The SBC resolution passed on Wednesday echoes Catholic teaching in affirming that while “all children are to be fully respected and protected, not all technological means of assisting human reproduction are equally God-honoring or morally justified.” (Nearly a third of Alabamans are members of the Baptist faith.)
“The in vitro fertilization process routinely creates more embryos than can reasonably be implanted, thus resulting in the continued freezing, stockpiling, and ultimate destruction of human embryos, some of which may also be subjected to medical experimentation,” the resolution continues.
“[W]e call on Southern Baptists to love all of their neighbors in accordance with their God-given dignity as image bearers and to advocate for the government to restrain actions inconsistent with the dignity and value of every human being, which necessarily includes frozen embryonic human beings.”
Debate on the floor of the SBC annual meeting, taking place in Indianapolis, saw several delegates from Baptist churches around the country — known as “messengers” — rise in support of and opposition to the resolution.
One messenger, Kentuckian Monica Hall, rose in support of the resolution, saying that there is “no way to describe the treatment of embryos at any point on the IVF process as ethical or dignified.” She endorsed a section of the resolution calling for the adoption of existing frozen embryos — a practice that the Catholic Church has not definitively ruled on but has expressed serious moral reservations about.
Prominent Southern Baptist leaders had signaled opposition to IVF in recent weeks, with Albert Mohler, president of the flagship Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (SBTS) in Louisville, Kentucky, and a longtime critic of IVF, urging Christians to support the “correct ruling and judgment by the Alabama Supreme Court.” Mohler authored the SBC resolution along with SBTS professor Andrew Walker.
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