COUNSELLING CHILDLESS COUPLES FACING THE ETHICS OF CURRENT REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES IN A POST-MODERN SOCIETY Pastor Ian Nash

Article in “The Mercury” of Thursday 7 August 2008

Introduction Married couples who share a bond of suffering. Not illness, but torment Worst at times of celebration: Christmas, Mothers’ Day, Baby Showers, Family reunions. Barrenness (Infertility)

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” (Genesis 1:27-28) Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, “With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man.” (Genesis 4:1) Childless couples – Abram and Sarai (Genesis 15 – 18) Jacob and Rachel (Genesis 18) Hannah (1 Samuel 1)

CAUSES AND TREATMENTS OF INFERTILITY SUMMARY Causes Treatment DETAILS THE WOMAN ANOVULATION ENDOMETRIOSIS FIBROIDS POLYCYSTIC OVARIAN DISEASE BLOCKED OR DAMAGED FALLOPIAN TUBES

CAUSES AND TREATMENTS OF INFERTILITY DETAILS THE MAN LOW SPERM COUNT MOTILITY MATURATION ARREST GERMINAL CELL APLASIA MALE TUBE BLOCKAGES

ASSISTED REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY (IUI) AIH AID IVF ICSI GIFT IN VIVO DONOR OOCYTE SURROGACY

SOME ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS A.I.H. PRO’s AND CON’s Both parties are natural parents to the child “I-Thou” relationship No real partnership but rather “vagrantly” Physical and psychological extravagance A.I.D. PRO’s AND CON’s Child inherits wife’s characteristics Normally donor well matched Third party introduction Two basic questions: Responsibilities? Payment?

I.V.F. CONCERNS Dyson: Ethics of IVF Lists “summarily and without comment” some 23 ethical objections to IVF. As he states, “they are intended to represent the kind of standpoint which the objector might adopt”.

POST-MODERNISM Jay Kesler “This generation is that whose grandparents had a Christian belief, parents who have a memory of that belief and now children who have nothing.” R. Schrader – “Three Umpires” Moreland summarises the basic tenets of Postmodernism under six points.

COUNSELLING COUPLES Charles Gerkin in “An Introduction to Pastoral Care” says that “…good pastoral care is not simply talk about the gospel or some general statement of its applicability to people’s lives. Rather, good pastoral care embodies the gospel in relationships by speaking to the inner beings of individuals.”