Stem Cell Research

U.S. Roman Catholic bishops issued a document Friday warning against what they consider the moral dangers of embryonic stem cell research, saying it treats human beings as commodities and reduces procreation to a manufacturing process. With general elections looming in November, the bishops said they are not asking Catholics or the public to choose between science and religion. Instead, they are urging people to examine how society should conduct medical research. Research advocates say that banning scientific use of embryos would halt promising efforts to find treatments for diseases such as cancer and multiple sclerosis. Human embryonic stem cells are created in the first days after conception and give rise to all organs and specialized tissues in the body. But the bishops said that "no commitment to a hoped-for 'greater good' can erase or diminish the wrong of directly taking innocent human lives here and now." "As believers who recognize each human life as the gift of an infinitely loving God, we insist that every human being, however small or seemingly insignificant, matters to God," the bishops said.