Questions to the Moralist - Personal Web Server - Boston College

Dear Fr. Bretzke,
I had a question from a woman whose husband has low sperm count -- and after much
research, no possibility of her becoming pregnant from him. They've heard about
embryo adoption, where frozen embryo -- mother and father profiled -- but embryo
would be discarded.
1. What if embryo was produced for artificial implant -- profiled donors for a projected
implant of embryo say with desirable traits.
2. What if embryo produced for research, but to be discarded.
In either case, may a couple ethically undergo implant from such an embryo?
I'm especially curious about #1 -- there seems to be some commercial value intended for
future sale of frozen embryo. It's aiding and abetting in an immoral business venture. If
that were true, I'd say I have doubts about cooperating in such a venture, even though the
individual frozen embryo might be destroyed. Life could be lost, but because there was
no market: the death as an alternative was certainly intended. Is that relevant?
In the second case for whatever research value, an embryo was produced it is now to be
discarded? There could be a record of donors, but as record for research, not record for
genetic profile with advantage for enhanced commercial profit. Is this a case of choosing
the lesser of two evils for a good end, life immorally produced rather than death.
May the couple adopt the embryo #2 for implant?
Fr. Bretzke replies:
I'm about to leave town for two weeks and don't have time to give you a long answer to
your good questions right now, so will have to suffice for the short one. The issue of
embryo adoption is being discussed among ethicists right now, and there is no clear
consensus. There is no official Church statement that clearly and definitively addresses
this question, and the closest we would have would be the 1987 Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith's Instruction "Donum Vitae" on Reproductive Technologies. Since
embryo adoption didn't seem to be a big issue on the horizon then it is not explicitly
handled, but the basic logic of the document would seem to caution against it, mostly
because of the claim that a child brought into the world has the right to natural parents,
etc. I'm not saying that this ultimately would be a persuasive argument, but it is basically
the argument Donum Vitae makes. I am attaching the document for you (it's also on the
Vatican web site), but I'd caution that there's a lot of jargon in it, and it would perhaps
take the help of a moral theologian to try and make sense of it for an average couple.
Anyway, that's the best I can do now in haste.
Thanks,
Fr. Bretzke
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