Simon Barrow (London, Ekklesia): Irrespective of where we go on the voting procedure, Cardinal Keith O'Brien's intervention over the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill has been clumsy and unhelpful. He's got the science wrong, he's used alarmist language, he's treated Catholic MPs as if they are his troops in a war, he's assumed that all Christians should share his view (they don't), and he's behaved as if complex moral and scientific matters can be solved by big institutions throwing their weight around.
This doesn't strike me as remotely appropriate Christian way to intervene in the political arena. Humility not hectoring is the spiritual and rational virtue needed to tackle sensitive and complex issues like the ones bound up with the biosciences.
Terms like "monstrous", "Frankenstein", "grotesque" and 'hideous", such as those Cardinal O'Brien has employed to put pressure on the government and shape public response, are deeply misleading and irresponsible. What we are talking about are microscopic embryonic entities that contain traces of animal material and are to be used for life-enhancing research over a few days with very strict limits. There's room for debate and caution, but not this kind of gross caricature.
Likewise, it is unfair of Bishop Tom Wright to accuse government ministers of pushing through legislation from "a militantly atheist and secularist lobby". Gordon Brown is a Christian. Health Minister Ben Bradshaw is a Christian. The former Anglican Bishop of Oxford, Lord Harries, has played a significant role on the HFEA - as have other theological ethicists. There's been a two-year debate; an 18-year one if you count all the discussion following the previous legislation in this area.
Of course the Catholic Church opposes any cellular research in this area because it accords an embryo the full moral status of a human person from conception. This is not a position shared by many other denominations or faiths, and some would argue that it owes much more to nineteenth century developments within the magisterium of the church than it does to the more ancient precedent often claimed.
All Christians, and all people of good will, want to revere and develop life. Whether ongoing decisions in this area can be taken by an appeal to human preference alone, framed purely by the language of rights and without a broader sense of ethical possibilities and restraints, is a fraught and contested question. Whether one answer to such questions is possible, framed independently of any particular tradition of moral reasoning, is even more tricky. Secular liberal ethics is in as much difficulty here as religiously grounded ethics, probably more so.
But moral progress, in concert with the proper encouragement and regulation of scientific endeavour (together with its protection from voracious commercial interests), will not be made by shouting, seeking to pull rank, political manipulation or throwing the weight of our different lobby groups - religious or otherwise - around. We need to develop less confrontational political mechanisms and more serious civic ones to keep the conversation going.
I believe that churches and faith bodies have as legitimate a role as others in this debate. But they need to learn to articulate themselves better in a society and culture that does not understand or share their assumptions. They also need to be clear about the boundaries between seeking to regulate their own lives and seeking to regulate the lives of others. No one is compelling people to support or benefit from embryonic research that goes against their conscience, for example.
For me, the current Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill is perfectly consistent with my Christian ethic, which is to honour life as a gift for all rather than as something to be exploited or monopolised by the few. I fully appreciate the integrity of those who differ, whether on religious or non-religious grounds. But simply trying to out-manoeuvre each other is no way to do ethics.
