Appendix G. 
243 
5. For Catholics, this position is explicitly confirmed 
by the Magisterium of the Church which, in the 
Encyclical Evanaelium Vitae, with reference to the 
Instruction Donum Vitae of the Congregation for the 
Doctrine of the Faith, affirms: "The Church has 
always taught and continues to teach that the result 
of human procreation, from the first moment of its 
existence, must be guaranteed that unconditional 
respect which is morally due to the human being in 
his or her totality and unity in body and spirit: The 
human being is to be respected and treated as a 
person from the moment of conception; and therefore 
from that same moment his rights as a person must 
be recognized, among which in the first place is the 
inviolable right of every innocent human being to 
life’” (No. 60). (Pontifical Academy for Life, 2000; 
emphasis in original) 
Notice that the core of the argument, namely points one and two, is 
framed in terms of the rights of the individual embryo. We have seen 
this emphasis already in noting Richard Doerflinger's various 
statements on stem cell research. Yet, notice also the claim that we 
know the embryo to be an individual with rights on the basis of "a 
complete biological analysis.” This is not, of course, the first time 
that the Catholic church has made this claim. In the Declaration on 
Procured Abortion, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith 
claimed that "modem genetic science” confirms the view that "from 
the first instant, the programme is fixed as to what this living being 
will be: a man, this individual-man with his characteristic aspects 
already well determined” (Congregation . "Declaration on Procured 
Abortion, ”1974, 13). The Instmction on reproductive technology, 
Donum Vitae , also makes this claim. "The conditions of science 
regarding the human embryo provide a valuable indication for 
discerning by the use of reason a personal presence at the moment of 
the first appearance of a human life: how could a human individual 
not be a human person?” ( Donum Vitae . 13). 
One reason the Catholic church has played such a major role in 
framing the stem cell debate is that, in defending its position, it 
combines the two claims we have just noted, neither of which is 
explicitly religious. First, the early embryo is an individual person 
with rights and, second, the fact that the embryo is an individual 
person is confirmed by modem science. Indeed, a fair amount of the 
literature that supports embryo research generally can be read as an 
PRE -PUBLICATION VERSION 
