Recently and amazingly a federal judge in Washington, D.C., Judge Royce Lamberth, ruled that two scientists who appeared before his court seeking injunctive relief would indeed suffer immediate and non-reversible harm if he did not place a hold on embryonic stem cell research while the constitutionality and ethics of the procedure were under judicial review. Embryonic stem cell research has been approved by President Obama and federal funds directed to it. The two research scientists convinced the judge who ordered a temporary halt to further research pending the outcome of the larger case. On Tuesday, not unpredictably, a three-judge federal appeals court over-ruled their lower court brother and voted to allow the federal government to keep on financing embryonic stem cell research. Editorially this morning THE NEW YORK TIMES crowed about the appeals court ruling, seeing it as providing relief for victims of Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord injuries and other serious ailments. There are two things horribly wrong with this line of argumentation.

Embryonic stem cell harvesting precludes human life from coming into existence and is a form of abortion, against the law of God and also the laws of humankind for most of our history. There is little argument about the fact that taking embryonic stem cells takes human life. The second never mentioned fallacy of the proponents of embryonic stem cell research (Florida voters should take note of the positions of the candidates for the U.S. Senate on this issue) is that after about a decade of the deadly embryonic stem cell research, there has yet to be one success, one result which would sustain the hope of those with these horrible diseases. Bluntly put, immoral means leads in this instance to totally unsuccessful end.

There is real promise to be found in adult stem cell research, however, and there are already successful applications arising from the research. One sign of hope is occurring here in the Diocese of St. Petersburg and involves St. Joseph’s Women’s Hospital in Tampa. Our Church allows and strongly encourages adult stem cell harvesting and research. A company begun in Pittsburgh by two venture capitalists with an uncompromising commitment to what is both ethical and moral has opened a laboratory in Clearwater for adult stem cells. Stemnion, Inc. began its life with research grants from the United States Government, the United States Department of Defense, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and a few other sources to produce ethically and morally a protocol for more rapid and complete healing of severe burns. Archbishop Donald Wuerl while still bishop of Pittsburgh visited Stemnion’s Pittsburgh lab and blessed it and those engaged in the search for a real cure (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Article). The results today have been very positive and now the company awaits FDA approval to begin marketing its findings. To continue its forward looking and thus far successful research, Stemnion approached the Catholic Health Association and its President, Sister Carol Keehan, DC, to held them find a source for adult stem cells taken from the placentas of women who have just given birth. She suggested they contact St. Joseph’s Womens and following the statement of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops which said, “We must pursue progress in ethically responsible ways that respect the dignity of each human being. Only this will produce cures and treatments that everyone can live with” St. Joseph’s Women’s began their Placental Tissue Donation Opportunity. Stem cells from adult tissues, umbilical cord blood and placenta can be obtained without harm to the mother or child and with the expectant mother’s prior consent and when the birth is by C-section only, the placenta is donated to Stemnion, Inc to be used to manufacture investigational treatments that promote rapid healing of tissue of burn victims and other types of wounds. C-section birth mothers are told that “at a time when you are starting a new life with your family, consider giving the gift of your placenta to help others have a better chance at life.”

This was no small commitment for St. Joseph’s Women’s to make as there is no money in it for the hospital or mother and the former must at a very busy time when the mother who has just given birth and her prior consent require the first and immediate attention, the nurses must harvest and collect the placenta, put it into a proper transportable container, give it to a waiting courier and get its to Stemnion’s lab where the window of opportunity is open for only two hours from delivery to freezing in the Stemnion Lab after proper analysis of the incoming tissue. One bad day on the Howard Franklin and the effort will have been for naught as the window is only 120 minutes.

So like Archbishop Wuerl at the Pittsburgh Lab I blessed and invoked God’s blessing on the Clearwater Stemnion lab and employees. Their work is already bearing substantial results from a moral and ethical procedure. But, politicians and newspapers still back a horse which has yet to make it out of the starting gate and tend to ignore those who are already rounding the three-quarter pole and sprinting for the finish.

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Update: You can read the article from the Catholic News Service on the web site of the Catholic Herald, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and about the whole process in Catholic Health World.

Last night I received an e-mail from Sister Carol Keehan whom I had tried to reach by phone prior to writing the previous blog. She was flying and I was busy so we never connected. Sister Carol is a good woman of the Church, no liberal trouble-maker by any stretch of the imagination and a woman who as CEO turned Providence Hospital around from certain bankruptcy and closing to a viable facility in the northeast section of the District serving an increasingly poor and marginalized community. She is worthy of being listened to and the other members of the CHA (Catholic Health Association) board respect both her experience and her wisdom. She writes and I believe I owe it to her to place here: “I need to tell you that the information about our position [in your blog] is incorrect. I know that it is what Cardinal George’s statement says but that is not our position. We believe that the Senate bill as written now, meets the test of no federal funding for abortion. We said that we wanted that preserved in the reconciliation bill not fixed. That is a misrepresentation of our position. We would not have taken the position we took if we were hoping for a fix. It had to be already in place and it is. Many legal scholars, the ABC News “Fact Check” also same the same thing. The provisions were negotiated by Senators Casey and Nelson, two of the most ardent pro-lifers out there.”

