LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2004, Page 402

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402 THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS

From the opposite direction, some Christians point to the widely
accepted practice of adoption and ask, “If the adopting of a child
whose genetic origin is completely outside the marriage can be a
suitable way to create a family, why would we reject procreative
technologies simply because they use gametes from outside the
marriage?”

One response to this question is to argue that the practice of
adoption provides only an imperfect analogy with reproductive
technologies. In adoption a couple typically is rescuing a child who
lacks a family, rather than purposely creating a child in a way that
goes beyond the marriage. Furthermore, the adoptive parents are
in a better position to maintain a symmetrical relationship to their
adopted child. Neither parent has provided any part of the genetic
instructions. '®

Some Christians also argue that if marriage and parenting are
significant analogies of God’s adoption of us in Christ, then per-
haps the biblical guidance does not so strictly confine conception to
the union of sperm and egg of husband and wife. In this view, com-
mitted love between husband and wife incorporating children in a
faithful way counts for more than the source of the child’s DNA.

We may respond to this line of thought by pointing out that the
biblical analogy of adoption suggests most persuasively the oppo-
site. Couples who are not so focused on reproducing some of their
own DNA are likely to be more prepared to share their love with
the world in whatever way God calls them.

We of course have yet to see the end of developments in genet-
ics and reproductive technology. Among the more challenging
technologies on the horizon, for instance, are current efforts to de-
velop an artificial womb. As we have noted previously, the Com-
mission in a further study intends to deal with additional moral and
spiritual questions raised by scientific manipulations of human
cells.

As we struggle with these problems and questions we are given
to understand more keenly the limitations of our human existence
in the flesh, captured so well in Jacob’s troubled reply to Rachel,
“Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of
the womb?” (Gen. 30:2).

Conclusion

“What Child Is This?” Indeed, whose children are we? Every
one of us, both those conceived in the procreative act of husband
and wife and those conceived through extraordinary means, are
born children of humanity, in the flesh and with a human will.
God’s Word teaches, as we have seen, that a full and abundant life
will not emerge from the life of the flesh. But his Word also brings
us the good news of a Savior and the new birth he brings through
Baptism.

This living Word calls men and women to see that their life to-
gether in marriage is filled with opportunities to give glory to God
and to practice unselfish love. Christians will therefore seek to dis-
cern how their lives in marriage and family may grow under God’s
guidance. To recognize the grave moral dangers inherent in the
practice of cloning they will need to reflect carefully on the use of
contraception and reproductive technologies. In this report we have
sought to help provide guidance for Christians as they think about
these issues in light of what the Scriptures teach concerning mar-
riage and the family.

As we engage also in this task of assessing contemporary tech-

nologies of reproduction, our foremost concern is to ask what these
technologies mean in light of Christ’s promise of new birth from
above through water and the Spirit. And we remember as Chris-
tians that our ultimate mission is to participate in making “disci-
ples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19).

2004 Convention Workbook

Glossary”

Artificial Insemination (AI): A technique that introduces sperm
into a woman’s body by some means other than sexual
intercourse. Sperm often comes from the woman’s husband
(AIH), but donor sperm from outside a marriage is also used.
(AID).

Clone: An individual grown from a single somatic cell of its .
parent and genetically identical to it.*

Cryopreservation: Preservation (as of cells) by subjection to
extremely low temperatures.*

DNA: An abbreviation for “deoxyribonucleic acid.” Any of
various nucleic acids that are usually the molecular basis of
heredity, localized especially in cell nuclei, and constructed
of a double helix* (spiral). In humans this “double helix”
structure in each bodily cell contains our genes, the sets of
instructions that provide the basic framework for our
physical development throughout life.

Embryo: The early developmental stage of an animal while it is
in the egg or within the uterus of the mother. In humans the
term is applied to the unborn child until the end of the
seventh week following conception. From the eighth week
the unborn child is called a fetus. In organisms that
reproduce sexually, the union of an ovum with a sperm
results in a zygote, or fertilized egg.

Gamete: A mature male or female germ cell (sperm or egg).
These cells contain only one-half of the paired genes found
in other body cells, and they are capable of forming a new
and physically unique individual by fusion with a gamete of
the opposite sex.

Gene: The basic physical unit of heredity. Each human body cell,
- except for sperm and egg cells, has 40,000 to 60,000 units of
physical instructions encoded in the DNA in the cell. These
instructions provide the basic framework for our physical
development throughout life.

Genetic Science: The systematic study of how genes govern
physical development, sometimes simply called genetics.

In Vitro Fertilization: A term referring to a variety of highly
sophisticated techniques whereby an embryo is conceived
outside a woman’s body. Several different methods are used
for transferring the embryo into the woman’s womb.

Reproductive Cloning: The use of technologies of cloning to
produce a new individual animal or human. Reproductive
cloning replaces the fusing of gametes (sperm and egg) with
techniques that take a full set of paired genes from a body
cell and that use this double set in an egg that has been
emptied of its own genetic instructions. The resulting
individual has the same double set of paired genes that the
donor of the cell has and is sometimes called a “delayed
identical twin” of the donor.

Reproductive Technologies: Term referring to a variety of
technologies that have been developed to address problems
of human infertility.

Somatic Cells: Cells of the body that compose the tissues,
organs, and parts of that individual other than the germ cells.
A somatic cell has the complete double set of paired genes
and thus differs from a sex cell (germ cell) that has only half
of the set of paired genes.

Surrogacy: The practice of having a woman who is not intended
to be the social mother of the child provide the womb in
which the child develops until it is able to be bom.