Namaste. Divine life within me greets divine life in you. When we meet in this space, there is no me and you. There is just us….dancing in Cosmic relationship.

Sharon Olds wrote a poem called “Everything” in her collection called “One Secret Thing”.

Most of us are never conceived.
Many of us are never born—
we live in a private ocean for hours,
weeks, with our extra or missing limbs,
or holding our poor second head,
growing from our chest, in our arms. And many of us,
sea-fruit on its stem, dreaming kelp
and whelk, are culled in our early months.
And some who are born live only for minutes,
others for two, or for three, summers,
or four, and when they go, everything goes—the earth, the firmament—
and love stays, where nothing is, and seeks.

There is something in the poem that captures some of my experience at the birth of my three children. Large, existential questions swirled in my mind- Why do I have THESE beautiful, amazing kids and not any of the millions of other potential kids that could have been born? What is the value of my life, now that I am the father of these kids? I realized that if giving up my life would somehow save my three children from experiencing any pain in their life, I would do it. Suddenly, the very  notion of life got larger. Life only has meaning in this larger context. The birth of my kids put life in perspective for me.

I’m sure it was the same experience for the Schneiders when their little boy was born in 2002. Their joy quickly turned to fear when Ryan was slow to develop. At age 3 he was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy and their world fell apart. In a moment of maternal clarity, Ryan’s mother, Mary, remembered that they had kept samples of Ryan’s umbilical cord blood. After many rejections, they finally found a doctor who would perform the procedure. Ryan’s own stem cells were filtered through his body via an IV drip. Cells divided and healed, life multiplying within his tiny body. Within a month, the progress for Ryan was astonishing. After 8 months, Ryan was developing in leaps and bounds and even catching up to the development of kids his age.

This form of stem cell therapy is the least controversial of all. It was Ryan’s own cells taken from his umbilical cord, cells that would have been discarded under normal circumstances. And yet federal research funding for stem cells is still limited, insurance companies often deny benefits and the medical community is reluctant to take on such procedures. This is a matter of life and death, and it deserves society’s best efforts.

Some of you who are parents will empathize. Those who are not parents will also relate to the gut wrenching desire to end the suffering of a loved one. I will never forget the day I had to hold my 2 year old son down while a lumbar puncture was performed on him. The agony and betrayal on his face as he looked me in the eye almost broke me. If I could have switched places on the table with him, I would have done it in a heart beat. It was only the belief that the procedure was necessary to address his sickness that gave me the courage to allow this incredible suffering in my little boy.

If the use of stem cells from umbilical cords or the placenta can ease suffering in your loved ones or people that are loved by others, then who wouldn’t support it? Now, push the scenario a step further. If the stem cells from a human embryo a few days old could ease or eliminate suffering would you support it? Maybe they are surplus embryos from an IVF clinic, or embryos developed in a Petri dish. In some people’s minds, the embryos are alive and fully human.

This is far more controversial, and the arguments against this form of stem cell research are intimately related to an interpretation of the Judeo- Christian tradition. The argument most often used is that God alone has jurisdiction over life and death. We are told that to use embryos, even for noble purpose, is to play God and that is counter to the spirit of the Judeo- Christian tradition. But is it?

Playing God or Being Responsible Co-Creators

The argument that God alone has the right to give and take life usually begins with the Genesis story of creation. Keep in mind that there is no reason to think of the Genesis account as historically factual in any sense. It is a camp fire story told by a community trying to retain its moral compass in a foreign land. The Hebrew communities were telling this story to each other, desperately trying to find the balance of autonomy and compliance, responsibility and obligation in Babylonian culture. If you can imagine Genesis as a camp fire story, the first seven days in the story are building a context of order and structure. Each day builds to a crescendo. It’s the eighth day when the story teller’s tone rises to an urgent pitch. Its as if the story teller has God saying, “Enough!. I have done enough. Now it’s up to you. I have intentionally left the world imperfect, incomplete, because it is your job to complete it.” The people were left with fire. Its flames reflected their humanity back to them. Its crackling embers called them to responsibility and free will. The gift of the eighth day was fire, the element of co-creation.

The Greeks told the myth of Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods. As punishment, he was chained to a rock and vultures fed on his liver. The gods then caused his liver to grow back so the vultures could eat it again. Reconsider the myth, but from a Hebrew creation story perspective. Prometheus defied the gods by taking fire that was rightfully his. Then he defied death by regenerating his own liver in an act of god-like healing. Prometheus played God and became the hero of stem cell regeneration.

Your body is loaded full of cells, miraculous, god-like gifts of regeneration. Embryos are loaded full of cells, miraculous, god-like gifts of regeneration. To use these cells to bring healing is to fulfill the eighth day covenant of co-creating, playing with fire for the common good.

Is stem cell research playing God? Yes, and that is exactly what you are called to do- be a co-creator.

Keep in mind that playing God is always controversial….at first. Then people come to accept the necessity of scientific advance.

The invention of the umbrella was challenged on religious grounds: “If it’s raining, then God intends us to get wet.” Now, you would be hard pressed to find a single person, religious or not, who would now consider the umbrella immoral.

When the Panama Canal was built, creating a waterway between North and South America, religious groups held mass rallies in protest. They cried, “What God has put together let no man cast asunder”. Now, you would be hard pressed to find a single person, religious or not, who would today consider the Panama Canal an offense to God.

When the Wright brothers created the first airplane there were many who considered it an act of blasphemy; as if to say, “If God meant for man to fly He would have created him with wings.” Now, you would be hard pressed to find a single person, religious or not, who would consider the airplane unethical.

