The tabloid press reports that Quebec singing sensation Celine Dion is pregnant with twins, through in vitro fertilization (IVF). Dion who was raised in a large conservative French- Canadian family, openly claims her faith background as staunchly Catholic, despite having resorted to multiple IVF treatments which the Catholic Church opposes.

                   In Catholic Insight’s article of June 2009, (p.21) Dr. John Shea outlines the reasons for the Church’s moral opposition to this means of procreation. He also restates the core doctrine behind Dignitas personae (The Dignity of the Person) about assisted reproduction published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in December 2008. (On our website also Dr. John Shea, “Church Teaching and Human Reproduction” at http://catholicinsight.com/online/bioethics/article_908.shtml)

                  When IVF is used to yield a human being,

1)       it ‘opposes the conjugal union between a married couple’,

2)       it devalues the dignity of procreation, and

3)       it subjects the child to unnecessary medical risk factors. As many IVF embreyos are discarded even before implantation into the mother is achieved or attempted, the IVF procedure inevitably involves killing of the innocent unborn. It is due to this last single fact, that the church so greatly opposes these practices.

With her status as a North American, even global, music star, Dion sets a bad example which should not be followed.

 No fathers

                  IVF is bringing about a whole new problem: society is robbing children of their biological heritage because sperm donors are not fathers. See Michael Cook in “Orphaned at conception” (Mercator National.com, June 2, 2010). He mentions how a 51-year-old Michigan man may have fathered as many as 400 children by donation sperm to an IVF clinic between 1980 and 1994. At the time he saw it as a way to pay his way through medical school and to help infertile women. Today he regrets it.