Embryos, Counterculture, and Natural Law

Robert George on the First Things blog, http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=477, remarked in connection with embryonic stem cell research that, “So, however much one might dislike Republican policies in other areas, it’s clear that the death toll under the Democrats would be so large as to make it unreasonable for Catholic citizens, or citizens of any faith who oppose the taking of innocent human life, to use their votes and influence to help bring the Democratic party into power.” This conclusion reasonably could be said to follow Vatican teaching. To kill an embryo for stem cell research is to kill an innocent vulnerable human being. To kill millions of innocent vulnerable human beings is to engage in acts arguably so heinous as to eclipse all other issues (poverty, torture, war, etc., though George would not necessarily concede that the Democratic party is better overall on moral issues even if abortion and stem cell research ceased to be issues). Let us assume for the moment that this is the most reasonable interpretation of Vatican teaching.

 It seems obvious that Vatican teaching in this respect is far removed from the values of the American people. If Vatican teaching is correct, the killing of embryos should be regarded as first degree murder. Yet, 60 % of the American people favor federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. I would imagine the percentage of Americans that would support murder laws for the killing of embryos is small. To be sure, a majority of Americans favor criminalizing abortion (though, not necessarily murder laws) in a wide variety of circumstances, but the overwhelming majority of people, including an overwhelming majority of Catholics, favor exceptions that they could not possibly accept if they thought an embryo or a fetus was the same thing as a baby (rape, incest, and in some circumstances, the life of the mother).

The first point of my post is to question the coherence of the First Things project (which George may or may not endorse). According to Linker, the purpose of the project is to show that Catholic values are American values. It seems obvious that Vatican values are far more absolute than those of the American people. Indeed this is the point of the epithet about the culture of death. In that regard, the First Things project is in tension with Vatican thinking. The Vatican thinks that American culture is far removed from a Catholic culture. The Vatican is not engaged in a project of American populism.

Another point of my post is to ask how the Vatican’s positions on embryonic stem cell research, abortion, and natural law fit together. The question in part is whether the Vatican’s position can be demonstrated without resort to its authority. If natural law is written on our hearts, the Catholic position should be capable of defense without resort to authority. Robert George argues in conformity with Vatican teachings that embryos are human individuals, that discrimination on the basis of the stage of human development is morally wrong, and that killing for research purposes can not be justified. But, as I have suggested, most people do not accept these views. To be sure, an embryo is a human organism (and I will assume that one can be distinguished from another though that does not fully capture what most think a human individual is). But the intuition of most people is that a microscopic group of cells (even those of a human organism) in a petri dish are not the same as an adult. They in fact believe that discrimination on the basis of human development makes sense (even if they were in favor of criminalizing embryo destruction, they would likely not consider the crime to be the same as infanticide). And they do not regard the failure of embryos to attach to uterine walls to be a health crisis. Perhaps they believe that the capacity to suffer, to feel, and to think are important to what it means to be a human being (even if they regard human life to be of some or considerable moral weight). What does one say to get beyond impasse?

 If the Vatican’s position can not be demonstrated (or defended on more persuasive grounds) to be right without resort to authority (a matter upon which I am eager to learn more), it should be recognized that those with different views have no knockout punches to throw either. This is not mathematics. But there is a truth of the matter. Someone somewhere is right here and many are wrong.

I wonder whether the natural law claim that the law is written on our hearts can hold up on these issues in a profoundly pluralistic society. The law written on the hearts of Vatican Catholics does not appear to be the same as the law written on the hearts of millions of other Catholics and non-Catholics in American society and elsewhere. Ironically the  Vatican takes a countercultural position at the same time it asserts that the truth is written on our hearts. I wonder whether disagreement here can simply be written off as the natural consequence of a “culture of death.” That phrase aptly describes a part of our culture. I would think it would appropriately be applied to someone morally insensitive enough to think that abortion, for example, raises no serious moral issue. Does it explain the range of disagreements on embryonic stem cell research and abortion?