Cardinal Keeler on the Korean Cloning

Here are His Excellency's excellent words, as quoted from Human Cloning Announcement ‘Sign of Moral Regress,' Says Cardinal Keeler:

"I am saddened to learn that South Korean scientists have used cloning to create and destroy dozens of human embryos. While touted as scientific progress, this is a sign of moral regress. Human cloning turns procreation into a manufacturing process, treating human life as a commodity made to preset specifications. Moreover, using this or any means to create innocent human lives solely to destroy them is an ultimate violation of research ethics.

"Neither this study nor any other has shown that human cloning is a workable or necessary path to medical benefits. At the same time, adult stem cells and other morally sound avenues are producing treatments for the devastating diseases often cited to justify
human cloning research. Seldom have researchers done so much harm to so many fellow humans, with so little justification.

"The human cost of the Korean experiment was very high. Dozens of human embryos were created and destroyed to produce a single stem cell line for further research. Also deeply troubling was the use of potentially harmful fertility drugs on 16 women, to produce 242 eggs for this experiment. These women were used as egg factories while their embryonic offspring were treated as nothing more than objects of research, their human dignity ignored in the name of progress.

"Science and technology are great human goods when placed at the service of the human person. Here the opposite occurred. Human beings were treated as products of technology, then used and discarded. If scientists will not voluntarily turn away from this abuse of science, a national and worldwide effort to ban human cloning is more urgently needed than ever."