Man: self-creator? ” “

Cloning: an issue of the day, and given added urgency by the presumed birth of the first cloned baby under the auspices of the Raelian sect. The issue has long been discussed both at the international level and in individual countries, though hitherto without reaching any uniform position, also in view of the differentiation between cloning for therapeutic ends (a definition considered inappropriate by some, who would prefer the term “for research purposes”, or “research cloning”) and cloning for reproductive purposes. The UN attempt to approve a world moratorium on reproductive cloning failed in early November 2002 and negotiations were deferred till the end of September. At the European level, the additional protocol on the banning of human cloning, signed in Paris on 12 January 1998, prohibits reproductive cloning but not therapeutic cloning, which is permitted in some countries, such as Great Britain, Belgium and Holland. In Germany, after months of indecision and confusion, the federal parliament (the “Bundestag”) in recent days presented the government with a request for the general banning of cloning: the motion is supported by a cross-party coalition. Apart from the political parties, numerous opinions hostile to cloning in any shape or form have been expressed: from the order of physicians to the Catholic and Protestant Churches, from the League of Catholic families to German Caritas. In the meantime, the German government has announced an international conference on cloning, to be held in Berlin from 14 to 16 May, with the aim of finding a supranational accord to the question. We have interviewed Johannes Reiter , professor of moral theology and social ethics at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz. Professor Reiter, what’s your reaction to the fact that a total ban on cloning has now been requested in Germany? The rejection of cloning by the federal government and by the political parties is not so clear-cut as people think and as the minister for research has now asserted. Whether the consensus on the banning of cloning is still holding will be tested on the occasion of the forthcoming amendment of the law on the protection of the embryo of 1990, that prohibits any type of cloning. But there are indications that therapeutic cloning may be permitted in future. How do you evaluate the reasons that prevent the EU from finding a common position on cloning? The existing difficulties on the international level in sanctioning and enforcing a general ban on cloning are also reflected at the European level and substantially consist of two obstacles: on the one hand, the fact that therapeutic cloning is a profitable business; on the other hand, the fact that no commonly accepted view exists on the beginning of human life and on the ethical and juridical status of the human embryo. So far the protocol on cloning, which came into force on 1st March 2001, has been signed by 29 of the 44 member states of the Council of Europe, and has been ratified by 10 countries. Like Austria, Switzerland and Belgium, Germany has not signed the protocol, because it’s first necessary to sign the additional protocol of 1998. The German criticisms especially concern the provisions that permit, in particular circumstances, research on persons “incapable of giving their own assent”, and on embryos. What contribution can the German Church make to this issue? The German bishops intervened in the present bioethical debate in the form of a pastoral letter with the title “Man: self-creator?” (7 May 2001). An initiative of this kind could be promoted by the Council of the European Episcopal Conferences. The bishops ought to step up their contacts and collaboration with groups involved in the protection of life, even if not avowedly Catholic. What’s your view of the appeals to Catholic politicians to devote themselves to the protection of life, contained in the recent doctrinal Note of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith? The issues addressed in the Note, though not new, are recalled at the right moment; in Germany they fall into a context in which the perplexities of Catholic moral theology are still being registered. The document rightly recalls ethical principles that, by their very nature and their fundamental role in social life, are not “negotiable”, rooted as they are in the essence of the person, e.g. the inviolability of human life.