Thinking Anglicans

two more follow-ups on the embryology row

Simon Barrow wrote this article for the Wardman Wire: Flexing the Faith Muscle: Thinking Aloud. In it he looks at the style and tenor of church engagement with public life and the realm of politics – arguing that flexing the faith muscle in an overbearing way ends up being profoundly counter-productive.

Mary Warnock who among other things is a member of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s advisory group on medical ethics, wrote an article for the New Statesman which has been titled The politics of religion. In this she argues that religious belief is no basis for law-making.

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L Roberts
L Roberts
16 years ago

Thank God for Mary Warnock, she is soreley needed by our country and this archbishops’ council

Spirit of Vatican II
Spirit of Vatican II
16 years ago

How charming is divine Philosophy!
Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo’s lute,
And a perpetual feast of nectared sweets,
Where no crude surfeit reigns.

Christopher Shell
Christopher Shell
16 years ago

Where Baroness Warnock has not the resources to answer a question, she is capable of choosing to ignore it. She was challenged in the Lords by David Alton on why she had originally called for respect for embryos and later said she wished she hadn’t because it is odd to call for respect for that which you are flushing down the incinerator (or whatever). My point to her was that she would rather forego the respect than forego the (blessed euphemism) termination – and that this was manifestly a skewed system of priorities. While answering other points of mine, this… Read more »

Spirit of Vatican II
Spirit of Vatican II
16 years ago

Christopher Shell, could you please give Mary Warnock’s exact words?

Christopher Shell
Christopher Shell
16 years ago

‘I said then (and said publicly) that I regretted the use of the word respect, being annoyed, for example, by the phrase ”with respect”, and feeling that the term was overused by the civil servants involved in the commission…What I meant to convey was that embryo research should not be undertaken lightly, frivolously, or where other alternatives would work as well or better.’ The difficulty with all this is that we are still in the position (after literally millions of embryos have been experimented on) that none has helped us find a cure for anything, though it is still hypothesised… Read more »

Pat O'Neill
Pat O'Neill
16 years ago

“The difficulty with all this is that we are still in the position (after literally millions of embryos have been experimented on) that none has helped us find a cure for anything, though it is still hypothesised that they may well do so. That is something that cannot easily be known in advance, though it may be intrinsically plausible. We are also already in the situation where another approach (adult stem cells) is working considerably better.” Well, yes and no. The adult stem cell research has resulted in a few breakthroughs, but none of them of the kind expected from… Read more »

l,McConnell
l,McConnell
15 years ago

Please will someone tell me if human female eggs are used or planned to be used in Human/Animal hybrid research? Amendment 10 allows this but I doubt if many women know about it. Women are not lab. rats. Show us respect please.

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