficult, if not impossible, to get elected, which means that they are often less than completely honest, and the voters know it – which may explain why the Congress ranks so low in public esteem. One fears that the very idea of Democracy as the favored political philosophy is losing world-wide support because the “great unwashed” is too easy to manipulate – not a pleasant prospect. CWB+
