Students at Los Angeles’ Loyola Law School have drawn criticism over writing a legal brief in support of Costa Rica legalizing in vitro fertilization, a practice condemned by the Church.
The Catholic school issued a statement on its decision to submit the brief, saying it is “committed to the academic freedom of faculty members and students to participate in the study of different perspectives.”
But Anthony Lilles, professor of spiritual theology at St. John Vianney Seminary in Denver, countered that a Catholic understanding of academic freedom means that it should be guided by truth, as revealed in Scripture and Tradition, and as taught by the magisterium of the Church.
“Academic freedom means the freedom to pursue the truth, wherever it might take you,” he said in an interview with EWTN News Oct. 1.
Loyola Law School is a branch of Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, which describes itself as a “Catholic institution.”
The legal brief, submitted Sept. 3, concerns a case before the Inter-American Court on Human Rights, in which Costa Rican couples wishing to use in vitro fertilization are suing the country for prohibiting the practice. The brief is called an amicus curiae (“friend of the court”).
The document was prepared by students in the International Human Rights Clinic and supervised by professor Cesare Romano.
Loyola Law School is not representing either side in the case, and by releasing the brief “merely seeks to advise the court on a matter that relates to the litigation,” the school's statement reported.
The brief is written solely on legal grounds and does not address the moral implications of IVF, which almost invariably results in the killing of human embryos.
Students at the Catholic law school encouraged the court to “steer clear of the debate about when life begins and what the legal status of human embryos is.”
Rather than deciding the case based on the rights of embryos, the brief indicated that the decision should be grounded in “the rights of infertile women and men.”
Although the brief said that the issue of when life begins “remains better left to the will of states and their practice,” it overlooked Costa Rica's move not to legalize in vitro when a bill permitting the practice failed in its legislature.
In 1987, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith released Donum Vitae (The Gift of Life), an instruction on the dignity of human procreation. In vitro fertilization was found to be “morally illicit” because it “establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person.”
“Such a relationship of domination is in itself contrary to the dignity and equality that must be common to parents and children,” the congregation said.
Loyola Law School’s statement explaining the brief said that its vision of academic freedom is “in harmony with the law school’s institutional Catholic identity and Ignatian heritage.”
Lilles responded, however, that “Catholic universities need to be instruments of the truth.” He concluded by saying, “Hopefully, the faculty there will continue to work with those students, so they can make better moral judgments.”
Calls to Romano and the student authors of the brief were not responded to in time for publication.
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The Vatican should be working constantly on transferring these issues from the ordinary magisterium ( where they might or might not be universal) to the extraordinary magisterium as was done in Evangelium Vitae on abortion and euthanasia and killing the innocent. That would allow stronger censures under canon 749-3. Otherwise, the Pope should be closing these schools. These tales are constant for decades because no Pope likes administration. They like writing. As long as that’s the case, the bizarre tales will continue….and Catholics will huff and puff. Rome needs to face administration.
This is disappointing and obviously written by folks who don’t have a well-formed conscious. To ignore life as indicated in this article tells everything of the culture of convenience and materialism that currently dominates academia.
This should come as no surprise…for one thing, it’s a Jesuit college - therefore, no mandatum and the bishop in charge of the USCCB’s Committee on Catholic Education lives nearby. This same school has Lavender graduations and supports other gay agendas. Students with theology degrees who graduate from there are really just social action types who haven’t a clue about the magisterium or Catholicism in general.
“Students have drawn criticism” from whom other than a single professor at a seminary half a continent away from Loyola Marymount?
I would like to have learned what the Jesuit provincial or the loval Archbishop have to say about this.
It is time to rein in the apostate ‘Catholic’ law schools in this country. Why should this group at Loyola, or the slatternly Sandra Fluke at Georgetown Law School for that matter, publicly flout sincere and reasoned Catholic doctrine while attending (nominally) Catholic law schools? I’d drum them out, and work with a smaller population of students who understand, or at least are trying to comprehend, the awesome and dignified heritage of Catholic philosophy and theology. Fewer lawyers in the populace wouldn’t be a bad thing, either…
OK, so this is a clear violation, something that goes directly contrary to the Catechism. What is odd is that such matters ever get this far. How is it that there is zero oversight? It would take less than 5 minutes. Cannot a single person in some kind of authority position in the Church simply make a phone call and say something like “all association between this brief and the Catholic Church must be removed from the document—it must not use the word ‘Catholic’ or associate itself with the a Catholic University in any way”. The Church teaching on the matter of IVF is crystal clear so how is it ever possible (or allowed) for anyone to associate IVF with the Catholic Church? It is just boggling to me how this stuff can happen. I have heard of cases where The Holy See has said “such and such” a book/pamphlet cannot have the word “Catholic” in it, and the like. What is that SO hard to do? Why does it take SO long? I really do not get it. My 6-year-old son and see the matter with a 5-minute explanation from me. So, what gives? What is REALLY the problem here? Why does it seem that the Catholic Church’s teaching on IVF (which has been made absolutely clear) being ignored by “Catholic” students at a “Catholic” school?
