The virgin birth is a staple of orthodoxy and defended through the ages by untold numbers of theologians and pastors. As mysterious and shocking as that idea is, I find myself wondering more about Jesus than Mary. What did his DNA look like? Was one strand clearly from Mary’s genetic material but the second strand novel? Or did the genetics represent both Mary and Joseph? Or perhaps neither?

Maybe Mary was a true surrogate, and not even an egg donor. No problem defending a virgin birth with that sort of conception. It eliminates the difficulty of original sin, too. Original sin is what prompts some to claim that Mary was a product of an immaculate conception. But I don’t really understand why God couldn’t erase original sin if He could form a new embryo without sperm. Were there God-sperm?

I don’t mean to be sacrilegious. I am seriously pondering these mysteries. The more we learn about human genetics, the more fascinating the whole idea of Jesus’ conception becomes. It is rather routine in our culture to hear of egg donors and sperm donors and surrogates. Babies are being born under a myriad of embryonic possibilities, from labs to freezers to strangers to mothers. Consideration of the virgin birth certainly conjures up more images than were possible 2000 years ago.

Evidently I’m not the only one wondering about this. There are several ready—and rather certain—answers available. Some declare that Jesus got 100% of his DNA from Mary. But he still needed that Y chromosome. One suggestion is that parthenogenesis occurred—asexual reproduction which occasionally happens in nature, although never with humans as far as we know. To me, this limits God. Where is the divine God-man in this event?

Others state that Mary received male mitochondrial DNA from the head (not tail) of a uniquely created sperm that was inserted into Mary’s fallopian tube. Really? How do they know that? A similar argument declares that the DNA is that of David’s—King David, that is. No need for those long genealogies when God bypasses generations with direct DNA deposits. But David, as special as he may have been, was still fully human. Why would God use David’s DNA?

A number of theologians argue against the idea of surrogacy. They say that if Mary were a surrogate, then Jesus would be fully divine and not born of woman. Have those men ever witnessed a pregnancy and birth? So far in human history, all babies are born of women. Surrogacy only eliminates the genetic material. That is, when accomplished by human manipulation. I just don’t see why God couldn’t manufacture whatever DNA he wanted, including a bit of Mary’s, and still make surrogacy the method.

Some say Jesus’ DNA had to be perfect, without genetic errors. If that is the case, there is no way he had Mary’s DNA. We all have loads of potential genetic disasters within our sequencing. It’s hard to imagine how anyone could claim Jesus was fully human if he had some sort of superman DNA. And as he was tempted and tried he experienced hunger, pain, suffering and more. Perfect is misused when meant to be a vehicle for the elimination of suffering or an ideal of physical life. That concept of perfection is the root of much of our rejection of human life today, whether in the form of a genetically disabled fetus or an elderly person with Alzheimer’s.

Jesus is the new Adam. God mysteriously gave humans, represented in Adam and Eve, his image. And we corrupted it. I don’t know how it all happened. I am comfortable with evolution. But I do think there was and is a Trinitarian creation that is responsible for all life and matter. So then, could Jesus have the DNA of Adam?

I’ll never know the sequence of Jesus’ DNA, but I’m sure he had a double strand. I don’t know how his goodness was affected by what some call God-genes or a genetic predisposition to be spiritual. Maybe we all are supposed to have those genes fully expressed?

My faith doesn’t fall apart if Jesus grew up with brothers and sisters, looked a lot like Joseph, and had bouts of hay fever. I’m more troubled by human certainty than I am by God’s mystery. Though Jesus’ conception is deemed miraculous, each human being is more than the product of the rearrangement of genetic material, no matter the technique. DNA is as much the word of God as it is anything else, and awe is my response.

I enjoy teaching medical students bioethics and am encouraged by their interest in a field that has received little formal notice in the course of graduate programs in both health professions and theological studies. One of my medical students at Pacific Northwest University wrote this essay on the ethics of physician-assisted suicide. Trent describes himself as coming from a background enriched by diverse faith traditions and as one intrigued by spirituality and religion. I found his thoughtful essay cogent, compassionate and encouraging.

