I understood that article differently, as the bishops being caught wrong-footed by a technological development that may well overwhelm all of us. A fall-back position. But after all, what could they say?

A poem I wrote years ago, as it appears in Lion Sun:

THE SECRET

I saw the Church a cockleshell
The priesthood shrunk of half a dozen
The faithful in a catacomb
The civil cult a witches' coven
The eucharist a hidden crumb
The cup of wine a thumble heaven
The word of God a secret code
The daily prayer in whispers hidden

But privately the Creed confessed
In blessing to a monstrous guest
And all the calmness of despair
Is cured by deep unfolded prayer
A living root, an ancient need
The parable a mustard seed

-- Pavel
Pavel Chichikov | Homepage | 06.27.07 - 12:58 pm | #

I am not comfy with chimera embryos at all. But wake me when someone from [your favorite Death Eater group goes here] can explain why cloning and getting a baby is horrible and must be prevented but cloning and getting spare parts is a wonderful advance.
Ed the Roman | 06.27.07 - 1:03 pm | #

What's a 'Death Eater group?'
Pavel Chichikov | Homepage | 06.27.07 - 1:04 pm | #

Planned Parenthood, NARAL, the House and Senate Democratic Caucuses...
Ed the Roman | 06.27.07 - 1:06 pm | #

I literally got chills when I read this. Crossing HUMANS with ANIMALS. I really am sick to my stomach. Who would think up something like this? Oh, but it's for the betterment of humankind that we create these monsters. What are they thinking???

May God help us if any of this happens.
Staci | 06.27.07 - 2:04 pm | #

Time to whip out Walter Miller's "Conditionally Human" and Cordwainer Smith's stories of the Underpeople. In both cases, the genetically altered animals do become equivalent to homo sapiens. Not that I think the current line of research will lead to this.

I do worry about somebody cross-breeding Man and Chimp to mock the idea that humans are anything special.
Sandra Miesel | 06.27.07 - 2:17 pm | #

As I understand it, chimeras [chi -MER - as] are not hybrids. They are the result of introducing the embryonic cells of one species into the embryonic cell mass of another species. In 1993, the director of the Institute for Human Morphology in Moscow explained to me the work that institute was doing in the chimeric mixing of arthropods with other phyla. He was annoyed that the paper his insitute has submitted to Nature had been rejected. Perhaps he has obtained better funding that he had at the time.

Chimeras of domesticated animals have been produced for years now.
Pavel Chichikov | Homepage | 06.27.07 - 2:33 pm | #

And, the crossing of human genes into animals has been going on for several decades already; almost all diabetics are beneficiaries of one of those crosses. Diabetics used to become allergic to non-human insulin, harvested from pigs and cows. But now the little vials are full of real human insulin --- not harvested from humans, but from some little one-cell animal, am amoeba if my memory's right, that was crossed with human genes so it excretes human insulin......
Karen Marie Knapp | Homepage | 06.27.07 - 7:03 pm | #

Dr Bernard Nathanson, the ex-abortionist, suggests that pro-lifers could use the expression "right to live" because it makes it plain that the person we are talking about already has a life, rather than having a "potential" life.

At any rate, I've decided to use that expression in my own writing now.
Louise | Homepage | 06.27.07 - 11:42 pm | #

I've always wondered about this development in terms of one potential fulfillment of "the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place".

A human-appearing being (temple) that has no immortal soul (desolation).

Just a thought.
Michael Forrest | 06.28.07 - 5:43 am | #

I think the organism used is an E. Coli strain.
Ed the Roman | 06.28.07 - 7:52 am | #

I don't get it. Why are the bishops not taking vigorously opposing mixing human and other forms of DNA in the lab? If in vitro fertilization is not acceptable, how can this be?
Judith M. | 06.29.07 - 1:57 pm | #

Strike "taking".
Judith M. | 06.29.07 - 1:57 pm | #