One Christian adoption agency is attempting to save frozen embryos from being discarded or used for research, by finding adoptive parents for them.  Nightlight Christian Adoptions, based in Fullerton, California, calls these tiny frozen humans, “Snowflakes” and arranges “Frozen Embryo Adoptions” for them.

 

 

One Christian adoption agency is attempting to save frozen embryos from being discarded or used for research, by finding adoptive parents for them.

 

Nightlight Christian Adoptions, based in Fullerton, California, calls these tiny frozen humans, “Snowflakes” and arranges “Frozen Embryo Adoptions” for them.

 

The snowflakes are excess embryos from in-vitro fertilization procedures. In-vitro fertilization (IVF) is the process of combining the egg from a woman and sperm from a man in a laboratory dish, then implanting the conceived child into the mother’s womb or another woman’s womb (The same process that used to be called creating a “test tube baby.”)

 

One of the issues of IVF is what to do with viable frozen embryos that have been created in the laboratory, but are not implanted in a woman’s womb? These tiny frozen persons have a right to life and a right not to be experimented on like anyone else.

 

Nightlight claims that there are nearly 500,000 embryos in storage in the United States and 12 percent of those, some 60,000 embryos, are not being used by the parents for their own families. If you assume that frozen embryo transfer only has a success rate of 30 percent, these embryos could result in the birth of almost 18,000 children.

 

More on Nightlight’s Frozen Embryo Adoptions: www.nightlight.org/snowflakeadoption.htm

 

 

There are many ethical issues surrounding infertility treatments, such as IVF and the use of fertility enhancing drugs – one of them is selective abortion. Many women who undergo IVF are implanted with more embryos than they can bear. In this case, a doctor will “selectively abort” or remove viable embryos to allow the ones left behind more room to grow.

 

The issue of selective abortion was brought to light with the birth of the world’s first septuplets - Iowa’s own McCaugheys, born November 19, 1997 in Carlisle, Iowa. While Kenny and Bobbi McCaughey became pregnant through fertility drugs and not IVF, they made headlines when they refused the same selective abortion process, despite the huge risks of trying to carry seven children to term. Today, looking at the bright and rambunctious, Brandon, Kenny Jr., Joel, Alexis, Natalie, Kelsey and Nathan, each with their own unique personalities, it is hard to imagine how anyone could ask, “Which ones would you eliminate?” But that is exactly the issue of selective abortion.

 

 

The Pope Paul VI Institute, located at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska is internationally recognized for its outstanding achievements in the field of natural fertility regulation and reproductive medicine. The institute was founded in 1985 by Dr. Thomas W. Hilgers, MD, who joined a natural system of fertility regulation with a women’s health science to create effective, morally acceptable and sexually healthy options for women and couples.

 

More on the Pope Paul VI Institute: www.popepaulvi.com