Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Sydney (Fides Service) - “Scientific reserach must respect the supreme value of human life” said Cardinal George Pell, archbishop of Sydney in his submission to a Government inquiry into laws covering cloning and the use of embryos for research. Speaking in public the Archbishop underlined that human life is sacred and that scientific justification for using embryos had diminished since the laws were passed in 2002. Progress has been made with adult stem cells not with stem cells from embryos.
But scientists are pushing for laws to be extended to allow somatic cell nuclear transfer or "therapeutic cloning", in which embryos are created specifically for their stem cells and then destroyed when they are a few days old.
In the heated social debate on the subject with ethical, social and religious input, the Catholic community is promoting awareness on questions connected with bio-ethics, fertility treatment, problems of scientif research, calling attention to the Gospel of Life.
Pro-life movements are ever more active in Oceania: dioceses, parishes and associations are becoming centres of information on the subject explaining the anthroplogical reasons for the Catholic view which protects human life and human dignity from conception to natural death. Local Christian families are being encouraged to live and promote a culture of life.
(PA) (Agenzia Fides 21/9/2005 Righe: 25 Parole: 243)
