The announcement of the cloning of Dolly the sheep in February of 1997 lead to the questioning of how close society was to playing god. Some have become concerned with who exactly has the power or right to create human life, for what reasons, and in what manner. In addition, cloning has raised the question of the sacredness of life and how valuable it is, if anyone can "mechanically" create a human. Many religious groups have come forward to shed light on the issue. Some say that this will cause the long -term devaluation of human life and the ruination of individuality.

Theologians- Theology concerns itself with creation and with individual identity and values. As a result, it has put itself in position of being a large part of the human cloning debate. Many of the Judeo-Christian religions draw their beliefs about cloning and the sanctity of human life from this Old Testament Quote:

And god said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have domain over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every thing that moveth upon the earth… And God saw everything that he made, and, behold, it was very good.

Genesis 1:26-28, 31

ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

The Roman Catholic Church has publicly condemned human cloning. Pope John Paul II has renewed the Catholic Church's strong opposition to cloning, saying it is a serious attack on human dignity. In the Bible's Creation Story, Man should not dominate nature because nature is God's realm, and cloning violates this. Cloning is playing God because God is the ultimate Creator, not man. Support for such beliefs are drawn from the Genesis quote above: "So, God created man in his own image"

Because we have human dignity, our lives as Roman Catholics are all sacred.

According to the Vatican, in order to respect the sacredness of human life we must "unconditionally respect human dignity at every phase of life." Cloning violates human dignity by treating man as a mere means or simple object

(Ex: organ donation, aborting malformed embryos-took 276 tries to successfully clone Dolly)

We are valuable in God's eye because we were created by Him (in His own image). To Catholics, our sense of Human Dignity stems from this realization, and cloning violates this sense of Human Dignity (Human worth)

In a statement issued form the Vatican, The Catholic Church holds that:

Cloning risks being the tragic parody of God's omnipotence. Man, to whom God has entrusted the created world, giving his freedom and intelligence, finds no limits to his action dictated solely by practical impossibility: he himself must learn how to set these limits by discerning good and evil. In human cloning the necessary condition for any society begins to collapse: that of treating man always and everywhere as an end, as a value, and never as a mere means or simple object.

JUDAISM

There is no clear consensus yet in Jewish law regarding cloning. There has however been talk of a cautious tolerance, envisioning the moral applications of the technique.

Judaism, like Catholocism, look to the words of the Creation Story. They feel that cloning interferes with the deeply held belief that God created the world such that a man and woman would unite to "be fruitful and multiply," in order to create new life together. To clone humans would be to surpass this.

In addition there is the qestion of whether or not cloning challenges the traditional family relationships. In Jewish law, family relationships are very important. The Torah commands "honor your father and mother"-it becomes hard to uphold God's command in the case of cloning. When cloning a woman, is there a father?

In some instances, cloning is justified by the Jewish faith because they have a responsibility to preserve God's creations and a commitment to healing, as derived form the Creation Story. They feel that cloning may aid man in finding cures for a variety of diseases and in overcoming infertility, and thus should not be completely prohibited.

Theologian Elliot Dorff of the University of Judaism in Los Angeles concurs that Human Cloning can have moral and therapeutic uses if carried out under strict guidance:

It would be, I think, not in character of the Jewish tradition for us to have a technology that is available and that does have real promise-not to use if, I would think, would not be in consonance with the general Jewish theological tradition. At the same time, we are supposed to work in the world and also preserve it. So hence, the need for some careful thinking about what kinds of restrictions would be appropriate.

PROTESTANTISM

The Protestant Religions, as a whole, have taken no official stance on human cloning

However, there is the wide spread fear, common with that of the Roman Catholic Church, that children will be treated as objects whose genes will be manipulated by man instead of God.

On the other hand, they have also adopted the Jewish belief that human cloning is ethically justifiable in some circumstances; for example, to save the life of a child with leukemia by creating a sibling to be a matching bone marrow donor. There is the qualification that this is only acceptable if the sibling were also loved. However, the real moral argument against human cloning was that it should not proceed

This can be exemplified by a Protestant group such as the one below:

THE ETHICS AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY COMMISSION OF THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION

There are no morally acceptable reasons for cloning human beings. To attempt to do this is an attempt to "usurp God's prerogatives as Creator." The cloning of humans should be made internationally unlawful. If society fails to do this, man will try to achieve what they wrongly perceive to be human perfection. If technology makes it possible in the future to clone human body parts, it may be acceptable with the proper ethical safeguards including, no entire human be cloned and that no patents be made on human organs, tissues, cells or genes.

On March 6, 1997, the Southern Baptist Convention voted unanimously to call upon Congress to "make human cloning unlawful" and to call "for all nations of the world… to prevent the cloning of any human being." The United States Government should create a bioethics regulatory commission that includes ethicists as well as scientists, to protect the nation from biological disasters.

http://www.erlc.com/President/1997/LJ-Aclone.html

ISLAM

There is also no official consensus on the issue of Human Cloning in the Islam Religion. Like that of the Jewish religion, there has been talk of supporting a cautious tolerance to allow for moral applications cloning.

Those in the religion that choose to oppose cloning, suggest that cloning would result in a loss of kinship because it creates children who lack either a mother or father and kinship is very important to Islamic faith. In addition, cloning is not mentioned in the Koran. For this reason, some delegates who attended a conference on cloning would not even discuss the cloning issue.

On the other hand, some Islamic thinkers believe that human cloning would not result in a loss of kinship and find support for human cloning. For example, some thinkers state that they are not opposed to cloning because it would not rob a child of his roots, an important concept under Islamic law. In fact, the discovery might even represent divine will, or a God-given opportunity for mankind's moral training.

Muslims also believe that we have a responsibility to use the knowledge given to us by Allah. If we have the knowledge to potentially clone human beings, we therefore must fulfill our commitment to Allah.

Finally Muslims are commanded to have a commitment to healing: According to the Koran, humans should research cloning techniques if they might potentially "improve human health"

Islamic theologian Aziz Sachedina of the University of Virginia, says the usefulness of human cloning can be justified by the Koran. He says it asserts that human are participants in the act of creation with god, and can promote overall welfare by intervening in acts of nature.

Human manipulation of genes made possible by technical intervention in the early stages of life in order to improve the health of the fetus, or cloning in the meaning of embryo splitting for the purpose of improving the chances of fertility for a married couple, is regarded as an act of faith in the ultimate will of God as the giver of all life.