It was definitely the most incredible moment of my life… I never imagined I would be in a delivery room with my mother in this particular situation.
~ Sara Connell describing the moment that her mother, Kristine Casey, gave birth to her own grandson via in-vitro fertilization, as discussed on an episode highlighting infertility, Katie Couric, June 18
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Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Surrogacy is turning children into commodities while children languish in the adoption system. Genetically it may be her son, contractually as well, but as far as human relations go its her brother. Her brother spent nine months in the womb bonding with his mother, not his sister. How will this impact their family relationship down the road? How many other children died as part of the IVF process? We laud adoption as a positive option, a best choice for some, but of course not the ideal. Surrogacy has no ideals, it turns reproduction from joy into gratification.
I would do anything for my child!!! Right? Isn’t that what a mother says? Of course not. She shouldn’t do just anything for her child. Maternal love has boundaries. It may be boundless in quantity, but there’s still a fence around it that should not be crossed. A mother should not be a friend, in the sense of a peer. A mother should not cross sexual boundaries, of course that doesn’t even need to be said. A mother should not meddle in the marriages of her children. And a mother should not allow her empathy for her infertile daughter to so overwhelm her that she would pervert nature to this degree.
I’m glad for the birth of a healthy child who is clearly very loved, but surrogacy is wrong. Women giving birth to their own grandchildren is wrong. Children being manufactured is wrong. Babies are not commodities. We don’t have the right to create them and “grow” them according to our wishes and designs, violating natural law all along the way.
This is not respectful of human life.
Effective parents learn to say no to their children.
Was this episode entitled Extreme Enabling?
I need to apologize for my comment above. I had not watched the video yet and it tells how the mother offered to carry the baby for her daughter. Her daughter did not ask her. It is still extreme enabling. The mother could have offered to help and support her daughter and son-in-law through the adoption channels.
The amount of children that are created and then discarded in these attempts is staggering.
I agree with Jen that this little boy is obviously very loved but the way he was conceived and carried was not respectful of human life.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the world seems to get crazier every day.
Yet it’s incredibly “respectful of life” to force a woman to remain pregnant if she wants to end it. Sure.
Yes, BlueVelvet, it is. If by “respecting life” you mean getting the most life and the best quality life, NOT aborting wins. With abortion, you kill one life and wreck another–look it up. With the choice of Life, one gets his God-given right, and the other has to do something difficult and perhaps scary, but she can live Proud.
Forcing a child out of his first location through abortion is bullying and disrespectful of the new, developing human’s life.
BlueVelvet, the point is not to “force” a woman to remain pregnant, but to recognize the human life in the womb and protect the sanctity of that life. The child does not deserve to die because his mother doesn’t want to be “forced” to remain pregnant.
Newsflash: SEX MAKES BABIES.
But Megs needed that degree, Jen. C’MON.
End “it.” Humph. I was not an “it” to be ended, Megan. I am deeply offended by your comment.
“Forcing a child out of his first location through abortion is bullying and disrespectful of the new, developing human’s life.”
So what? Two “people” — in our Western, post-Enlightenment sense of the phrase — can’t possibly inhabit the same body. The fetus is about as “entitled” to his mother’s body as I am to your dinner or gun collection.
“But Megs needed that degree, Jen. C’MON.”
You know, when you constantly attack other people for their decisions, it could be seen as a sign of discontent.
So what? Two “people” — in our Western, post-Enlightenment sense of the phrase — can’t possibly inhabit the same body. The fetus is about as “entitled” to his mother’s body as I am to your dinner or gun collection.
And since the 17th and 18th centuries, we’ve learned that two people can and DO inhabit the same body during gestation of a new person. Thanks, science! The child in the fetal stage is as entitled to his mother’s shelter and nourishment as a born child is. Once again, thanks, science!
You know, when you constantly attack other people for their decisions, it could be seen as a sign of discontent.
I am HIGHLY discontented by your decision to kill your child in order to facilitate you getting your degree. For your child’s sake.
DFTT
Surrogate motherhood for pay should be re-considered. A relationship is formed in the womb only to be broken at or soon after birth.
The situation here is that of a grandmother carrying and giving birth to her grandchild. It is not a commercial transaction. What’s more, even though the baby was turned over to the mother, the link with the woman who bore it need not be broken. Grandma will probably often see, hold, and otherwise care for this baby.
I AM a little discontented I have to work on this beautiful day. True that.
Two people don’t inhabit the same body – one body is inside the other. There are TWO bodies.
Dearest Mat. Anna,
You mean to tell me when I carried each of my 3 boys their penis’ weren’t mine??
WOW!
And when I carried my daughter I didn’t have 2 extra ovaries and 1 extra uterus??
