c. 1998 Religion News Service

Octuplets’ birth prompts ethical questions

(RNS) The birth of octuplets in Houston has prompted new ethical questions concerning the use of fertility drugs.

As the staff of Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston continued to care for the eight tiny babies, most of whom were born Sunday (Dec. 20), experts wondered aloud about the medical risks and costs resulting from the drugs that made the births possible.”This should not be a cause for celebration,”Dr. Mark Perloe, director of reproductive endocrinology at the Atlanta Reproductive Health Center, told The New York Times.”The cost of caring for these babies and the pregnancy will run into the millions of dollars. The risk of death still exists. And there is a significant risk that they will have lifelong health problems.”I think this is a wake-up call for the medical profession.” As in the case of the McCaughey septuplets, born in Iowa last year, the parents cited religious reasons for declining the option of”selective reduction,”where doctors abort some fetuses so others have an improved chance of survival, the Associated Press reported.”It was totally out of the question,”said Dr. Brian Kirshon, who delivered the octuplets for the deeply religious Nigeria-born couple.

The Houston-area parents, Nkem and Iyke Chukwu, have declined to give interviews.

Nkem Chukwu (pronounced nih-KEHM chuhk-WOO), 27, gave birth to her first daughter on Dec. 8, but doctors were able to put off the other births until Sunday.

Multiple births have increased with the use of the kind of fertility drugs taken by the new mother. But with those births comes the potential for disastrous consequences for mother and children, said Dr. Alan Copperman, director of reproductive endocrinology at Mt. Sinai-N.Y.U. Medical Center and Health System in New York.”I wish this couple well and I hope the babies do well, but this scares me,”Copperman said.

Martha Holstein, a senior research associate at the Park Ridge Center for the Study of Health, Faith and Ethics in Chicago, questioned the drive behind the use of unpredictable fertility drugs.”What is it that creates this seemingly unlimited desire to have one’s own children?”she said in an interview with Religion News Service.”How is it getting stimulated? Why is it getting stimulated? I think among certain people there is a sense of wanting to preserve their own gene line.” Holstein also wondered about the general equity of spending money to sustain eight children when others get no good health care.”If we spend the millions that this takes, I think of all the children who get no basic primary care at all,”she said.

Leaders urge Clinton’s support of ban on child soldiers

(RNS) Forty leaders of religious, humanitarian and child-welfare groups have written to President Clinton urging his support of an international ban on the use of children as soldiers.”Robbed of their childhood, child combatants are subjected to a cycle of violence that they are often too young to understand, or resist,”the leaders wrote in the Dec. 15 letter released Monday (Dec. 21).”Some are used for particularly hazardous duty, such as entering mine fields ahead of older troops, or undertaking suicide missions.” Although the United States has financially supported the rehabilitation of former child soldiers, the leaders were concerned about the country’s role in determining a minimum age for military recruitment.”We are deeply disappointed that the United States has opposed efforts through the United Nations to establish 18 as the minimum age for military recruitment or participation in armed conflict,”they wrote.”The United States’ opposition to the proposed standard is based on current U.S. practice, which allows the voluntary recruitment of 17-year-olds, with parental permission.” They estimated that more than 300,000 children younger than 18 participate in armed conflicts across the globe and hundreds of thousands more are members of armed forces that could be sent into combat.”Mr. President, the United States is in a unique position to exert strong leadership towards ending the reprehensible use of child soldiers,”the leaders wrote.”We urge you to give your full support to an international prohibition on the military recruitment or participation in armed conflict of any child under the age of 18.” Shortly before the letter was released, the World Council of Churches adopted a statement condemning the use of children in warfare and urging international and regional prohibitions on recruitment and participation in armed conflict by children younger than 18. That statement was adopted Dec. 11 at its assembly in Harare, Zimbabwe.

Signatories to the letter sent to Clinton include William F. Schulz, executive director, Amnesty International USA; Ron Daniels, executive director, Center for Constitutional Rights; the Rev. John Dear, executive director, Fellowship of Reconciliation; Kenneth Roth, executive director, Human Rights Watch; the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary, the National Council of Churches; Sharifa Alkateeb, vice president, North American Council for Muslim Women; the Rev. Judy Mills Reimer, executive director of the Church of the Brethren General Board; and Charles Lyons, president of the U.S. Committee for UNICEF.