I must also include for your thinking that several very reliable sources have said the same thing as Sister Carol above. The position of the bishops, which I embrace until I have some certainty that we are wrong, is being refuted by usually reliable sources and last night, Congressman Thomas Perriello, a conservative pro-life Catholic, said that he was convinced that the Senate version would guarantee that no federal funds would find their way to abortion services. If he moves to accept the Senate version, that will be a major moment for the pro-life movement given his past perfect record.

Passions run high in this matter, sometimes at the expense of rational analysis. I will try and keep myself informed of the developments throughout this week and continue to share my thoughts with you here. Now it is off on AMTRAK again, this time to Miami, for a visit with our twenty college seminarians and a funeral in Lake Worth tomorrow.

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Update: Here are the complete letter by Sr. Carol Keehan, DC and statement by Cardinal Francis George, OMI

Those of you who might be expecting some narrative of my weeks of confinement at St. Anthony’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, are bound to be disappointed. My purpose today is to address the recent statements of two organizations within the Church seemingly at loggerheads on the matter of health care reform.

On Saturday, the Catholic Health Association of the United States of America announced that the Senate health care reform plan enjoyed that association’s blessings, with some minor difficulties which needed to be fixed prior to passage or before enactment.

On Monday, Chicago’s Francis Cardinal George, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a statement on behalf of the bishops saying that the Senate Health Care plan, while containing many admirable features is unacceptable because of far too generous abortion provision language and, sadly, its passage would have to be opposed by the bishops of the United States.

There you have it, two highly respected organizations representing the same Church of Jesus Christ on opposite sides of the street during this seemingly final week of deliberations and action. What should a serious Catholic make of all of this?

First, in the interest of full disclosure, I ask that you recall that:

• I am an elected member of the Board of Directors of the Catholic Health Association, serving the first year of my second three year term. Because of my well known illness, I have been unable to attend any CHA board meetings since last June and until only the last few days have been either unable or unwilling to read Board documentation. Therefore, as I write this¸ I have no personal knowledge of any discussions held and/or actions taken by the governing board prior to last Saturday’s press conference by Sister Carol Keehan, our president, and a woman whom I deeply admire for her history both in Catholic health care provision and pro-life advocacy.
• I am also a member of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Again because of my lengthy and well publicized illness, I have been unable to attend or participate in any USCCB plenary meetings since November 2008 and until the last few days have been either unable or unwilling to read Conference documentation as well.
• Finally, for nine years I served as either Associate General Secretary for Public Policy Advocacy of the old NCCB-USCC or as General Secretary of the same, acting as the Chief Operating Officer for six years.

During the time of my confinement, I have been led to believe that CHA and USCCB were working together to eliminate any language in the health care proposals which threatened the effectiveness of the long standing Hyde amendment which prevents federal monies (your tax dollars and mine) from providing abortions. The USCCB skillfully acted as a major player in gaining the Stupak amendment to the House passed Health Care Reform Bill last Fall. CHA in the end supported the Stupak language.

CHA prefers the health care reform vision of the Senate bill as they deem it ultimately more successful, more efficient, and more effective than the House passed version. USCCB has no major objections to the language in the Senate bill as it relates to the delivery of services except for the need of greater inclusion of immigrants and its abortion language. CHA agrees that there are problems with the abortion language (or in some instances the lack thereof) in the Senate bill but offers that it can be fixed in the “reconciliation” process or after enactment. The bishops say in response to this basically, “that will be far too little and much too late.”

CHA says that general access to health care benefits is a right of all citizens and every effort should be expended to see that it is made available. USCCB agrees but says nothing in the law can or should either extend abortion “rights”, use taxpayer monies to pay for abortions through new insurance possibilities, or in any way infringe on the right of conscience of those opposed to participating in what they believe to be morally illicit procedures.

At the very beginning of this national debate, CHA and USCCB had a long record of working together for genuine, real health reform so that remains and does not divide.

So today, the Catholic Health Association says we are willing to accept the Senate version of health care reform with the understanding that the less than perfect working document must and will be improved later in the process.

And also today, the elected leader of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Cardinal Francis George says passing the Senate bill will produce too large a loss of moral integrity and the Conference can not risk fixing things outside of the legislative process. He wants health care but finds the Senate bill requires too high a price with woefully inadequate abortion language and conscience protection proposals. The bishops want the Hyde amendment to apply fully which the House bill does and the Senate bill does not.

As a member of the Board of the Catholic Health Association, I too want universal access to health care in this country to all our inhabitants. But I do not wish it through a vehicle that expands abortion rights or weakens conscience clause protection. So I side with the USCCB on this one. Were the bishops’ conference asking for new legislation, further tightening access to abortion or writing new abortion language law, it would have trouble. From the beginning the bishops have said only we must insure that we keep what we have.

I hope and pray that in these final decisive days, the Congress will see the wisdom of the Church’s position on abortion in health care as articulated by the bishops and the experience and wisdom of the Catholic Health Care providers who yearn for a reform of a system which is failing and becoming incredibly expensive – to maintain and to access.

If this were a tennis match, it would not yet be “game” but “advantage bishops.” However, the game is still not over although it is approaching match point. I would hope that Congress will see the wisdom and find the ways to fully apply the Hyde amendment so that both CHA and the USCCB can unite in general support of health care reform that protects the life and dignity of all.

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