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The stem cell/cloning controversy raises, once again, the fundamental issue of personhood and the ensuing considerations of how human persons should be treated. Unfortunately, Christians cannot turn to the Bible for a specific verse to tell us if the embryo has the same rights as other humans. However, when Scripture mentions the unborn, the context is almost always one of God's protection for them and His vision for their lives (Psalm 139:13-17; Isaiah 44:1-2; Jeremiah 1:3). Human dignity arises from our being created in the image of God. If we ask "Who is an image of God?," we may receive no easy answer. But Jesus was asked, "Who is my neighbor?" His reply with the parable of the Good Samaritan redirects the question (Luke 10:29-37) and emphasizes our responsibility to care for all human beings in whatever ways we can. Are we acting as good neighbors to these embryos? Do we reflect the image of God when we endorse the destruction of other human beings? Hardly.

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What if the stem cells being used belonged to a dead person, is this still biblically unethical?

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ORIGINAL: Cloak

What if the stem cells being used belonged to a dead person, is this still biblically unethical?

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ORIGINAL: Real_Solitude

I want to ask the Christians in the audience a question.

If the harvesting of new embryonic stem cells was banned in all 50 states today, how would you feel about scientists continuing research on the 22+ existing embryonic stem cell lines?

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ORIGINAL: Zhi

It appears that a type has been skipped... there is a great deal of promise being shown in placental/cord blood stem cells, which do not require the destruction of the baby in their acquisition (they're often grouped as "adult" but that's really not at all accurate). In fact, some scientists are claiming that placental stem cells are more helpful as they do not tend to create the tumors that embryonic stem cells do without laboratory specialization. As such, it might become a moot point. I don't see how anyone could reasonably find anything ethically wrong about using placental stem cells.

I'm very excited about placental stem cell research. I am currently looking into donating the placenta/cord blood of my current pregnancy to science.

So I guess my answer would be that it depends on where the stem cells come from.

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Is there any Scripture against that???

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If the harvesting of new embryonic stem cells was banned in all 50 states today, how would you feel about scientists continuing research on the 22+ existing embryonic stem cell lines?

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It appears that a type has been skipped... there is a great deal of promise being shown in placental/cord blood stem cells, which do not require the destruction of the baby in their acquisition (they're often grouped as "adult" but that's really not at all accurate).

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Those people didn't sign anything donating their bodies to science.

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Placental stem cells are a form of adult stem cells. They would be very beneficial to harvest them for future use on that child. Since any organ formed from them would be those of the child, they would not be rejected, as is the case in most if not all adult stem cell applications.

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As such, unlike adult stem cells (except for very rare cases), placental stem cells tend to be pluripotent, which is the desireable part about embryonic stem cells.

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It has been known for about 30 years that stem cells are present in the tissue of the adult, but it was assumed that they could only form cells of a particular tissue. That is, reprogramming them was considered impossible. In recent years, however, pluripotent stem cells were discovered in various human tissues–in the spinal cord, in the brain, in the mesenchyme (connective tissue) of various organs, and in the blood of the umbilical cord. These pluripotent stem cells are capable of forming several cell types–principally blood, muscle, and nerve cells. It has been possible to recognize, select, and develop them to the point that they form mature cell types with the help of growth factors and regulating proteins.

This shows that in tissues of the body, adult stem cells possess a much greater potential for differentiation than previously assumed. This knowledge must be brought into the public consciousness with all possible emphasis. If stem cell research were really only meant for therapeutic uses, which it most obviously should be, adult stem cells would promise a very productive research field–and beyond that, a possibility, without moral objection, to discover fundamentals of the dynamics of tissue differentiation.

It has become clear from transplantation experiments with animals, that stem cells of a particular tissue can develop into cells of a completely different kind. Thus, bone marrow stem cells have been induced to become brain cells, but also liver cells. Adult stem cells obviously have a universal program for division that is common to all the kinds of tissue stem cells, and makes them mutually interchangeable.

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However, pluripotency is a two-edged sword in that working with ESCs may be quite difficult to regulate their responses toward beneficial properties. Almost every week, another researcher finds that ASCs appear to have much greater capability for differentiation than previously thought. From The Case for Adult Stem Cell Research:

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It actually makes me wonder if God anticipated the stem cell issue and set up placental stem cells so as to have a specific, ethically reasonable source as the source with the most promise.

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ORIGINAL: drmark

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It actually makes me wonder if God anticipated the stem cell issue and set up placental stem cells so as to have a specific, ethically reasonable source as the source with the most promise.

Sure sounds like Intelligent Design to me! [:)]

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ORIGINAL: Real_Solitude
If the harvesting of new embryonic stem cells was banned in all 50 states today, how would you feel about scientists continuing research on the 22+ existing embryonic stem cell lines?

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ORIGINAL: DanJames
Those people didn't sign anything donating their bodies to science. Put them up for adoption or destroy them humanely, and let's move on to adult stem cells where we are actually making progress.

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ORIGINAL: drmark
I fervently pray that harvesting ESCs would be banned all over the world! The procedure is particularly egregious in countries where little, if any, safeguards to human rights exist.

Personally, I believe the primary motive for current ESCR is to continue down a slippery path of degrading the dignity of human life for commercial purposes. The scientific and economic evidence to date is overwhelmingly in support of adult stem cell technology, so why waste resources on ESCR as DanJ says. But from a strictly Christian ethics perspective, see my first response in this post.

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But your reply doesn't really answer my question either.
If all new ESC harvesting were to be banned, would you oppose the continued use of existing ESC lines that would continue that research?

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The reason to continue ECS research would be because while there are no current uses, there are many more potential uses for them.

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ORIGINAL: HHV5

Proponents of ESC research make it seem as though there is no alternative whatsoever.

As mentioned before, there are adult stem cells. Granted, they're not as "malleable" as ESC, but there are multiple sources of adult stem cells, each with varying capabilities to differentiate into different types of cells/tissues.

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ORIGINAL: Real_Solitude

That really doesn't answer my question.
An embryonic stem-cell line, while taken from an embryonic host, hasn't seen an embryo in many generations.

A stem-cell line is produced when you take the original sample of stem cells from a human embryo, and using certain chemicals to make sure that they divide as long as they're in that solution. Basically, an existing stem-cell line might have come from an embryo that was harvested five years ago.
There is no way for someone to 'adopt' them, they're just collections of ESC's. Any potential for these ESC's to become a child has long since passed.
They can not be 'destroyed humanely' because, as previously mentioned, they have no possibility to become a human. They are just cells. They are what happens after the embryo has already been destroyed in order to harvest the cells.