 Dr. Jennie McLaurin

The Dilemma of Physician-Assisted Suicide:  An Ethical Analysis

By: Trent Sensiba

As the brother of a sibling with Trisomy 21 and Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia who has undergone chemotherapy and two heart surgeries for congenital heart defects, one would presume that I have my fingers firmly placed on the pulse of death and the ethical questions surrounding it.  I do not; nor, I suspect, do my parents or my sister herself.  In the case of my sister, our family has relied upon faith and love to get us through difficult times, while focusing on the beauty of my sister’s life.  Fortunately, my family has never needed—or more appropriately, chosen not to—take into consideration Physician Assisted Suicide (PAS) in regards to my sister.

In firm contrast to my sisters situation is that of my wife’s uncle, who recently was diagnosed with stage 4 non-small cell lung cancer.  As a resident of Oregon, he has expressed his desire to utilize their Death with Dignity Act.  Observing my wife’s family and contemplating their struggle with his wishes has provided me with an impetus to more closely examine the ethical dilemmas surrounding PAS.

The climate of PAS is changing rapidly with Oregon enacting its Death with Dignity Act in 1997.  More recently in 2009 and 2011, two additional states—Washington State and Montana—have become the second and third states to legalize PAS while other states such as Vermont and Hawaii appear soon to follow suite.  Despite this, the majority of states continue to prohibit physician-assisted death, and furthermore, most state referenda challenging this prohibition have failed.  Simultaneously, opinion polls indicate that PAS is garnering increasingly widespread support amongst the public, suggesting a shift in thought of how we interpret the role of medical practice during end of life care.[1]  Adding to this, there is an unprecedented segment of the population on the cusp of advanced age with a staggering 7000 Americans turning over 65 years old every day.[2]  Regardless of opinion polls, and as in any deeply divided issue, cogent arguments can be made on both sides of the debate. In lieu of this, it is my intention to contextualize the salient arguments of the controversy using the framework provided by bioethics and in doing so, unravel my personal, albeit biased conclusion.

In dealing with end of life issues such as PAS, ethicists usually rely upon four primary principles, which include autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice[3].  Autonomy is the ability to make and implement decisions for ourselves, ergo the need for informed consent prior to procedures.  As an extension of this, human dignity lies in our ability to make and carry out these choices as based upon our personal values.  In the debate over PAS, autonomy has played a central role on both sides.  Advocates argue that individuals should be able to make their own decision regarding end of life issues, including the employment of PAS.  The opposition proposes that our veneration for life and human dignity should trump our autonomy in choosing an assisted death.  Furthermore, inductive reasoning can be applied to argue the opposition’s position by using the following examples:

1. Predicated on The Extended Analogy Fallacy, they adduce that slavery is morally unjust—despite a person’s desire to be enslaved.  Then pose the question, should we condone slavery just because someone chooses to be enslaved?  From this, one could then infer that suicide is immoral and ask, should we as a society support Physician Assisted Suicide just because someone chooses to end their life?
2. Furthering the discussion of autonomy’s limits, they illustrate that patients are not allowed full autonomy—the right to choose—in deciding what specific pharmaceutical therapy a physician will prescribe to them.  This describes the common scenario of patients taking pharmaceuticals such as opioids based solely upon their desire and in doing so, causing harm to themselves.  Analogously, they conclude patients should also not be able to choose PAS.

The previous examples, lead us to the question, what is the physician’s role in preserving autonomy?  In my humble opinion, it becomes obvious that there is a moral boundary to which autonomy should be upheld by physicians, but to what extent is the true question.  I believe the crux of this argument lies in whether or not PAS is regarded as a detrimental act.

