This may be news to you if you live under a rock. But what is significant about
this story is that for the first time in my recent experience at least you see a Baptist bioethicist engaging in the kind of dissemblage that is usually reserved for the Conference of Catholic Bishops and the National Catholic Bioethics organization - that is, arguments in favor of a moral position on embryonic status that neither admit that there is scientific ambiguity nor acknowledge the impact of the decision on the practice of religious life. It is particularly interesting, in fact, because if this argument is representative of the fundamentalist Baptist bioethics lobby's plan of attack on embryonic status - which it probably is, given Mitchell's standing in that community - you can bet that it spells bit debate among Baptists concerning IVF, which has not been a big issue among Baptist congregations, since this ruling really would spell the end of IVF. From the article:
LIFE DIGEST: Judge rules embryo a human being; pro-lifer leaves DNC race; Oregon teen wins breast cancer suit - (BP): "That ruling “is only stating the obvious,” said Ben Mitchell, associate professor of bioethics at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in suburban Chicago. “Law should conform to facts. The fact is, the human embryo is as fully human and as fully a person as a newborn baby. Every human being has a right not to be unnecessarily harmed. The law must recognize this fact, not deny it for the sake of social engineering.
“Geography should not dictate our view of the immorality of homicide,” said Mitchell, a consultant with the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission."
