Questions answered

by WM. B. Smith

Question: Is it permissible to cremate a fetus or bodily member? I do not find any directive on this in the new "Ethical and Religious Directives."

However, there was such a Directive (#43) in the NCCB "Ethical and Religious Directives" (1971). It read: "If there is reasonable cause present for not burying a fetus or member of the human body, these may be cremated in a manner consonant with the dignity of the deceased human body."

Probably the best commentary on this old Directive is that of Msgr. O. N. Griese in his book, Catholic Identity in Health Care (Braintree, MA: Pope John Center, 1987, pp. 149-151).

The Church prefers that her faithful members including fetuses and amputated limbs be buried in a Catholic cemetery or other suitable place. Provided that the reason for cremation is not an anti-religious one, the Church is not opposed to cremation (CDF, May 8, 1963).

As Griese points out, the Church has always insisted on the dignity of every human individual from the moment of conception-most recently and emphatically in John Paul II's Evangelium Vitae (3/25/95) n. 60.

If at all possible, stillborns and dead fetuses should be buried in a Catholic cemetery, especially if they have been baptized. The parents and pastor can make the arrangements with a minimum of expense and ceremony. In the case of a stillborn or newborn infant who dies shortly after birth, the Order of Christian Funerals (1989) n. 318 suggests that the "Rite of Final Commendation for an Infant" may be used in those cases.

Cremation, however, is allowed in earlier cases if circumstances are such that a burial would place a heavy burden on the family, or if some danger of contagion or health hazard is present. Where civil law allows it and parents give permission, a fetus may be retained for autopsy or even research or teaching purposes-quite apart from the experimentation or exploitation condemned in EV (3/25/95) n. 63. In these cases, cremation of the remains would be the more hygienic procedure. The ashes should be buried in a Catholic cemetery and most cemeteries have special plots for such burials.

With regard to major body parts, i.e., parts that retain human characteristics after amputation (e.g., arms, legs, feet, hands, etc.) cremation is most often the only reasonable solution. Large hospitals usually have refrigerated storage facilities so that a preferred option for a mass burial from time to time can be scheduled. If the option is for cremation, it should be done as a separate cremation for human remains only. It would be an offense to human dignity to cremate such remains along with the usual cargo of hospital refuse (bandages, equipment, pathology tissues, etc.). The ashes of such special cremations should also be buried in a reserved cemetery plot (Griese, p. 150).

Slope or Cliff?

Question: Newspapers report that fertility clinics are being sued for unethical practices. Most of the same reports claim that we need further and fuller legislation since there are hardly any laws in this area. Is legislation needed?

Some offer cautions that with better record keeping, better auditing and more "quality control" in reproductive technology, we can slow the slide down the "slippery slope." My hunch is that "slippery slope" is too polite a term; indeed, we have gone off the cliff entirely.

You are correct, newspapers now report oddities worthy of Aldous Huxley's imagination. Eggs were stolen from nine anesthetized women and implanted in other women resulting in three births at the University of California's Irvine Center for Reproductive Health (NY Times 11/12/95; p.28). Two Rhode Island couples sued that State's only fertility clinic for losing nine embryos (NYT 10/1/95; p.26). "Almost Anything Goes in Birth Science in Italy"-a headline (NYT 4/4/95; p. A-14) reporting "granny moms" and baby Elisabetta who was supposedly conceived from an egg taken from a woman who died two years before and carried to term by her father's sister. The prestigious University Hospital at Utrecht (Netherlands) announces the birth of two healthy twin boys: one white, one black (NYT 6/28/95; p. A-3). The Genetics and IVF Institute of Fairfax, Virginia regularly advertises donor egg services "available now with no waiting list"-"over 100 fully screened donors immediately accessible." Perhaps your list is longer than mine, but I don't think legislated "quality control" is the answer.

Our society and its vaunted technology has taken a wrong turn, a very wrong turn not merely down some slippery slope but really off the cliff.

With the birth of baby Louise Brown in 1978, the first IVF birth was a technical success. With all other people of good will, I wish Louise well, but she was, however, misconceived. That technical event was not an ethical giant step forward. Rather, and unfortunately, it opened a door to a new level of human manipulation that seems now only to get deeper and wider.

In the U.S.A., given our legal obsession with absolute individual autonomy, some pretend it is all a matter of "choice." There is no right or wrong in "reproduction" (as they call it); it's all a matter of "choice." If all is choice, then get prepared for some strange choices and the inevitable consequence of the "choices" of others that you did not choose at all.

There is a cryptic passage in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992) #2275 which refers three times to the "Introduction" of the Instruction on Bioethics, Donum Vitae (2/22/87) of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

That "Introduction" has five points which can serve as a concise Christian anthropology far more necessary for correctly evaluating this field than any catch-up civil legislation.

Procedures make it possible to intervene "not only to assist but also to dominate the processes of procreation" (DV, I, 1). The Church does not intervene here to teach science as science; but the Church does offer criteria for moral judgment regarding the application of research and technology to human life and its beginnings.

It is an illusion to claim that research and technology are morally "neutral." They are not. The fundamental moral insight is that research and technology must be "at the service of the human person," of his inalienable rights and his true and integral good according to the design and will of God (DV, I, 2).

An intervention on the human body affects not only tissues, organs and their functions, but involves the person himself. Thus, applied biology and medicine can work together for the integral good of human life when they come to the aid of a person stricken by illness or infirmity and when they respect that person's dignity as a creature of God (DV, I, 3).

No biologist nor doctor, no mother nor father, no technician nor advertiser can reasonably claim, by virtue of scientific competence, "to be able to decide about people's origin and destiny." Human life is a gift, not an achievement. Humans are begotten, not made nor manufactured.

Donum Vitae then focuses on two central points: the life of the human being (I, 4); and, the special nature of the transmission of human life in marriage (I, 4). The larger parts of that Document (I and II) take up these two points in detail, and part III addresses both Moral and Civil Law.

However, it is the "Introduction," the Christian anthropology if you will, that must be read with care and thoroughness-read it with a copy of the New Testament and the Documents of Vatican II at hand. The laws of God and the natural moral law offer true perspective and corrective here; additional human legislation-apart from or contrary to divine law-will probably only make worse, by arbitrary inclusion or exclusion, what is already a very wrong turn against life and against marriage.

Please address questions to Msgr. Wm. B. Smith, St. Joseph's Seminary, Dunwoodie, Yonkers, N.Y. 10704.n