What’s all the fuss about? Is IVF right or wrong?

Well, perhaps surprisingly to some, even though I am a convicted Christian I’m persuaded in favour of IVF very much so. Like most things along these lines, for me, the key deciding factors are in the circumstances in which such a thing is done in the first place. It is as the cliché goes how you do it not what you do.

If I take the abortion example, I don’t think abortion is right when people use it almost as a ‘get out of jail free’ card every time they make a mistake or let their guard down, not at all, even though I do believe in second chances. However as opposed to two strangers perhaps encountering one another having a one night stand resulting in ‘knocking’ the women up, the circumstance when it is between a couple, in reasonably committed relationship changes things in my eyes. Mistakes happen, but in this case the decision going forward isn’t reckless and thoughtless, since if it is not best for the two them; may it be not financially wise or right for them at that stage of the relationship or the potential life of the child would be compromised then fair enough! It’s when people abuse this power to have such a thing done, do I object, I think it’s something to be taken very seriously, not a backup plan.

It’s the same with IVF. Look at it this way, as regular human beings we have this rather cool ability that when two people love each other very much… Or when a man and woman make a special wish… Or when two people hopefully in a committed relationship want to they can actually reproduce another little version of themselves, new life! That’s great. Some take this for granted, and kids just ‘happen’ without much thought or planning. However how just is it, that people would deny a couple who potentially really love each other, love each other enough to have a child, married, in a great position to love and raise a family because they can’t reproduce in the same way as most of us can. It makes no sense, that most of us have this luxury whether we like the person we have a child with or not, yet some people would deny people the opportunity arguably as suited or more suited than some people who have kids on these grounds. It’s not about the science or process, it’s about the desire.

In situations like these, I think it’s wise to question why people may go through with such a process, what are their reasons, and where are their hearts? I highly doubt some couple planning to have IVF are somewhere are sat at home thinking... ‘yes I’m gonna get one over on mother nature here’ or ‘yes I’m gonna have a baby not the way my creator intended me too’. I would like to think that in their minds they’re saying ‘I love this person; I really want a child with them’. The sorry truth of the matter is that in most cases, couples undergoing these troubles suffer great sorrow, with the ugly face of what confronts them, I wouldn’t know personally, any parent would better understand the stress or worry when trying to have a baby and it being painfully unsuccessful.  So that’s my first point, we shouldn’t judge people on solely their actions but also why they are doing what they’re doing, we’re all human here.

It’s also worth a mention, that in life as a whole, there are many things we accept which aren’t too dissimilar from IVF or abortion. I don’t have a universal standpoint, but generally I sense that most people’s objection to something like the IVF is that it’s not ‘natural’ or ‘it’s playing God’ or ‘messing with nature’. Now I’m sorry but who the hell wants to define what ‘natural’ truly is and means for starters? Is building houses using resources from the earths ground natural or intended, or is that any different from using chemicals in the earth in IVF treatment, they’re both available to us.. Furthermore I don’t know if anyone ever has really ‘played’ God before, so again it is very hard to define what that is, although last time I checked God wasn’t literally playing apart in the conception of all embryos. I think these common responses just mask people’s ignorance and general hostility to most things new, and most things unusual or in the minority, an unfound prejudice in my view.

When we strip it down to the bare logic, often what people don’t like is us manipulating something that we have come to understand (something that has perhaps been a certain way for as long as we know) and us changing it for our advantage. I can see the issue with that, but I’ll address it later on, the point is that many many things are and do involve what I just described, and we’re (well most of us) are fine with them. Contraception for one, using a condom – requires us to engineer the particular material we understand has certain properties and using for our gains so we can have sex without the risk or pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases. Funnily enough that example actually relies upon exactly the same background about fertilisation except this time we’re trying to avoid it, which is incredibly ironic. Was it intended for us to have sex involving latex, I’m going to assume not, but who cares about that!? It seems morally corrupt that we can have all the fun we want, whilst people who want to have a child, oh no, they are not entitled to technologies benefits.

Even though some people do object to those things, a lot of us don’t or don’t even naturally question it or realise it is actually the same thing in essence as some of the more topical issues of abortion or IVF which get so much more scrutiny and attention. IVF is understanding the science behind fertilisation, using some clever tools, to make it so we can do it outside the womb and then implant into the womb so a women can have a child. (Apologies if I offended any scientists with my poor knowledge of the actual technical process). We have to consider the principle of what we’re dealing with; I don’t think it is much different from a whole hatful of things we don’t dispute.

As much as I do think the two previous points are relevant, so far I’ve only danced around the main issue by pointing things out without actually tackling the question of why people thing it could be wrong in the first place. It’s fairly simple to observe, that even though we are understanding our world, taking and using its resources with that knowledge, for our advantage sometimes, we have no indication that it is actually right to do so? Yes the outcomes can be very positive (as well as negative but that’s not the point), and that process dominates our entire lives, where would we be without it? But why do we have the divine right to do so? Most people don’t question this on a large or deep scale, even though it does relate to the most basic of things say like a common remedy for a cold, which naturally we just don’t question whether it’s right for us to take that plant or whatever we need to make the cure for something whatever it may be, we just do it.

 I guess more controversial topics, question more specifically ‘do we have the right to alter nature or change this or that?’ – this is more relatable to IVF I’d say. Initially that seems reasonable because it is perfectly plausible that perhaps that leaf used to make the remedy is meant to be there to be used by us to cure colds, we’re not changing or altering it so there’s nothing wrong with that. Although how is say altering the surroundings in which an egg and sperm ‘should naturally’ meet any different from taking the leaf of the tree where it would naturally live and die if it wasn’t for our intervention. It’s now getting more complex, but the key issue is uncertainty. We have no idea how the world around is ‘supposed’ to be used, if it ‘supposed’ to be used in any particular way at all. And the bigger problem is that should we control it, considering we don’t own it or do we own it? Ownership is very interesting, and that is where often God comes into the thinking of some.

God as the maker and so the owner of the universe is in charge so how does he want us to treat or use the world in the broad terms? however He says we are meant to live and play in our world it admittedly with rules, although that argument seems to become hazy quickly since specific things like the morality of IVF aren’t mentioned in the bible – believe it or not. Also many passages vaguely linked are often very open to different interpretations.

I guess it could be a bit like a bank loan, we know the bank owns the money and so it regulates how we use it and we agree terms and conditions. Contrastingly in our situation, we don’t who has given us the earth and its resources, what to naturally do with them, or anything at all. Having read a few philosophical texts related to the issue, often the conclusion is as unclear as this one. We are left with an image that doesn’t really make things like IVF appear wrong, or make IVF appear right either.

Hopelessly, taking all this analysing to one side, I end up thinking what would Jesus do? Well Jesus took fish from the sea, grapes from vines (not meaning to use those examples in a literal sense), but whatever he did do was often to show love, to bring happiness, to share peace. Can we relate the effect of IVF to one of those things in certain circumstances? What would God want for you, if you were in this position? Well since I don’t think IVF is either definitively right or wrong, all I can say is that, he would be loving. He would be supportive. Understanding. And have you and your best interests at heart. Now, if all of us, regardless of our viewpoint, could act and conduct ourselves in this way towards the issue I think a lot of heat around this issue would fade away. If we behaved in this way, I think it would be hard to really see what all the fuss was truly about.

Thanks for reading, God Bless.