(by 9 weeks a female child has all her reproductive organs and is making reproductive cells!!)
CRAZY!!
The body inside of my body was not my body. TRUE THAT!
Come on proaborts. DERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
But let’s talk dinner and gun collections with Megs!!
You are not entitled to either Megan but you are welcome to them.
Back to the grandmommy-mommy surrogate baby thingy:
This is very, very dangerous.
There is something that is actually comforting when evil truly looks monstrous. Auschwitz looks like evil. Gosnell’s clinic looks like evil. When we look at evil, like to be able to condemn the whole thing.
This incestuous surrogacy shows us a loving mother and a loving grandmother and a healthy newborn child. All of these seemingly good things mask the horror of what has really happened. This is a fantasy, like those gorgeous twinkling vampires that haunt modern romance stories — the monster is hidden under an attractive facade.
Where do we start? How do we explain the damage that this sort of abomination brings into the world? I wish there were a visible implosion of the universe to match the spiritual catastrophe that this is.
“The body that was inside my body was not my body.”
This doesn’t actually contradict what I said.
“Where do we start?”
Start by examining the pervasive belief in our society that there is no greater calling for a woman than to have a baby, and you’ll possibly be more sympathetic to people who go to seemingly insane lengths to reproduce.
” There is something that is actually comforting when evil truly looks monstrous. Auschwitz looks like evil. Gosnell’s clinic looks like evil. When we look at evil, like to be able to condemn the whole thing. ”
Okay, so this woman carrying a baby for her daughter is like gassing millions of people? Ooookkaaayy…
I don’t really see anything morally wrong with surrogacy as long as they don’t deliberately destroy embryos in the process or coerce vulnerable women into being surrogates.
And saying stuff like “the damage that this sort of abomination brings into the world” just looks like you’re bashing on the kid.
“Start by examining the pervasive belief in our society that there is no greater calling for a woman than to have a baby, and you’ll possibly be more sympathetic to people who go to seemingly insane lengths to reproduce.”
Well, there’s the society pressure but I think it’s weird that people seem to deny there’s a pretty big biological drive to reproduce as well.
Sorry Del my 3:33 comment was a little harsh, I know you aren’t bashing on the kid and I realize that Catholics (and some other denominations) believe that surrogacy is contrary to natural law, and that’s not a bad belief in itself. But I wish people would watch their language. It’s not the kid’s fault that he was conceived in a way you think is wrong. Using language like “evil” and “abomination” will probably not make him feel very worthwhile when he’s old enough to understand how he came to be. It’s like when pro-choicers call children conceived by rape/have rapists as a father or mother “rapist spawn” or “the product of evil” and that kind of stuff. I get that they are reacting to the horror of the rape but it’s not fair to the child who had nothing to do with it. I think people should think about that when they are speaking out about things.
I don’t know why anyone would think that I am bashing on the child. This child is like a child conceived by a rapist: an innocent victim of some terrible adult actions.
The broad problem with surrogacy is that it further dehumanizes children. Babies are just a commodity, to be purchased when wanted and discarded when unwanted. In this case, the child was purchased by parents who desire a person to nurture and develop. Someday, someone may order up a child-clone to be a pancreas donor.
This particular child may grow up well. But we can see that this child is at significant risk of emotional turmoil and legal confusion, depending on how the adults behave in the future.
” Babies are just a commodity, to be purchased when wanted and discarded when unwanted. In this case, the child was purchased by parents who desire a person to nurture and develop.”
I think that’s a sweeping generalization of couples who use surrogacy and IVF.
“Someday, someone may order up a child-clone to be a pancreas donor.”
I think it’s incredibly unfair to compare people who want a child to love to some hypothetical person who would make a clone to farm for organs. It’s like comparing adoptive parents to someone who would purchase a child for slavery.
” This particular child may grow up well. But we can see that this child is at significant risk of emotional turmoil and legal confusion, depending on how the adults behave in the future.”
As are adopted children.
Adoption of orphans is a natural human event.
Whereas IVF, surrogacy, and paying another woman to get pregnant so you can buy her child — these are abuses of technology and fertility in conflict with human natural. These all treat children as a commodity to be purchased when wanted.
Infertility is a tragedy, but there are right and wrong ways to work around that tragedy. Adoption is in accord with human nature and the Natural Law. The unnatural mech/tech is not.
And yes…. good people like yourself have trouble seeing this. I don’t fault anyone for trying to do a good thing. This is why we need moral education — so everyone can make better choices.
“Adoption of orphans is a natural human event.”
