The use of fetal cells is morally indifferent. The sinfulness comes from the origin of those particular fetal cells, namely from an aborted fetus. The principle seems the same in hypothetical. Starting a business with money is morally indifferent. The sinfulness comes from the origin of the money, namely from a murder. Thus the business is a direct causal result of the murder, just as it is argued that vaccines produced from cells developed from an aborted fetus are a direct causal result of an abortion, no?
First we must get some facts straight. The aborted unborn baby had to be alive (at least for a moment) in order harvest the live fetal cells for the vaccine line. In fact the harvesting may have been the imminent cause of death because dead fetal cells will not work for vaccine development. I don't know if that changes things or if it is still morally indifferent to you.
However, what I cannot wrap my mind around is juxtaposing money to live fetal cells. Maybe in some dry, scholarly way, this comparison would work although I find the argument is not honest. What is
currently present is live cells from a human being , no past tense here. We are not really distanced from the abortion at all, in fact it is a continuation of and participation in the act, procuring and sustaining live cells from a long dead fetus as a commodity, as a product, as a medical 'advancement' but never as a person who could have lived.
Obviously I m not conversant in the moral theology you are arguing about - l admit that. But now with all of the stem cell technology available, could it not be possible to take the pluripotent activity of these cells and make them not a means to an end but to a beginning? I truly don't like this idea either, but when you are dealing with living cell lines in the present, they probably could be applied either way. it kind of turns the subject on it's head.
Pax was relating on an earlier post re: a relationship to the Eucharist, i can't remember specifically what. But as a crumb of the Sacred Species is all and entirely God; is not a living cell of a child, a child?There are many things to consider- Not theologically based on my part for sure.
i do find many of these arguments an exercise in hair splitting. There is just so much parsing and analyzing one can do to extract the desired results when sometimes going with your gut (your Catholic trained gut) is the best answer. Either this is evil or it is not.