First Things has published an essay with the same name, in which the author bloviates about the moral problems with IVF, which are - admittedly - legion. But the author fails to address the central problem.
God participates in IVF by creating and infusing the human soul.
He doesn't have to, but He chooses to.
So... what do you do with that?
Now, you can argue that this is part of God's magnificent freedom, part of His gift to human persons. After all, in an act of pure love, God created and formed the universe. He lets us do whatever we want with this universe. He holds it in existence from moment to moment, while our sin abounds. If we turn lead into bullets and fire a bullet into someone's skull, He will hold that bullet in existence and allow it to smash open a brain pan. It's a radical freedom to give us suzerainty over the universe like that.
But this is a bit different. This isn't just God holding some pre-existing something in existence. This is an honest-to-God act of ex nihilo creation. During the IVF process, God creates a new human soul and infuses it.
Think about that.
He has to actively take part in our attempt to create a new human being. He has to actively create the new human soul out of nothing and infuse that newly created human soul into the attempted embryo as part of the process. God is as much an active participant in this process as the lab tech infusing the sperm. God ACTIVELY PARTICIPATES in the creation of the life of the new human embryo. If He did not, the embryo would never form.
Christians don't believe souls pre-exist conception, so that makes God an ACTOR, a PARTICIPANT in the IVF sequence. And He appears to be fine with it, because He makes sure the human soul is present and operational.
So... what do you do with that?
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