A recent Pew Research study found Americans largely do not see in vitro fertilization as a moral issue. Adults across religious traditions, including evangelicals, are more likely to say IVF "is not a moral issue" than they are to take a position for or against it.
While grieving with those who struggle with infertility, Christians still need to look more carefully at today's reproductive technologies such as IVF in light of our beliefs about God, life, our bodies, and our children.
Since the time of the Old Testament, infertility has been part of the human experience. Many of us know someone who has struggled desperately to have a child or have experienced that difficulty ourselves. In the 21st century, though, infertility is met with "options," "solutions," and countless technologies offering hope to those in our midst struggling with fertility issues. Rather than rushing to embrace any procedure that might bring us a child—IVF, sperm or egg donors, surrogacy—we should consider the appropriate use and limits of technology.
The fact that so many people fail to consider the moral implications of IVF suggests that in the age of fertility treatments, surrogates, and modern family-building via parenting partnerships, a woman's womb has come to be seen as a somewhat arbitrary location. NBC's The New Normal quips that women are "Easy-Bake Ovens" and children are "cupcakes."
In Scripture, God affirms that what happens in utero matters and cannot be casually or disrespectfully dismissed. The womb, where God first knits us together (Ps. 139:13-14), is not an arbitrary place for a child to grow and develop. In fact, modern science has proven just how important those 9 months are—for both mother and child.
Renowned marriage and family therapist Nancy Verrier, in her book The Primal Wound, writes about how mothers are biologically, hormonally, and emotionally programmed to bond with their babies in utero as well as at birth. A baby knows his or her mother at birth, and both the mother and the baby will experience grief at any separation at the time of birth. This primal wound is forever present.
In other words, it's nowhere as easy as the Easy-Bake metaphor. In the case of surrogacy, we can interrupt the natural rhythm for mother and child and risk negative effects. (It is worth noting that surrogacy differs from adoption in that surrogacy intentionally establishes a situation that demands that a woman not bond with the child she is carrying.)
With the Center for Bioethics and Culture, I'm currently working on a documentary about surrogacy, and in our interviews I have sadly heard firsthand stories of the complications of this process—even when everyone starts off with the best of intentions. One surrogate was asked to have an abortion because the child she was carrying had a genetic defect. Another surrogate's own children were heartbroken that their mother gave away the baby. A woman who served as a surrogate for her brother and his partner is still battling over custody of the now school-aged children. Even Elton John, who celebrated the birth of his children with the help of an egg donor and a surrogate, admits that it is heartbreaking that his children will grow up without a mother.
In response to assisted reproductive technologies and procedures, an uneven patchwork of policies and laws in the U.S. attempt to protect intended parents rather than surrogates or the children they carry. Legislative debates frequently take place with no larger sense of the gravity of this practice or how it might harm families and society.
For example, this year in Louisiana a state senator introduced a law that would allow surrogacy contracts for heterosexual couples. The legislator, who had gone to another state in order to contract with a surrogate to have children, described surrogacy as baking a loaf of bread in an oven, a comparison that—as I've mentioned before—belittles the very real issues involved. As human beings created in the image of God, women are not ovens, nor are their bodies simply vessels to be used, sold, rented, or loaned.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal considered deeply the implications of this new law, and in vetoing the bill he wrote:
Creating a state-sanctioned regulatory structure for contracts pertaining to the birth of children has a profound impact on the traditional beginnings of the family…
Traditional beginnings for those who profess a Christian worldview include the biblical teachings about life being a gift from God, rather than the modern day thinking that regards a child as a right or an entitlement. A Christian worldview also informs our views of man and woman, of marriage, and of the mystery of two becoming one flesh. Within this mystery, procreation is a love act through which we receive the blessing of children.
