Tea at Trianon: Black Market Babies

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, October 7, 2011

Black Market Babies

Humans cannot be owned.

As fertility technologies increase, so do the ethical quandaries. Scanning the comments on these news articles, one is immediately struck by the revulsion many people have to these accounts of black-market infants. On the other hand, the dozens of websites soliciting surrogate mothers indicate that surrogacy is — for many of these same people — just another legitimate business arrangement.

The subject is complicated, even polarizing, because many couples (including Catholics) conceived their own children via IVF. For these parents, IVF is applauded as a means of family-building, not abuse of babies. The temptation of couples who have difficulty conceiving deserves our compassion and prayers. The echo of Hannah is heard down the centuries: “And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to the Lord and wept in anguish” (1 Sam 1:10-11).

Yet the lurid news accounts of black-market babies provide an opening to share the wisdom of the Church’s prohibition against IVF and teaching on the inviolate sacredness of human life. The challenge for Catholics is to effectively engage the secular argument, which is best achieved from the perspective of the common good for all of society without recourse to religious references. Wisdom need not be presented as religious or scriptural teaching, but rather as the practical consequence that proceeds from violating a basic ethic: Humans cannot be owned. (Read entire article.)

May said...: I worry about all the frozen embryos left over from IVF, too...it's an impossible problem to solve.; October 7, 2011 at 2:18:00 AM EDT