The second ethical principle of beneficence describes the duty to contribute positively to the patient’s welfare.[4]  Supporters of PAS suggest that assisting in death mitigates the physical and psycho-spiritual suffering that certain patients experience in terminal illness and, in effect, becomes a “beneficent” response to that suffering.  Contrary to this, those who oppose PAS contend that assisting in death is diametrically opposed to beneficence as it violates the sanctity of life and contradicts many religious writings from which beneficence was derived.  Furthermore, when one analyzes the reasons why people have chosen PAS they differ from what advocates say they want—to alleviate pain and suffering—and what the actual cited reasons are: loss of autonomy and enjoyment in life.   Upon examination of the data, less than 25% of the people who embraced PAS actually did so to alleviate pain and suffering, while other reasons such as loss of autonomy and enjoyment were the most frequently reported reasons at 60 and 58% respectively[5].  Is loss of autonomy and enjoyment a valid reason to allow or assist someone in ending their life?  Expanding upon this, it appears valid to say, why should we support PAS while simultaneously not supporting suicide? Are the reasons for choosing suicide and PAS all that different?

The third ethical principle of nonmalefiscence, which essentially means to do no harm, is largely used as a reason to advocate against PAS.  Organizations such as the American Medical Association (AMA) use this as a reason to withhold their support of assisted death, citing its incompatibility with the Hippocratic Oath.  The Hippocratic Oath, which American medicine has fervently honored as its primary declaration reads, “Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do so, nor will I suggest such a course.[6]” To counter this, supporters commit the fallacy of argumentum ad misericordiam by arguing that denying the patient their right abandons patients in their time of need, and thereby causing more harm.  While the AMA is reluctant to embrace PAS, many say that it goes against the public’s opinion which largely appears to support PAS.

Other arguments against PAS are centered on the societal consequences of its legalization.  Often cited is the slippery slope fallacy that institutions, governments, and families will exercise their hegemony over the vulnerable to encourage PAS in order to decrease the burden of terminal illness.  Notwithstanding its fallacious origin, the weight of this argument has forced advocates to acknowledge that the potential for abuse is both real and viable.  However, in response, they propose that legalization will increase quality controls via both public and governmental auditing processes.  Furthermore, they employ their own bit of invalid logic by pointing out that PAS will continue “behind closed doors” despite its illegalness and therefore pose the question, why not just legalize PAS, thus making it more regulated? They point out that aid in dying and euthanasia, albeit unsanctioned by the medical establishment, occurs in every state of the union at a rate four times that of its incidence in Oregon and Washington.[7] In this example, I believe the advocates are guilty of committing their own fallacy by appealing to fear.  Additionally, the opposition points towards the Dutch laws, where euthanasia was tolerated and then made legal, but continues to occur outside the guidelines set forth.[8]

Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act (DWDA) has the unique potential to serve as a case study for assisted suicide.  Thus, researchers have meticulously analyzed the implementation and practice of PAS as well as its consequences.  Supporters highlight the following successes in Oregon:

1. Hospice care is double the national average.[9]
2. People are more likely to die at home or care facilities than other states.[10]
3. Oregon consistently ranks in the top three for the medical use of morphine to control pain.[11]

Commensurate with the program’s success, supporters point out that numbers of people who have utilized their legal right have been minimal, ranging around 1/7 of 1% of deaths.  Furthermore they point out, that PAS is not disproportionately undertaken by the most vulnerable in society such as those whom are less educated, poor, or uninsured.  In fact, the evidence suggests the contrary, in that it appears to be more used by those whom are educated and with a higher level of access to care.[12]  Even more, they add that Oregon has one of the highest rates of Advanced Care planning and physical access to Hospice Care in the nation.[13]

On the other side of the analysis are those who point out missteps in Oregon’s DWDA—such as the previously mentioned incongruity with the bills intention (to alleviate pain and suffering) and the actually reasons for its use (loss of autonomy and enjoyment in life.)  Furthermore, they highlight that 1 in 4 terminally ill patients who opt for PAS have clinical depression and may in fact not be capable of making a rational decision about ending their lives.[14]  This underscores a key weakness in the DWDA and asks the question, does the law appropriately protect patients whom are impaired by mental illness?  In 2003, only 5% of patients who opted for assisted death were referred for psychiatric evaluation—an inexplicably low number when compared to the 20% incidence of depression in those requesting PAS. Moreover, the incidence of depression amongst dying cancer patients is nearly universally greater than 60% and in addition, 11% of the patients who requested PAS changed their mind after a trial of antidepressant or antianxiety medication.[15]  This alludes to a huge discrepancy in the protection of those with mental health conditions, which happened to be a large number of people with terminal illness.  In fact, this is the largest concern amongst my wife’s family when confronted with her uncle’s choice.  In his case, he has a long history of mental health issues may not be adequately able to make a rational decision.

