c. 2005 Religion News Service
BOSTON _ In a bid to make sure Massachusetts remains a leader in medical know-how, the state is poised to clear the way for laboratories to seek cures for diseases by cloning human embryos for research.
Legislation approved by both houses in the final two days of March represent a loss with national implications for the Roman Catholic Church, Massachusetts’ largest denomination, and other anti-cloning religious groups. Massachusetts’ Mormon governor, Mitt Romney, says he will veto the measure, but the Legislature has enough votes to override it.
The drama, in which both sides lavishly cited the views of scientists to make their case, made clear just how hard it can be for religious groups to establish credentials _ moral or scientific _ for addressing the ethical implications of life science on the cutting edge.
The outcome also represented, to some, a sign of waning religious influence for a Catholic Church in a state where it has been badly damaged by sex abuse scandals. The church never got the hearing it once enjoyed on other moral issues.
“I expected it to be difficult, but what I’m finding is that the issue is so complex and so multifaceted that the average legislator is grappling with all the dimensions of it, and it gets very, very confusing,” said Maria Parker, interim executive director of the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, the public policy arm for the Catholic Church in the state.
Parker complained that legislators are “going to make a political decision at the end of the day, and that’s really not the best way to deal with an issue of this magnitude.”
At issue was one thorny section of an otherwise non-controversial bill enabling privately funded research using human stem cells. Voices on the left and right supported the use of “adult” stem cell lines to seek cures for Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and other diseases. But sharp divisions fissured when bill supporters refused to strike a provision that would allow embryos to be cloned and then destroyed during their first 14 days.
Proponents said cloned embryos are more malleable and therefore more promising than adult stem cell lines. Opponents countered that the procedure crosses a traditional moral line that has forbidden “killing in order to cure.”
Across the nation, voters and lawmakers are beginning to grapple with the hard science and equally hard moral dilemmas raised by stem cell research. Because the Bush administration has banned federal funding for stem cell lines created after August 2001, states have become the front lines for debating questions that arise with the creation of new cell lines.
California voters last year approved $3 billion for stem cell research, including embryonic cloning. New Jersey has provided $650 million in funds for embryonic stem cell research. Other states have imposed stricter limits, such as Arkansas, Iowa, Michigan and North Dakota, which according to stateline.org prohibit research on cloned embryos. The Maryland Senate is debating this month whether to fund embryonic stem cell research.
In the Massachusetts House of Representatives, lawmakers recognized the issue as a potentially polarizing force along moral and ideological lines.
“I consider myself a supporter of stem cell research, but this presents tremendous ethical problems,” said Rep. John Lepper, R-Attleboro. “A human embryo is not an artifact. It is not pure stuff. It deserves a certain respect because of what it is _ a potential human being. … If we didn’t have this dilemma (involving embryos), we wouldn’t have red states and blue states with regard to how to proceed on stem cell research.”
At the crux of the moral argument lies the question of what scientists may do with embryos that will never be implanted in a womb or brought to birth. Romney says he supports research using extra embryos created during in vitro fertilization, but will veto this bill when it reaches his desk.
Romney, writing last month in the Boston Globe, said “conveniently dismissing the embryo as a mere `clump of cells’ cannot disguise the reality of what occurs: A genetically complete human embryo is brought into being.”
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The state’s Catholic bishops and the Massachusetts Family Institute oppose any stem cell research using embryos because they say it destroys human life. Others have taken a different tack. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, was quoted in the Boston Globe as saying he supports cloning of human cells because “I believe human life begins in the womb, not in a petri dish.”
Despite the concerns raised by religious groups, Massachusetts lawmakers invoked the views of scientists almost exclusively during a House floor debate last Thursday (March 31) that lasted seven hours.
“In the first 14 days, you are dealing with a series of cells,” said Rep. Daniel Bosley, D-North Adams, who shepherded the bill through the House. “It is not true that every embryo becomes a human being. I’m very comfortable that in the first 14 days we are not destroying life to create life. If the chance exists to unlock cures to diseases that are out there, ethically we have the responsibility to do as much as we can do.”
Opponents framed their arguments in terms of science and general ethical concerns, not religion, even though a majority of state lawmakers share a Roman Catholic background.
Rep. Paul Loscocco, R-Holliston, made the case against cloning without reference to religious arguments.
“Why should we vote to limit the destruction to 14 days, based on the artificial time line? Why? Because it makes us feel better,” said Loscocco.
“ … At about 30 to 45 days, cell differentiation occurs and organs begin to form. Organs are there for the taking. If we want them, why not commit embryonic development to 45 or 60 days? At 45 days, it’s no different than five days. It’s either human life in process or it isn’t.”
Well before votes were cast, religious organizations met with dozens of legislators, but their approach at the statehouse was decidedly low-profile in contrast to prior debates on sensitive social issues, such as gay marriage.
Sign-waving protesters were nowhere to be found because “we felt our efforts and resources were better spent elsewhere this time,” said Evelyn T. Reilly, director of public policy for the Massachusetts Family Institute.
An alliance even took shape between the Massachusetts Catholic Conference and Our Bodies, Ourselves, an abortion rights and women’s advocacy group that decries the birth of an industry that could create a free market for female human eggs. Such political tactics seemed necessary to gain a hearing with lawmakers skeptical of a church tarred by scandal since 2002.
“Ten years ago, you would have seen red robes (of bishops) at the hearing” and afterward, said Edwin Shanahan, a contract lobbyist with 20 years of experience in the Massachusetts statehouse. But this year, the four bishops who represent the state’s 2 million Catholics didn’t make an appearance.
“Ten years ago, we had a much stronger morality caucus in the Legislature … I think (the change) is probably the result of everything the Catholic Church has gone through and the diminution of the perceived clout of the church on morality issues.”
MO/PH END RNS