I can only imagine that in a hundred years time, people will look back and smile at the religious challenge of stem cell research. One day not far from this one, you will be hard pressed to find a single person, religious or not, who will consider stem cell research immoral.

Playing God? Yes. Fulfilling your covenant as a co-creator of life and healing in the world.

When Does Life Begin?

The second challenge to stem cell research on religious grounds is the sacred right to life of the unborn embryo. The Bible is used in odd ways to argue both sides of the argument. Those who believe that life begins at conception often quote Jeremiah 1, “Even in the womb, before your body was formed, I knew you, God says.” Those who are pro choice sometimes reference Job who “cursed the very day he was born”, signifying the relative value of quality of life as opposed to the right to life. Both uses of the Bible are trite and unconvincing.

It’s important to note that in the first century world, they had little understanding of the female body. They were completely unaware of ovaries. Aristotle believed that the womb of a woman floated around her body waiting for the seed of man to locate it. The woman was just the oven in which the man’s seed could incubate. It’s absurd to expect those with such a lack of biological understanding to have any insight on the development of an embryo or fetus. They also had such a low view of the worth of women and children, that it’s unlikely that they would have valued an unborn baby over the health of a man.

An episode of the sit com Friends comes to mind. Rachel is in labor and one of her male friends tries to give her advice on how to breathe. In between contractions, she screams at him, “No uterus, no opinion.” I sometimes wish I could say that to the many male politicians who oppose stem cell research on the grounds that life begins at conception. “No uterus, no opinion.” It’s certainly true of the Bible writers lack of understanding of reproductive issues. “No uterus, no opinion.”

The Bible simply doesn’t offer any specific guidance on reproductive issues. Having said that, much Jewish teaching suggested that, at a minimum, human life begins after 40 days. The Talmud refers to the embryo as “just fluid”. 40 days coincides with the beginning of noticeable fetal movement.

A passage in the Mishna, a second century Jewish text, is intriguing. It suggests that if the partial life of the fetus is weighed against the full life of the mother, precedence should be given to saving the full life. It goes on to say that- "...a baby...becomes a full-fledged human being when the head emerges from the womb. Before then, the fetus is considered a 'partial life.'"

Many within the Jewish tradition suggest that human life begins after the baby leaves the womb and takes its first breath.

Jesus, and all the New Testament writers are silent on the issue of embryos and fetuses, abortion and when life begins. The argument that life begins at conception is not an argument that finds support in the Judeo- Christian tradition. When does life begin? Who could say?

It seems more helpful to turn the question around. Instead of asking when life begins, ask the question, What is life?

Divine Life is not individual existence. Divine life is cosmic relationship.

Patanjali was a Hindu yogi of around the same time as Jesus. He wrote-
”When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds; your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction, and you find yourself in a new, great and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.”

Do you remember the “free hugs” guy, Juan Mann? For the last four years, he has been giving out free hugs in a Sydney mall. He seems to understand life that is lived in cosmic relationship. His latest act of self service is that he is donating one of his kidneys to someone who needs it. He is not donating it to anyone in particular. He is donating it so that when someone needs it, it will be ready. He knows that it might not end up being useful to anyone, but he is doing it because it is part of what fills his life with meaning. 
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080921/lf_afp/lifestyleaustraliahugsoffbeat

Bone marrow and blood donors also understand that life is a relationship. They choose life by being part of a greater whole. They are co-creators of life, playing God and being agents of healing and regeneration.

We can’t know for sure if an embryo is a human life or at what point becomes life. We can’t know what this embryo could become or be in the world. We can however allow the embryo to be a co-creator of life’s greater purpose.

When Moral Claims Collide

Maybe you still feel the dilemma. How do you resolve competing moral claims? This is the same dilemma that the Judeo- Christian tradition outlines. Jesus is challenged as to whether to heal on the Sabbath. He has to either betray the Sabbath or the sick person. He chooses the person every time over a legalistic understanding of his tradition. In fact, his tradition demands the same choice. As an interesting side note, note that in Genesis 2;2, God finishes the work of creation, then rests. So the Sabbath is not strictly speaking a day of rest. It’s a day for tying up loose ends, then resting.

2And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. 3So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.

There is far too much energy given to a literal interpretation of a tradition that was never meant to be taken literally.

Time and again, Jesus chooses the greater purpose, even denying his own life to further the cause. His interest was healing and compassion.

There is a parable in the Talmud about a building that collapsed on the Sabbath. The rescue crew does not know if anyone is trapped under the rubble or not. And even if someone is trapped, they may already be dead. Despite these doubts, they push aside the restrictions of Sabbath in order to dig out the rubble - on the chance that it may result in the prolonging of even one human life. The point is that saving life is saving the entire world.

Rid Yourself of Religious Dogma

The Judeo- Christian tradition has so much to offer in terms of general principles and challenges. The overarching message is to choose life, and life is always defined by the highest purpose and the greatest good in a circumstance. But it doesn’t offer absolute answers or scientifically informed clues to issues such as stem cell research.

It actually warns against this sort of dogmatism, as you read in Ecclesiastes when the author says that life defies simplistic categorization and dogmatic absolutism. Don’t confuse your own opinions with the right to be the moral arbiter of other people’s situations.

Know this. As you discern your own perspective on complex issues such as stem cell research, you are a participant in a cosmic drama. You are a co-creator of life with your eighth day gift of fire. You are part of something enormous and magnificent. Once you realize the magnitude of life, and your own humble place in it, you are well on the way to making choices of integrity and compassion.