A prominent Palliative Care physician in Netherland wrote:  “Accepting euthanasia or assisted suicide as a normal medical practice for some cases of unacceptable suffering assumes that the process will be controllable… Regulation has proved to be difficult if not impossible and is fraught with danger.  It also serves to stifle creativity in palliative care and even to make proper care impossible to achieve.”[16]  This physician addresses a very real concern that PAS is a threat to Hospice and Palliative Care.  Although advocates highlight that Oregon has above average access to Hospice care there are still inadequacies in the DWDA.  For example, reports of over 5,000 families indicate moderate or severe pain or distress in Oregon dependents has increased from 30 to 48% after the law took effect.  Furthermore, Medicare reimbursement in Oregon is among the lowest in the US during the last six months of life and has decreased steadily since the DWDA.[17]

Besides the fact that cogent arguments exist on both sides of the debate, what do I truly know?  I know that Palliative Care and Hospice should remain the standard of care and should serve as the ambition when challenging end of life issues arise.  What do I believe and feel?  The leap from palliative care to “better off dead” is a concept that I personally struggle to embrace.  However, I find more shameful than assisted death, is the reality that many in this country do not have access to care.  I fear the months and years prior to hospice, in which the true assault to human dignity and life’s worth occur.  I believe that Palliative Care and Hospice should mitigate the need for assisted death in nearly all the cases and that we as physicians need to focus our efforts on improving access and quality to end of life care.

Anyone interested in the faith and science conversation knows that there currently is considerable, heated debate over the problem of “Adam.” Genetic studies conclude that the modern human population could not have arisen from only one primal couple. Excellent Biblical scholars and theologians from various perspectives argue over whether “Adam” should be thought of as part of a population of early humans, or as an entirely non-historical figure. And of course, many Christians continue to insist that scientific data that appears to contradict a particular Biblical / theological interpretation of human origins should be rejected out of hand.

I’d like to suggest that this argument is in significant ways misplaced. The participants in this debate all seem to agree that what makes us “human” can be defined by genes and population studies. There is a pressing need for them to conform theology to population genetics, or to conform population genetics to theology, because the story of our genes is implicitly equated with the story of what it means to be “human.” The hypothesis that there was a “first human” – a capital-A “Adam” – can be tested in our genes.

But “genes” do not make us “human.” What makes us “human” is the irreducible phenomena of all of our material and immaterial being as persons.

Nothing we observe in the universe is flat. By “flat” I mean having only one aspect or “layer.” Consider, for example, an apple. What is it? Is it the fruit of an apple tree? The seed-carrier – the potentiality – of new apple trees? Beautiful and delicious? Skin, flesh, and core? Water and organic molecules? Caloric energy and roughage? Hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon? Physical laws? All of these things comprise some of what we mean by “apple,” but none of them are what an “apple” is. The reality that is “apple” cannot be reduced to any one of its aspects or layers.

It is possible to think of these aspects or layers hierarchically, with “higher” layers that emerge from “lower” ones. Physical laws emerge from quantum probabilities; molecules emerge from physical laws; seeds, skin, flesh and core emerge from complex arrangements of molecules; beauty and delight emerge from the connection of skin, flesh and core to human sense perception;¹ “apple” emerges from all of this (and more) combined with the human cultural experience of this thing we call “apple.”

Notice that some “layers” can impinge or “supervene” on lower ones – for example, human sense perception and cultural experience do something to this thing confronting the subject in order for it tobecome “apple.” But notice also that “apple” is not merely a cultural construction. The word or signifier “apple,” of course, could be arbitrary, but there is an objective reality to the thing signified. The layer of human sense perception and cultural experience supervenes upon, but does not create, the lower-order reality from which it emerges.