It may be time to consider that our Catholic brothers and sisters are right on these issues and that Protestants and evangelicals should carefully consider what they have to say. From the Catholic Church's catechism:
Techniques that entail the dissociation of husband and wife, by the intrusion of a person other than the couple (donation of sperm or ovum, surrogate uterus), are gravely immoral. These techniques (heterologous artificial insemination and fertilization) infringe the child's right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage. They betray the spouses' "right to become a father and a mother only through each other.
The barren womb is a matter of great heartache and sadness. But is it unlike any other suffering we are asked to carry? In what ways might Job's question, "Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" affect our thinking about infertility?
Decades ago, the examples of situations that mark today's reality in assisted reproduction would have seemed far-fetched and maybe even crazy. But over the past 20-plus years, Protestants haven't done the hard work of thinking Christianly about infertility or about new reproductive technologies such as IVF, sperm and egg donation, and surrogacy. The Brave New World is here, and we can't ignore or side-step these issues any longer.
Jennifer Lahl is president of the Center for Bioethics and Culture, a nonprofit focused on the intersection of health and wellness, medicine, science and technology, and law and public policy around matters in bioethics.
Guest blogger Nicole Baker Fulgham is vice president of faith community relations at Teach for America. CT featured Fulgham in a profile earlier this year.
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Waiting for Superman, the new documentary by Davis Guggenheim, opened in select theaters last week to rave reviews (including CT’s), and expands to more cities in the weeks ahead. The film opened amid much anticipation from the education reform community and is already getting lots of buzz. (Despite opening in just four theaters, the film earned an astounding $34,758 per theater, far above the nation’s top two films, Wall Street 2 and Legend of the Guardians, which earned $5,333 and $4,507 per theater, respectively.)
Waiting for Superman follows five families desperately seeking a quality education for their kids. The neighborhood schools simply aren’t measuring up, so the families apply to a handful of successful public charter schools as alternatives for their children. A highly competitive lottery decides who is admitted—and who goes back to the neighborhood school. One charter school, for example, received 767 applications for just 35 spots.
As a native Detroiter fortunate to attend a high-performing public magnet school, and who went on to teach in urban public schools, I found these scenarios hitting close to home. The reality is that by the time children in poor communities enter the fourth grade, they’re already three grade levels behind their peers in wealthier communities. Of children from these communities who do graduate, they perform, on average, at an 8th grade level. Waiting for Superman confronts these tragic realities.
As a psychologist, I hear the same words over and over when I ask folks what has brought them to counseling—"I just want to be happy." But as we know, happiness is an ever-shifting target.
If I can just find the right person and get married, then I will be happy…if I could get that new house or new car or new boat or new job… if I could just get pregnant and have a baby… if I could have another baby…if I could quit my job and stay home with my kids… if we could move closer to family and have help… if I could lose 15 pounds…if I could travel more…if we could afford to retire…
When we get those things, we are happy, until we're not. Psychologists call this the hedonic treadmill, in which the efficacy of a new pleasure wears off over time. The more feel-good stuff we do or have, the more we need to achieve the same level of happiness. It's like the tolerance that develops over time in addiction, so we need three glasses of wine to get the same good feeling only one glass used to produce.
We know we want to be happy, but researchers have a hard time defining what that really means. There's a whole field called positive psychology that, in part, explores how we become happy. Positive psychology examines positive subjective experiences (pleasure, happiness), positive traits (strengths, interests), and the positive institutions (churches, schools, communities) that support them.
Martin Seligman, often considered the founder of positive psychology, posited in his theory of authentic happiness that we make choices we think will make us feel good in the future (i.e. "I'm going to marry him because he will make me happy" or "I'm going to pay for this Disney vacation because we will have so much fun"). According to authentic happiness theory, our goal in life is to feel good, and we make choices accordingly.
But do we?
The authentic happiness theory failed to explain why we choose things that aren't always pleasurable, like caring for aging parents or demanding toddlers. Seligman recently improved his theory to account for the impact of relationships and meaning on our decisions and wellbeing. In short, we care for crabby toddlers and parents who can no longer care for themselves because we love them. Because they need our help. Because it matters. Because we believe it is good and right.
