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Is it part of our God-given destiny to exercise complete
control over our reproductive process? Richard Seed, in one of his first in-depth
interviews after announcing his intentions to clone human beings commercially, made this
very argument. U.S. President Bill Clinton offered the opposite view when he issued the
ban on human cloning. Rather than seeing cloning as human destiny, he rejected it as
"playing God." Is human cloning in line with God's purposes for us?
It is no accident that we call what we do when we have babies "procreation."
"Pro" means "for" or "forth." To be sure, we do bring babies "forth." But the deeper meaning here is
"for." We bring new human
beings into the world "for" someone or something. To be specific, we continue
the line of human beings for God-in accordance with God's mandate to humanity at
the beginning to "be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 1:28). We also create for
the people whom we help bring into being. We help give them life. They are the ones most
affected by our actions-far more than the rest of society and even far more than we
ourselves. What is particularly significant about this "procreation"-this
"creation for"-is that it is a creation that is by its very nature subject
to an outside agenda-to God's agenda primarily, and secondarily also with due
respect to the needs of the child being created. In this sense, only God is
Creator-the only one who creates something out of nothing ("ex nihilo") and
is subject to no outside agenda.
The human cloning mindset, then, is hugely problematic. With unmitigated pride it claims
the right to create rather than procreate. It looks neither to God for the way that God
has intended human beings to be procreated and raised by fathers and mothers who are the
secondary-i.e., genetic-source of their life; nor does it look primarily to the
needs of the one being procreated. It looks primarily to the cloner's own preferences
or to those of society. People operating out of the human cloning mindset see themselves
as Creator rather than procreator. This is aspiring to be God which God has consistently
chastised people for, and for which God has ultimately wreaked havoc on many a society and
civilization.
Today, as we lose sight of the Creator God, we increasingly orient more to the material
world than to God. We are more impressed with the Gross Natural Product than with the
original creation. So we more commonly talk in terms of reproduction rather than
procreation. In the process, we associate people more closely with things-with
products-than with the God of Creation. No wonder our respect for human life is
deteriorating. We become more like that with which we associate. CBHD
John F. Kilner,
PhD is Senior Scholar of The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity
and Franklin Forman Chair of Ethics at Trinity International
University.
Copyright 1999 by The Center for Bioethics and Human
Dignity
The contents of this article do not necessarily reflect the opinions of
CBHD, its staff, board or supporters. Permission to reprint granted as long as The Center for Bioethics and
Human Dignity and the web address for this article is referenced.
This article originally appeared in the Spring 1999 issue of Dignity.
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