Sociologist Christian Smith draws these strands together in a critical realist framework in his excellent book What Is a Person?: Rethinking Humanity, Social Life, and the Moral Good from the Person Up. In a critically realist approach to culture and human personhood, Smith suggests, “[h]uman beings do have an identifiable nature that is rooted in the natural world, although the character of human nature is such that it gives rise to capacities to construct variable meanings and identities….” Culture is a social construction, but it is not merely a social construction. Human beings are social, but they are not subsumed by the social. The reality we inhabit is “stratified”: it includes both the reality of individual conscious human agents and the reality of the social structures that emerge from the cultures created by those agents. These “personal” and “cultural” layers of the world interact with each other dynamically, each continually informing and changing the other.

Smith’s approach is helpful, but perhaps it does not go far enough. For Smith, as for critical realists in general, the phenomena of human culture remain subject to some degree of granular disaggregation, at least analytically. A phenomenological approach suggests that no “thing” can be broken into components and still comprise that “thing” – the genes that encode for apple trees are not apple seeds, apple seeds are not apple trees, and apple trees are not apples. The critical realist framework of stratification, emergence, and supervenience functions as a very useful heuristic device, but to describe what an apple is, we must approach the phenomenon of “apple” in its fullness. To know whether something falls into the kind “apple,” we must hold an ideal of everything an apple is, and compare the subject to the ideal.

And because of the transcendence of the ideal concept of “apple,” we can begin to speak of the relative excellence of particular instantiations of apples. What is an “excellent” apple? What distinguishes the excellent apple from a poor one? We can only ask such questions if “apple” means something more than the particular physical specimen in hand, whether firm, sweet and tart, or bruised and sour.

The same is true of human “persons.” We can say almost nothing about a “person” merely by observing genes, because genes are not “persons.” Populations genetics studies can provide models of the dispersion of genes through groups of biological entities, but they can tell us nothing whatsoever about when the first “human person” emerged. Indeed, for population genetics qua population genetics, there simply are no “persons” – for this is a science of the movement of genes, not a philosophical, sociological, or theological description of “persons.”

So what of “Adam?” It is often suggested that in Romans 5:12 Adam is a type of Christ. But, in fact, in Paul’s thought, as well as for the early Church Fathers, Christ is the type, the typos, a notion derived from the “stamp” or “seal” on an official document. There is a hint in Romans 5 of a truth that would only become clarified later in Christian theology – that the pre-incarnate Christ, the second person of the Trinity, always was. Whereas Arius declared that “there was a time when he [Christ] was not,” Nicea established the orthodox Christology of Christ’s eternal sonship. Thus Christ is and was the Redeemer, the one for whom creation was made and in whose death and resurrection creation always finds its fulfillment. Adam’s failure was that he went against type – he did not conform to Christ but rather tried to become something else, and thereby the true nature of humanity was broken.

Is the typos of Christ reducible to a set of genes? Surely not. It resides not in genes or in any other created thing but rather in the Triune life of God Himself. We might speak, in a roughly analogical way, of ideas we hold in our minds – say, the idea of a perfect Bordeaux, ruby-red, silky, smoky, plummy, luxurious. We could labor to instantiate that idea, combining genes and terroir and water and light and care, and perhaps we might achieve it, to the point where upon taking a sip we exclaim, “this – this – is Bordeaux. Nothing else is worthy of that name.”

This is what God said of Adam, when he gave him breath and a name. It is not something that God said of any other creature, even apparently some creatures that a modern population geneticist or paleoanthropologist might designate as ancestrally human based on genes or bones. Yet that Adam, and each of us in that Adam, fail to participate fully and unreservedly in the true nature of the true human, the nature of Christ. And so Pontius Pilot, an unwitting prophet, said of Christ: “behold, the man” (John 19:5, KJV). And so also Paul invites us to see: the sinful man, the broken seal, the first created Adam; and the true type, the seal of humanity’s future, the perfect Adam, the Christ. None of this is about the definitions and categories of modern science, as helpful and important as they may be for the progress of scientific thought. It is, rather, about the fullness of what it means to be human.

