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Term Paper: The Right to Have Children The right to have children is understood in very different ways and people’s ethics and values are put to the test each and everyday when they find out they not only must take care of themselves but the lives of another human being. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted this statement regarding the right to bear children “men and women of full age, without any limitations to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and found a family”[1]. This concept has been viewed in multiple ways and according to ethical theorists; they agree that no rights are absolute. However, it is said that for women at least, there is a fundamental privilege to have children. The right to …show more content…

The ethical issues with this procedure are not rooted in the utilization of non-human elements to aid the procreative process. So why the moral fuss over the McNamara's method of growing embryos? The heart of the issue was the potential risk to the child. Animal diseases, either known or unknown, can easily be transmitted to humans through xenotransplantation (the use of live animal cells, tissues and organs for transplantation)[9]. There is the potential, both in xenotransplantation and in the utilization of animals in the procreation process, of placing humans at major risk of contracting new types of infectious diseases[10]. Clearly the McNamara’s view and attitude towards creating their offspring may not have been the most ethical way but they would have done absolutely everything to have the one thing they wanted in this world: a child. Do we have a right to have a child at all costs? It should be obvious that our rights must be limited for the sake of others, especially when our own actions would endanger the lives of others[11]. Are there ethical limits to our good, God-given desire to reproduce? There are limits to all our good desires, precisely because these desires are given by God to be coordinated with one another according to His specific design for human beings. When we add to this the fact that our God-given desires are mingled with sinful desires, selfish impulses, and fallen drives, the need for limits becomes even more apparent[12].

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