I would love to see a dialog opened up as to what “Oh, it’s a Jesuit school” means. “Oh, that’s because they are Jesuits.” I hear this all the time, especially since the dawn of the current New Evangelization movement. I see the misfailings, and in fact, I am a graduated of a Jesuit-run grade school, high school, and of LMU. I fell like many from my faith, and I tend to attibute some of my fall to the loose and confusing “Catholic” environment of LMU in the 80’s, which has only gotten worse. But, I have never heard a clear-cut explanation as to why “The Jesuits” are this way. What historically happened?
Ah, it is sad to see that so many “educated” humans do not yet understand one of the most fundamental principles of reality—life is sacred.
Loyola Law School, Professor Romano, and the students who wrote the brief, are using reasoning that is fatuous. How can you separate the rights of the unborn child from those of the infertile couple. (Notice the brief does not refer to couples, rather to women and men, meaning it accepts non-married parenting.)
Reference the excerpts below as further evidence of the duplicity of the writers of this brief:
“The brief is written solely on legal grounds and does not address the moral implications of IVF, which almost invariably results in the killing of human embryos.”
“Students at the Catholic law school encouraged the court to ‘steer clear of the debate about when life begins and what the legal status of human embryos is.’” [End excerpt]
This is a strange expression of the, “law school’s institutional Catholic identity and Ignatian heritage.”
I will never give money to or urge my kids to attend any “Catholic” college. This scandal at Loyola captures the attention, but the real scandal happens every day on “Catholic” campuses around the country.
The reality is that “Catholic” colleges are focused on academics first and really only. They give lip service to Church moral teachings, but really give it no importance than a rule about open doors in dorms with opposite gender visitors.
My spouse continued a promiscuous life for 20 years, despite attending 2 “Catholic” colleges. That habit has destroyed our marriage.
As Archbishop Sheen stated, “I tell my relatives and best friends, ‘If you want your children to fight for their faith, send them to public school. If you want them to lose their faith, send them to Catholic school.’” {http://archive.catholic.com/thisrock/1999/9901fea4.asp}
Tim,
Archbishop Sheen wrote that at a time when many Catholic schools were run by administrations that were and still are victims of the past 50 years of loose catechetics. When Blessed JP II called for the New Evangelization, it has rapidly taken many universities and colleges by storm. Some of the truly good Catholic colleges, and those are defined by those signing a maundatum of fidelity to the Magisterium on matters of faith and morals, still seem focused more on academics. However, if you look closer, this focus walks hand in hand with real Catholic teaching, which states that all the knowledge in the world without a relationship with Jesus is void. But we have to know about Jesus before we can fall in love with Him. I have a child at Franciscan University Steubenville, and there is no lip service there. Just true love of God and an earnest desire to know, love and serve him amongst the entire campus. There is also great academia on the campus, as well. Life’s not perfect there, but it’s about as close to heaven you can get at a university. Today, we must send our kids if at all possible to rock solid Catholic higher learning institutions so the New Evangelization can be carried out a little easier. Those who can’t afford to go to a Catholic university or can’t find their major of choice and calling there, must supplement their public university life with a good Catholic organization/group of young people. More public college campuses are being worked in this area with the development of rock solid groups like FOCUS and St. Paul’s Outreach.
This is truly a scandal at Loyola.
Ok, one more time. While it is fine to point out the embryonic destruction of IVF, we need to remember that even if there was an IVF method that didn’t involve embryo destruction it would still be gravely immoral. Notice the section on artificial conception in the Catechism doesn’t mention embryo destruction and gives the governing reason (my emphasis): “2377 Techniques involving only the married couple (homologous artificial insemination and fertilization) are perhaps less reprehensible, yet remain morally unacceptable. They dissociate the sexual act from the procreative act. The act which brings the child into existence is no longer an act by which two persons give themselves to one another, but one that “entrusts the life and identity of the embryo into the power of doctors and biologists and establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person.
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