Current Issues
Instruction Dignitas Personae on Certain Bioethical Questions
On September 8, 2008, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith published the Instruction Dignitas Personae on Certain Bioethical Questions. The Instruction addressed several topics that are both theological and bioethical in nature. These included the following:
- In vitro fertilization and the deliberate destruction of embryos
- Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI)
- Freezing embryos
- The freezing of oocytes
- The reduction of embryos
- New forms of interception and contragestation
- New Treatments which Involve the Manipulation of the Embryo or the Human Genetic Patrimony
- Gene therapy
- Human cloning
- The therapeutic use of stem cells
- Attempts at hybridization
- The use of human “biological material” of illicit origin