Notes

1. Human sense perception, of course, is an emergent property of an even more complex set of relations that give rise to the human “person.”

So what exactly did happen a billionth of a second after the Big Bang?

That’s the question particle physicists from around the world are trying to answer via a little science experiment using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

This week, researchers reported that they are one step closer to verifying the existence of the elusive Higgs Boson (a.k.a. the “God particle”). If they find it, it will be one of the biggest scientific discoveries in 50 years. “Our whole picture of how matter exists within the universe depends on the existence of the Higgs Boson,” said project physicist Dr. Robert Orr.

And it seems we’ll spare no expense or effort to prove it’s there. Budget? $10 billion. The plan? Fly protons around a 17-mile-long ring at 11,000-revolutions-per-second (99.99991% of the speed of light) and then smash them together. The purpose behind it all? To try to understand how matter and mass came to be!

To try to understand how we came to be.

It’s a worthy question.

Nobel prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg said, “The urge to trace the history of the universe back to its beginnings is irresistible.”

“Humans long for coherence and completeness,” wrote University of British Columbia professor Dr. Dennis Danielson in “The Book of the Cosmos.”

We are meant to know where we came from and how we got here. This is what’s driving us to invest so much energy and attention into this project. We’re searching for the big story,  a “grand theory,” something that makes sense of all of this.

And our need to know is pushing us to the very edge of our potential.

The fact that we can conceive of and implement an experiment like this is quite remarkable. God really did make us “a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned [us] with glory and honor.” Richard Dawkins evenagrees: “Our ability to understand the universe and our position in it is one of the glories of the human species.”

We are made in the image of a God who made the universe. So, when we bring the brightest and best minds in the world together to try and recreate a moment that is similar to that which occurred just after the Big Bang, we are imaging the God who was there when it happened the first time.

In a way, it makes perfect sense that humanity would come to a point where it would reflect God’s “particle physicist” mind through a scientific experiment like this. And what’s really exciting is the possibility that the LHC’s findings will reveal something new about the mind of God.

The more those scientists uncover, the more we’ll have to know, love and worship God with … to worship Jesus Christ with, the one through whom all things were made.

Imagine, the Large Hadron Collider revealing the mind of Christ.

They say that one reason scientists can do this experiment today is the fact that we now have the technology to focus enough energy into very small spaces. “It takes a huge amount of energy to create mass/matter,” said one expert.

When I read that quote, I thought about the energetic power of God and how much he must have exerted when his Spirit first “hover[ed] over the waters…”

What power. What a mind. And to do it all out of nothing.

We should be thankful for experiments like the LHC. They pull back the veil and allow us, in a sense, to look back in time to the beginning of all things. By recreating a 13.7 billion-year-old moment, the world’s scientists are giving us a better understanding of the Alpha nature of our Maker.

And God is glorified.

John Van Sloten is the preaching pastor of New Hope Church in Calgary and author of “The Day Metallica Came to Church.”

Science & Faith: Collision to Collaboration from BethanyCommunityChurch on Vimeo.

Recommended article on MercatorNet >>

Additional Photos from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) available here >>.

See: “Assisted Suicide: Expert Panel Urges Legalization Of Euthanasia And Assisted Suicide In Canada,” The Huffington Post. >>

Sharon Hammond is a certified nurse midwife. She’s delivered over a thousand babies, so she spends a lot of time around joyful parents and healthy newborns. But not all pregnancies and births go according to plan. For Sharon, it was a difficult birth experience — perhaps the hardest in her career — that she cherishes most. Sharon tells KUOW’s Sarah Waller how the birth and death of a baby changed the way she practices medicine.

Listen to the postcast: Realaudio >> or MP3 HI/ LO >>

Source: A Midwife And Her Patient: Learning From Loss