Bomb explodes in Catholic church in Pakistani city

(RNS) A bomb exploded inside a Roman Catholic church in Karachi, Pakistan, causing an injury and destruction.

Police said the explosion Tuesday (Dec. 22) occurred at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in southern Karachi minutes after the congregation celebrated Mass. Most people had departed when the bomb went off, witnesses said.

One woman was wounded and there was partial damage to the interior of the 120-year-old church, the Associated Press reported.

The homemade device was hidden under a bench in the main hall of the church, said Moinuddin, the chief of the bomb disposal squad who goes by only one name.

No group has claimed responsibility for the explosion, but police have responded to the attack with tightened security at churches and other Christian properties in the city.”We are investigating … but so far we have no clues,”said police commissioner Shafique Paracha.

Religious minorities in the overwhelmingly Muslim country often complain about attacks and persecution by extremist Muslim groups. Dozens of Christians have died in recent years in attacks by Muslim extremists.

Vatican city-state to join European monetary union

(RNS) The tiny Vatican city-state announced Tuesday (Dec. 22) that it will join the European Monetary Union and adopt the euro as its official coinage.

Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said in a brief announcement that although the Holy See is not a member of the European Union, the EU’s Monetary Committee has accepted the Vatican’s request to join the monetary union and will open negotiations on particulars.

Vatican sources said this is largely a matter of convenience because Vatican coins currently are minted by Italy, an EU member, and are tied to the Italian lira, serving as legal tender in Italy as well as in the Vatican. Italy has a similar arrangement with the enclave of San Marino.

The Republic of San Marino and the principality of Monaco also have been accepted into the monetary union, bringing the number of states that will begin issuing the euro in 1999 to 14.

Italy is expected to continue minting coins for the Vatican and San Marino, just as France does for Monaco.

But there may be one sticking point as far as the Vatican is concerned. France opposes putting the face of any national leader _ a role filled by the pope for the Vatican state _ on the euro coins.

Italian monk Padre Pio to be beatified next spring

(RNS) Padre Pio, an Italian monk who died in 1968, will be beatified next May, the Vatican has announced.

The Capuchin monk has been credited with supernatural powers by followers across the globe. His beatification became assured when the Vatican certified a miracle attributed to him, the Associated Press reported.

The beatification ceremony, which is the last step before possible sainthood, is scheduled for May 2, said Joaquin Navarro-Valls, Vatican spokesman.

The announcement prompted celebrations at the sanctuary in San Giovanni Rotondo in southern Italy where Padre Pio died. Millions of people visit his tomb in Southern Italy each year.

Pope John Paul II attended a ceremony Monday (Dec. 21) that recognized the miracle by Padre Pio. A Salerno woman who was hospitalized after a lymph vessel burst prayed to Padre Pio and recovered in a few days. The Vatican called her recovery”extraordinary.” Padre Pio was born Francesco Forgione in 1887. He served as a World War I military chaplain and returned to his monastery in Puglia after the war. He became famous in 1919 when he apparently began to bleed from his hands, feet and side in the manner of Jesus on the cross. His beatification will be one of the fastest in modern times.

Update: Body of missing Chilean Mormon leader recovered

(RNS) Searchers have recovered the body of the top Mormon church official in Chile who was missing after a fishing trip.

The body of Dallas N. Archibald, 60, was transported to the city of Concepcion, 350 miles south of Santiago, for an autopsy and embalming, said Rodolfo Acevedo, a church spokesman in Chile.

His body was recovered Sunday (Dec. 20).

Archibald had been fishing with David K. Broadbent, 45, president of the church’s Chile Concepcion Mission, when his float tube overturned in rapids near Concepcion, the Associated Press reported.

During the days before the accident, Archibald and Broadbent, both from Salt Lake City, conducted church business. Archibald invited Broadbent to go fishing in the Bio-Bio River near Concepcion, officials said.

Quote of the day: Atheist Dick Hogan

(RNS)”I did mean to raise some eyebrows.” _ Atheist Dick Hogan, explaining why he hung a sign reading”Happy Winter Solstice, The REAL reason for the season”near a Nativity scene outside the Parker County courthouse in Weatherford, Texas. He was quoted in The Washington Post.

IR END RNS