Positive psychology research indicates that we can alter thought patterns, increase gratitude, serve others, exercise and eat well, savor the moment, engage in challenging and novel experiences, and smile more to feel happier. When we feel good, we are more likely to do good. The reverse is also true; doing good makes us feel better. These practical strategies for improving mood and quality of life have helped many of my clients, and I am thankful for research that provides a pathway to feeling and doing good.
At the same time, as a Christian and a psychologist, I struggle with the foundational focus on feeling good as motivation for our behavior. Do we pray because happy people pray? Do we feed the poor or care for the widow because it makes us feel good? Even in Christian circles, numerous books and studies address the ties between our faith and our happiness. Yet, I hope that my spiritual life is not about feeling good, but rather about responding to God's great love for us and for his creation.
People often come into my office expecting me to help them feel good. It is a privilege to walk with hurting men and women toward freedom from unnecessary suffering, loneliness, shame, fear, and isolation, but I long not to help people feel good, but to help them become good.
The Christian life is not about avoiding pain and maximizing pleasure. Rather, suffering is essential to our humanity. Instead of alleviating pain with a feel-good experience, we can grow in and through suffering. We can search for redemption among ashes. I am reminded of Dostoyevsky's words, "There is only one thing that I dread: not to be worthy of my sufferings." We don't merely want to be happy; we want our lives to matter. We want our pain to mean something.
The emphasis on happiness sometimes feels hollow because of its inherent temporal nature. As good as it feels to fall in love, get a new job, hold your newborn son, or meet a dear friend for coffee, those moments are simply that, moments. Life is not static, and those moments pass. Henri Nouwen wrote that life is filled with such moments in which sadness and joy kiss. Happiness feels good, but it is temporary. And you and I were made for eternity.
When a new client enters my office and asks me to help her feel better, I am all in for the journey. And yet I hope that journey takes us somewhere different than the hedonic treadmill. I hope it looks a little more like Paul's contentment in Philippians 4:12: "I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want."
That's the kind of happiness I long for in my own life and in the lives of those in my care – one that isn't dependent on our ability to go for a run or get 7.9 hours of sleep or have a challenging job. Just like you, I want to feel good. But I don't want to settle for that. I want to become good. Will you join me?
Dr. Kim Gaines Eckert is a psychologist, author of Things Your Mother Never Told You: A Woman's Guide to Sexuality (IVP Books, 2014) and Stronger Than You Think: Becoming Whole Without Having to be Perfect (IVP Books, 2007), and clinical director of the Lee University Play Therapy Center. Kim blogs at drkimeckert.com.
For those who hope the movie offers a simple solution to this complex problem, prepare to be disappointed. The issues surrounding our nation’s struggling schools are deep-rooted and complicated—and there is no silver bullet to fix them. Change will take a lot of hard work from a broad constituency—including parents, teachers, community and faith-based leaders, teachers’ unions, the business community and policymakers.
But the film illustrates that we actually do know what success looks like when we do the hard work. Across the country, schools featured in the documentary, such as the KIPP Academies and the Harlem Children’s Zone, offer exciting proof points that every child—regardless of where they’re born or the extra challenges they may face—is capable of achieving success on an absolute scale.
In our work at Teach For America, the national corps of young leaders who teach in urban and rural public schools around the country, we see examples of possibility every day in our teachers’ classrooms. Research shows that teachers are the single-most important factor for a child’s academic success. The key is learning from and replicating effective teaching and overall success of high-performing public schools.
As people of faith, we live out the biblical principles of equity and service by getting involved to advance solutions. Students in low-income communities need tutors, policy advocates, and classroom resources. The producers of Waiting for Superman created a website to help churches take action: WeAreNotWaiting.com
The U.S. has the resources, talent, and collective potential to drive real solutions on behalf of our kids. Waiting for Superman illustrates that the millions of children caught in the cycle of struggling schools deserve better. So what are we waiting for? As people of faith, it’s time to take action.
