Genetic Engineering

How many times have you heard expectant couples say, "Well, as long as our baby is healthy"? John Knight from Desiring God ministries cautions, "'Healthy' exists on a spectrum of possibilities just like disability. And that spectrum is becoming narrower with every passing year." He points to an article about University of Washington scientists who were able to identify the DNA sequence of a fetus with 98 percent accuracy, and with safer techniques.

The article noted, "The accomplishment heralds an era in which parents might find it easier to know the complete DNA blueprint of a child months before it is born. That would allow thousands of genetic diseases to be detected prenatally." That means that more children with disabilities will be aborted.

But Knight also argues that many people will be tempted to order up "designer babies"—all fueled by "an increasingly idolatrous mindset that says I have the right and the responsibility to determine what is best for me — including the physical and/or developmental makeup of my children, or somebody else's children."

A survey asked highly committed evangelicals what they thought of using gene editing to:

Treat disease at birth

An appropriate use of medical technology 52%

Taking medical technology too far 43%

Reduce disease over a lifetime

An appropriate use of medical technology 40%

Taking medical technology too far 58%

Make a baby more intelligent

An appropriate use of medical technology 5%

Taking medical technology too far 93%

The movie The 6th Day is set in the future and is about a billionaire tycoon who illegally and successfully clones humans. In this scene, Adam Gibson's clone (Arnold Schwarzenegger) confronts billionaire Michael Drucker over his unethical cloning of humans.

Drucker says: "In two years, three tops, I'll control enough votes to get the laws changed. Then we won't have to lose our best people—our Mozarts. We won't have to lose our Martin Luther Kings. We will finally be able to conquer death. We will finally be able to conquer death!"

Gibson is silent for a moment, then says, "And who gets to decide who lives and who dies? You?"

"You have a better idea?"

"Yeah. What about God?"

"Oh, you're one of those." Drucker answers. "I suppose you think science is inherently evil."

"No, I don't think science is inherently evil. But I think you are."

"If you believe that God created man in his own image, then you also believe that God gave man power to understand evolution, to exploit science, to manipulate the genetic code. To do exactly what I'm doing. I'm just taking over where God left off."

Elapsed time: DVD scene 22, 01:32:08 – 01:33:18

Rated PG-13 for strong action violence, brief strong language, and some sensuality.

In a Time magazine essay, Charles Krauthammer tells why he does not support stem-cell research "from embryos created purposely and wantonly for nothing but use by science":

When I was 22 and a first-year medical student, I suffered a spinal-cord injury. I have not walked in 32 years. I would be delighted to do so again. But not at any price. I think it is more important to bequeath to my son a world that retains a moral compass, a world that when unleashing the most powerful human discovery since Alamogordo—something as protean, elemental, powerful and potentially dangerous as the manipulation and re-formation of the human embryo—recognizes that lines must be drawn and fences erected.

Gattaca, with Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman, is a futuristic drama about the possible consequences of genetic engineering. A husband and wife have their first son naturally and their second one genetically engineered to negate almost all diseases and human weaknesses.

The three-minute clip begins with a brief close-up of a cross on a chain and a baby's birth. The narrator, the natural-born son, Vincent (Ethan Hawke), says, "I'll never understand what possessed my mother to put her faith in God's hands rather than those of her local geneticist's. Ten fingers, ten toes, that's all that used to matter. Not now. Now, only seconds old, the exact time and cause of my death was already known."

As he says this, you see a nurse taking a crying baby (Vincent) to a small mat on a table. Another nurse pinches the bottom of the baby's foot with a needle. The blood is instantly analyzed: "Neurological condition: 60 percent probability. Manic depression: 42 percent probability. Attention deficit disorder: 89 percent probability. [The mother now has the baby in her arms and has a worried look as she hears all this.] Heart disorder: 99 percent probability. Life expectancy: 30.2 years." The father looks on in dismay.

Approximately three years later, Vincent's parents visit a geneticist, where they view on a monitor four of their fertilized eggs. The geneticist tells them, "After screening, as you see, you're left with two healthy boys and two very healthy girls. Naturally, no critical predispositions to any of the major inheritable diseases. All that remains is to select the most compatible candidate. First, we may as well decide on gender."

The mother says she wants a brother for Vincent to play with.

The geneticist continues, "You have specified hazel eyes, dark hair, and fair skin. I've taken the liberty of eradicating any potentially prejudicial conditions—premature baldness, myopia, alcoholism and addictive susceptibility, propensity to violence, obesity, et cetera."

The parents say that maybe it's good to leave a few things to chance. But the doctor rebuffs, "You want to give your child the best possible start. Believe me, we have enough imperfection built in already. Your child doesn't need any additional burdens. And keep in mind the child is still you. Simply the best of you. You can conceive naturally a thousand times and never get such a result."

Elapsed time: Measured from the beginning of the opening credit, this scene begins at 00:09:14 and ends at 00:12:28.

Content: Gattaca is rated PG-13 for brief violent images, language, and some sexuality.

The late professor Jacques Monod, the famous French geneticist and Nobel prize winner, in the course of a television session in Toronto with Mother Teresa, spoke of how in his opinion all our destiny was locked up in our genes, which shape and direct our character and outlook, thus destroying the individual.

As he held forth on this theme, Mother Teresa sat with her eyes closed and her hands folded, deep in prayer. On being asked by the programme's compere whether she had anything to say, she replied: "I believe in love and compassion," and resumed her devotions.

As the Professor was leaving the studio he was heard to mutter: "If I saw much more of that woman I should be in bad trouble!"