Pope Benedict, Bioethicist

James Hughes discusses the bioethics implications of a new Pope, including one interesting twist on the Vatican position concerning modifying the genes in human sperm. Tucked away in Hughes' post is a link to a San Diego reporter's claim that the Vatican - in an effort already led by the then Cardinal Ratzinger and his assistant - is about to release a conservative Papal statement on bioethics, which is likely to be aggressive and sweeping. More interesting, it appears that the statement will speak to the individual responsibilities of Catholics rather than (as previous statements on stem cells, e.g., have done) sticking to the broader questions concerning the science. Look for an explicit ban on any Catholic receiving any therapy derived from embryonic stem cells.

The really interesting stem cell question for the Papacy may be adult stem cells - the American Catholic clergy has for some time now argued that "adult cells are better/fine/acceptable" as a hedge against public opinion on embryonic stem cells. But the then Cardinal Ratzinger made the explicit point that if adult cells are de-differentiated so that they behave in such a way as to be essentially embryonic, then they are not different morally from embryonic stem cells. Catch that? Ratzinger's claim was that adult stem cells are not all the same - and some of them may be embryonic even if derived from adults. If elevated to the Papacy, that position would have the effect of taking a lot of the air out of the "first use adult stem cells" hedge.