Last week, Alabama expanded protections beyond the unborn child in the womb to the unborn child outside, becoming the first state to ruler that frozen embryos are children within the meaning of the law.
The move has drawn praise from some evangelicals who, convinced that life begins at conception, want to see these “baby snowflakes” treated as people rather than commodities.
It also complicates the future of in vitro fertilization (IVF) statewide, upsetting parents and expectant parents who have turned to the procedure. At least one hospital system has stopped IVF treatments for now.
After Roe v. Wade was overturned, part of the pro-life movement cited the 14th Amendment, which prohibits depriving “any person of life, liberty, or property,” and rallied behind this proposition. fetal personality laws ban abortion and guarantee human rights from conception.
The decision to protect the embryos was anticipated by anti-abortion and reproductive rights activists. It follows a pattern of pro-life politics in the Southern state: Alabama’s constitution protects “the rights of the unborn” and the state’s abortion ban took effect after Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in 2022.
In a case brought by the parents of several embryos destroyed at a fertility clinic, the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed Friday that unborn children fall under the wrongful death of a minor statute, regardless of either “developmental stage, physical location or other incidental characteristic”. “, that is to say even if they are kept in the freezer and have not yet been implanted.
A estimated at 1.5 million Embryos are on ice in the United States and fertility treatments like IVF are becoming more common. Last year, 42 percent of Americans – and 44 percent of white evangelicals –said they or someone they knew had sought fertility help, up from 33% in 2018, according to the Pew Research Center.
The ruling does not ban IVF, but because the procedure often results in leftover embryos being kept on ice indefinitely or destroyed, fertility clinics are unsure what the implications will be for them and their storage.
“Why were all the fertility doctors in red states freaking out after Dobbs?” Katy Faust, founder of the non-profit Them Before Us, previously told CT. “That’s because they (may not) be able to do business there if they can’t destroy human life.”
The outcome of excess embryos from IVF and the ethics of the process itself has become a more important part of the pro-life conversation among evangelicals, including advocacy for embryo adoption.
Justice Jay Mitchell—who assists Highland Church, a multi-site megachurch – wrote the majority opinion in the judgment on the embryo. He focused on understanding the word child and I didn’t mention God.
“Here, the text of the writ of wrongful death of a minor is sweeping and unqualified. It applies to all children, born and unborn, without limitation,” the judgment states.
“It is not the role of this Court to craft a new limitation based on our own view of what is or is not sound public policy. This is especially true where, as here, the people of this State have adopted a constitutional amendment aimed directly at preventing courts from excluding “unborn life” from legal protection.”
A concurring opinion from Chief Justice Tom Parker, however, draws on a biblical understanding of personhood and references Genesis, the Apostle Paul, Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine and John Calvin. Parker—a member of Frazer Church, a Free Methodist congregation in Montgomery, concluded:
The theological view of the sanctity of life espoused by the people of Alabama encompasses the following: (1) God created each person in his image; (2) each person therefore has a value that far exceeds the calculating capacity of human beings; and (3) human life cannot be unjustly destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy God, who considers the destruction of his image an affront to himself.
Andrew Walker, professor of ethics and public theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, called the decision is “a stunning development full of moral significance.”
Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, who became pregnant with her son through intrauterine insemination (IUI), referenced her fertility struggles on the campaign trail and agreed that embryos ‘are babies’ . on NBC News Wednesday.
“One thing is to preserve the sperm or the eggs, but when you’re talking about an embryo, you’re talking about… to me, it’s a life,” said Haley, whose IUI did not require the creation of embryos outside the body.
Haley, a Methodist who describes herself as pro-life, underlines the need for consensus at the federal level on abortion and sees more opportunities at the state level.
“When you see more women who are having difficulty getting pregnant, and you see more women who are doing artificial and in vitro pregnancies, those are conversations we need to have,” she said. “But these are also conversations where we need to involve women and doctors to say, ‘How do we want to manage this in the future?'”
Even before Alabama’s decision, Dobbs had made it more difficult for IVF couples to donate embryos they had chosen not to implant to researchers. The Washington Post reported that Stanford University’s RENEW Biobank has grown from accept embryos from 49 states to just 7 – the rest require additional review in case donors violate their home state’s laws.
Catholics have historically held more theological concerns around assisted reproduction than Protestants, although more members of the pro-life movement are attentive to this issue. Evangelical parents who want to have children but struggle with infertility may choose to practice IVF but limit the number of embryos created so that each can be implanted.
Despite some reservations, theologian Wayne Grudem wrote in 2019 for The Gospel Coalition, that “if IVF is used by a married couple and precautions are taken to prevent the intentional destruction of embryos, then it is a morally good action that pleases God because it does not violate any guidelines scriptural, achieves the moral objective. good to overcome infertility and brings the blessing of children to yet another family.
Jennifer Lahl, president of the Center for Bioethics and Culture Network, has raised concerns about assisted reproduction for years. After Alabama’s ruling, she pointed to Germany’s ban on embryo freezing, in effect since 1990.
“IVF is still legal and the sky hasn’t fallen,” she says. said. “You just can’t make a lot of them and freeze them, you have to implant them.”
