Airing My Political Dirty Laundry

My dad reads this blog every day.  He says he sits down and gets his fix – a mixture of laughing or crying or sometimes a little of both — depending on the post, depending on the day.  Tonight as I post tomorrow’s message a little early, I’m worried that my dad is going to shudder and might close his laptop lid and walk away.  I believe we may have differing viewpoints and beliefs about this topic.  I’m almost guaranteed that my mom and I don’t agree on it, but I could be wrong.  If I get a phone call from my mother-in-law, I’m sure I’ll know her viewpoint soon as well.  

The topic: embryonic stem cell research.  

I was born and raised a Catholic. So was my husband. I went through 12 years of Catholic schooling and earned my initial graduate degree from a Catholic University.  Once my husband’s annulment was approved, we took great pains to have our marriage blessed by the Catholic Church after being married across the street in a lovely, Lutheran congregation.  Yes, we did that more for our parents, but it was important to them, so it was important to us.  While I am officially on record as a Catholic, it’s been years since I religiously (pun intended) practiced in a formal building with a steeple.  I visit them sometimes and I stop and pray.  Most recently, I lit a candle and said a prayer at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.   

If we need labels, I consider myself a Christian.  I do my best to live a good, honest, and moral life.  Yes, I’ve made some mistakes along the way (no one needs to email me to remind me of them). I try to correct and learn from those mistakes and live a Christian life.   I believe in God and His Son, Jesus Christ.  I frankly don’t care if Jesus was a just a carpenter or just a miracle worker.  Some say He was married and bore a child.  I don’t care about that either.  He was God’s Son and being married or a father, in my eyes, makes Him no less holy than He was.  And, at least if He was married, He had good taste.  He was reportedly married to a redhead.   

I’m greatly conflicted about the religious beliefs and practices of most formal religious groups.  I refuse to stand in a Church, be a hypocrite and profess my faith while not being in agreement with the philosophies behind the religious congregation. I don’t feel like I need a title, a label, a building, rules or regulations to love God.  I am faithful and I have faith.  I practice both more privately.  And, yes, I still seek to find the truth in what I really believe.  I hope, genuinely hope, I find that truth someday.  I would love to truly fit into a congregation that I could call family; into a building I could call my religious home.   I’m just not there yet.  

I’m also normally very private about my political beliefs.  I work for public broadcasting and choose to avoid public discussions that would make someone question my ability to support the non-partisan mission of that entity. My religious beliefs, or conflicting confusions about them, don’t play a role in my political beliefs.  And here is where the controversy begins.  I have my opinions on abortion rights, gay marriage, and on the death penalty.  I also have very strong opinions on immigration reform, campaign spending, and our ever-declining economy.  I’m sickened by war.  While I consider my religious upbringing in my choices about those issues, I don’t make my choices because of any one religion.  For those who are highly devout, I understand this just doesn’t make any sense to you.  It’s just how I personally operate.  

I think it’s important to state up front that I have supported stem cell research for many years, as far back as it came into the scientific community as a potential for curing many, many life-altering and life-threatening diseases.  I’m not a band Wagoner – one of those people who get struck down with a non-curable disease and then all of a sudden believe in the cause.  I believed before I became sick with the MonSter.  Naturally, I believe even more strongly about it now.  So, how do I rationalize using human embryos – what many consider as human life and therefore entitled to protection – in medical research? 

Yes, of course, I have a stance on when “life” truly begins.  I understand the ethical and moral fine lines surrounding the controversy.  But, I also know that 400,000 Americans and more than two million people in the world suffer from the MonSter.  Millions and millions suffer and die from other non-curable diseases every single day.  These are living, breathing, contributing members of our society.  They are parents, children, friends, neighbors, co-workers.  They are adults who protect living and breathing children from harm and danger.  They teach our children and help them grow into becoming other contributing members of society. Many of them are crying, breathing, crawling, and walking children themselves. They are already alive, already born, and already physically on this earth.  They are suffering and they are dying.  And, there is something that can help.

Cloning freaks me out and I don’t support it. There’s a line and it shouldn’t be crossed.  Creating embryos just for the sole purpose of donating them to science doesn’t sit well with me either.  However, I support the idea that when a woman, through the process of in vitro fertilization, is left with viable excess embryos, she should have the choice to donate her embryos for scientific research.  Or they can just be discarded or live in a freezer.

And, I believe with my whole heart, that MY Federal Government should fund that research. 

I understand that this is a slippery slope and that human life should be cherished.  I just want my Federal Government to cherish my life as much as the one that is in the freezer or the test tube or can’t be seen unless under a microscope.  When did we abandon the living, breathing, producing adults and their children to protect those who have yet to truly be born? 

I haven’t made a firm and educated choice of who will receive my vote next year.  But I can assure you that man or woman must believe in supporting stem cell research and put their money where their mouth is. 

Click here for information on the candidates and stem cell research.

Stem Cells May Hold Promise for a Multiple Sclerosis Cure.

National M.S. Society Position on Stem Cell Research.