Frozen Embryos

[brightlights]

Do the thousands of frozen embryos in fertility clinics around the US have souls?

 

[Sanguine]

No, just like the 290+ million people in the US.

 

[DrBubbaLove]

Do we know when a soul enters a human during our creation? Not sure we know or how we could know for certain. No one has yet figured out how to observe or measure a soul. Some have tried. For me it is a safe bet that it happens before birth.
The more important question for me is what that embryo represents, which Catholics say is a human life. Once you make that distinction then that embryo is a person in the earliest stages of formation. It then becomes a serious error to start deciding who lives and who dies. For us it is no different than declaring certain people or classes of people non-human. An embryo is human life in its most helpless and defenseless form, so it is most deserving of our protection. Protecting the helpless, the defenseless is surely a common belief of all.

 

[P4g4nite]

An embryo is a potential human and, if there is such a thing as a soul, it has the potential for a soul as well.

 

[Arkanin]

The more important question for me is what that embryo represents, which Catholics say is a human life. Once you make that distinction then that embryo is a person in the earliest stages of formation.

If you make that distinction. Personally, I'm about as dispensed to conclude that lawn-mowing is an act of genocide.

 

[Follower of Christ]

Do we know when a soul enters a human during our creation? Not sure we know or how we could know for certain. No one has yet figured out how to observe or measure a soul. Some have tried. For me it is a safe bet that it happens before birth.
The more important question for me is what that embryo represents, which Catholics say is a human life. Once you make that distinction then that embryo is a person in the earliest stages of formation. It then becomes a serious error to start deciding who lives and who dies. For us it is no different than declaring certain people or classes of people non-human. An embryo is human life in its most helpless and defenseless form, so it is most deserving of our protection. Protecting the helpless, the defenseless is surely a common belief of all.

wonderful post.
the only area I think I disagree is the ''before birth'' thing.

Ackknowledging that God knows the future, Id think Hed know that a certain embryo was going to be frozen by some nitwit and deal with it accordingly.

If you do believe thats its before birth tho, that would finally help me understand the RCCs positoin on birth control.
I dont go that far with it all, but I can see how one could.

Human life is what matters here.
Playing around with fetuses, be it freezing them, aborting for convienience sake, or whatever, should be outlawed altogether.

 

[Arkanin]

Playing around with fetuses, be it freezing them, aborting for convienience sake, or whatever, should be outlawed altogether.

If we assume a handful of theological beliefs to be correct, which is not how our government should work.

 

[Follower of Christ]

If we assume a handful of theological beliefs to be correct, which is not how our government should work.

you mistake me then....my faith in God has nothing to do with how I feel.
Those embryos would become a human baby....they are life.
We protect seals and lab rats, then discard our own children.

Who knows what one of those murdered children may have been.
Could be that one of them could have found the cure for AIDS or cancer.
Or just been a really wonderful person.

Its sick to murder a defenseless person.

 

[DrBubbaLove]

An embryo is a potential human and, if there is such a thing as a soul, it has the potential for a soul as well.

Could agree that sperm and an egg are potentially human. Once we have an embryo we step beyond potential to the beginning of the formation of a human. Potential means it has not happened yet, an embryo is happening so it cannot be "potential". You could say that embryo has the potential to be born, to live or to become a fully formed human. If not otherwise prevented, the embryo is growing. If not un-naturally or naturally (spontaneous abortion) prevented from growing then a human will be born. So any way one looks at that, the decision involves choosing who will be born and who will not, which is the same as saying who will live. We say such a choice does not belong to the mother or any of us.

It is disgusting to see the result of a partial birth abortion but you could use the same argument to justify this barbaric practice. Crushing someone's skull and sucking out the brain is obviously wrong for most of us. Yet some will say as long as that human has not taken the first breath of air, it is only potentially human and therefore ok. Realize there is a distinction here between embryo and fully developed fetus, but we are really just talking about stages in the growth of a human.


The question is not if it is potentially human, but whether we will allow this growing human the right to potentially live and whether or not we have the right to make such decisions.

 

[Ubercow]

At what point does the baby acquire it's soul?

When it's conceived, when it bursts through the placenta, when it learns algebra? Calculus?

If a little one year old baby dies, when their soul goes to heaven or hell, how old will it be?

Will everyone be the same age they were when they died in the new life?

How is it fair to automatically allow babies into heaven when they were not given the same Earthly test that someone older has?

 

[brightlights]

If a little one year old baby dies, when their soul goes to heaven or hell, how old will it be?

How is it fair to automatically allow babies into heaven when they were not given the same Earthly test that someone older has?

1) isaiah tells us that all who die before the age of accountability go to heaven.

2) how is it fair for that baby to go to hell?

 

[Ubercow]

1) isaiah tells us that all who die before the age of accountability go to heaven.

2) how is it fair for that baby to go to hell?

How is it fair that Einstein or Gandhi went to hell, but they would have gone to heaven if they died as a baby?

 

[brightlights]

How is it fair that Einstein or Gandhi went to hell, but they would have gone to heaven if they died as a baby?

who says they went to hell?

 

[Ubercow]

who says they went to hell?

Is it fair that they didn't go to heaven, but would have if they had died as babies? Are you a universalist? I don't think non believers not going to hell is a christian idea.

 

[brightlights]

Is it fair that they didn't go to heaven, but would have if they had died as babies? Are you a universalist? I don't think non believers not going to hell is a christian idea.

it is not man's place to say who went to hell and who went to heaven. i have no idea of their thoughts on jesus and i also have no idea about how gracious god was with them

 

[Ubercow]

it is not man's place to say who went to hell and who went to heaven. i have no idea of their thoughts on jesus and i also have no idea about how gracious god was with them

Can't you look at scripture and determine whether or not they would have gone to heaven or hell based on what God did with others?

Do you believe that there is even one single human soul that is in hell? How is that fair if they would have gone to heaven if they died as a baby? How does this demonstrate God's perfect sense of judgement?

 

[brightlights]

Can't you look at scripture and determine whether or not they would have gone to heaven or hell based on what God did with others?

Do you believe that there is even one single human soul that is in hell? How is that fair if they would have gone to heaven if they died as a baby? How does this demonstrate God's perfect sense of judgement?

i cant say who goes where, i'm only man.

also, if someone lived out their life and chose not to follow god then god would be justified in judging them

a baby, on the other hand, cannot choose.

 

[Ubercow]

i cant say who goes where, i'm only man.

Don't bother repeating yourself, I already got that part. I'm saying that you could make an educated guess based on what scripture tells us about what God did with other people.

also, if someone lived out their life and chose not to follow god then god would be justified in judging them

They would have gotten a free ticket to heaven if they had died as a baby though.

a baby, on the other hand, cannot choose.

Do you think that, out of all the babies that went to heaven, every single one would have passed God's criteria for admittance to heaven?

 

[DrBubbaLove]

SuperCow,
While these are interesting questions, how do they relate to this thread?

 

[Stormy]

I know it is a very modern scientific procedure to freeze embryos and then later use one of them to produce a child.... and yet the whole thing seems so barbaric.