Sure. But most adoptions are not of orphans. Most adoptions in the US involve a single parent (usually the mom) relinquishing rights to her kid. That’s decidedly unnatural, in my opinion, children are naturally supposed to be raised by their biological parents. There are a lot of ethical issues with adoption (adoption agencies paying poverty stricken individuals in Africa to relinquish their kids is a big one), but that doesn’t make adoption in itself “bad”. It’s just a thing, that can be used properly and ethically or not. The same way I see IVF and surrogacy. It can be used ethically or not. I fail to see how taking a child from his or her biological parent(s) to be raised by biological strangers is “natural” while raising your own biological child that grew in another womb is “unnatural”. They both seem “unnatural” to me (not that I think stuff that’s “unnatural” is necessarily bad).
” And yes…. good people like yourself have trouble seeing this. I don’t fault anyone for trying to do a good thing. This is why we need moral education — so everyone can make better choices.”
I’m not “good, and I don’t really have trouble seeing it, I just disagree. I don’t think “unnatural” equals bad, and that just because something is natural doesn’t mean it’s necessarily good. Unmarried teenagers getting pregnant is biologically perfectly natural, but it’s not generally a positive. And pacemakers are unnatural, but I hope no one would argue they are an abomination
“I’m not “good”
Your way too hard on yourself, Jack. :)
I am against surrogacy, IVF, and other unnatural ways to bring children into the world. I think some couples who aren’t able to have children are meant to adopt the ones that have no family (and same-sex couples aren’t meant to have children, period). Like someone said – it turns children into commodities to be created, discarded, used, sure loved as well – the lucky ones, who were “chosen” to be implanted. Maybe I wouldn’t be so critical if no embryos were ever destroyed in the process, but as it is – it’s all part of the same evil process.
@ Jack: The biologically based relationship is mother and child. If both mother and child are lucky, the mother’s male companion or husband helps raise the child. That man is the “social father” regardless of whether biologically related or not. Throughout history, and before there was history, everyone has been “mama’s baby and daddy’s maybe.”
The child growing up with a social father (biologically related or not) is going to do much better than the kid sans a social father which is why marriage is vital for children.
Dear Jack —
I am using the word “natural” in the sense of “in accord with human nature.”
Your example of a pacemaker is a good one. It is natural to seek good health. When one’s heart suffers from a disorder, it is “natural” (in these sense) to install a manufactured device that restores order to the heart, causing the heart to work as it is supposed to.
Concerning pregnant teenagers: It is the natural order for a man and woman to cleave together in marriage and have children together. While it is “natural” (according to animal biology) for humans to have sexual activity outside of marriage and even outside of normal male/female coupling, this is disordered behavior. It is not in accord with the natural order. Likewise contraception, even within marriage. But these disorders are very common in our culture, and so it is a common error to accept them as “natural.” And that is why our culture is doomed, if we persist.
Infanticide and slavery, divorce and adultery, sodomy and child abuse, contraception and human sacrifice — these disorders have been common throughout human history. Briefly, during the Age of Christendom, these disorders were removed from or reduced in the cultures that accepted Christianity and truly tried to live in accord with the Law of Human Nature. Christendom fell apart during the Reformation/Enlightenment and since then culture has spiraled down into our current neo-pagan age, in which all of the ancient disorders are celebrated as new freedoms.
One of the great goods of the Pro-Life Movement is that we are asserting to the world the idea that some choices are wrong; i.e., intrinsically evil. Part of our work is to teach the world that there is truly a good that we ought to seek.
About teen pregnancy: hasn’t this been the historical norm?
Has there ever been a period in which most females waited until they were 20 or older to have their first baby?
Denise: Delaying marriage and children is a new thing. Teenagers are a new thing: Invented in the 1940’s, when young people were first corralled into warehouses known has “high schools.”
For eons, young children were trained to be homemakers and providers — and they were ready for marriage by their early teens.
Modern education is ordered toward contraception and short-term relationships, and many never learn how to live a real marriage or happy family life.
@ Del: Precisely! The whole “teenage pregnancy” problem is a mirage. The real problem is the growing disconnect between MARRIAGE and child-bearing. Throughout history — and probably pre-history — human females have USUALLY had their first baby while in their teen years. There was usually nothing the least bit scandalous about it as they are also usually married (at least after the custom of marriage evolved and the evolution of the marriage custom may have been a large factor in getting from pre-history to civilizations that could record history).
Focusing on the supposed epidemic of “teen pregnancy” is counter-productive. The age of the mom when she gives birth to her first baby is just not the problem. The problem is that marriage and child-bearing have been disconnected.
We can’t even begin to discuss appropriate solutions when the problem itself is so falsely stated. Thought experiment: Would you rather a baby be born to a 19-year-old married woman or a 20-year-old single woman?