"It's the Spark of Life"

When my Daddy gave me the 'plumbing' lesson which explains how babies are made I was slightly more enlightened than I was prior to. I said 'plumbing' because I received a matter-of-fact, biological, unemotional, power-point display of the mechanics. My hormonal state was still embryonic, so-to-speak, so Daddy was not concerned with the ethics, morality, or consequences of pre-marital sex. He did prelude the lesson with "...when a husband and wife love each other...", so right up front, he put the sex act in the context of good, beauty, and love. Life was pretty simple back in the early 60's.

Daddy didn't tell me about phospholipase C-zeta (PLC-zeta). Nobody told me about it until I read about it in this article. One is led to believe that science can skirt the ethical questions of embryonic stem cell research now because PLC-zeta can be extracted from the sperm and used to spur the egg cell to divide and multiply. Since the potential stem cells, or blastocysts, which result are composed of only the female chromosomes then no babies can develop. WOW! Let's press on with 'therapeutic' (as opposed to 'reproductive' stem cell research which physicians, philosophers, politicians, and humanists agree should be banned internationally) research!

Well, hold on. Notice that the referenced article uses euphemisms such as 'dividing' and 'harvesting' and never uses 'cloning.' I'm not fooled. Thank God for the Magisterium of the Church which had the prescience to provide a wealth of teaching on this matter to guide us in medical ethics. I did a search on 'stem cell' on a Catholic website and tried to find reference to research which involves dividing human eggs without sperm but could find none. (I am baffled by the article's use of 'embryonic' even though the stem cells are not fertilized) I anticipate a response from the Church in the near future. An important thing I noted: 'adult' stem cell research is supported by the Church.
There are two potential sources of stem cells for human research: firstly, "adult" stem cells, which are derived from the umbilical cord blood, the bone marrow and other tissues; and secondly, "embryonic" stem cells, which are obtained by the disaggregation of human embryos.

The Holy See opposes the cloning of human embryos for the purpose of destroying them in order to harvest their stem cells, even for a noble purpose, because it is inconsistent with the ground and motive of human biomedical research, that is, respect for the dignity of human beings.

However, the Holy See applauds and encourages research using adult stem cells, because it is completely compatible with respect for the dignity of human beings. The unexpected plasticity of adult stem cells has made it possible to use this type of undifferentiated, self-renewing cell successfully for the healing of various human tissues and organs,1 particularly in hearts damaged after myocardial infarction.2 The multiple therapeutic achievements that have been demonstrated using adult stem cells, and the promise they hold for other diseases, such as neurodegenerative disorders or diabetes, make efforts to support this fruitful avenue of investigation an urgent matter.3

Above all, it is universally agreed that the use of adult stem cells does not entail any ethical problems.

The news came last week of the South Korean woman who had been paralyzed for 20 years and suddenly is able to walk after receiving stem cell therapy. Although I find it hard to believe, and the event has not been independently verified, it is very good news. The woman was supposedly treated with stem cells from umbilical cord blood! Alleluia...

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