In a tragic turn of events, the state of New York has recently legalized commercial surrogacy. While its citizens find themselves preoccupied with a state-wide shutdown, shouldering the lion’s share of the U.S. coronavirus burden, New York’s legislators have taken it upon themselves to pass the widely-battled legislation that feminists argue is harmful to women, children, and families.
According to the March of Dimes, the premature birth rate in the United States has been increasing over the past several years. In response, researchers focus on the prevention of this issue, as well as on treatments and solutions. Among these solutions is the potentially life-saving artificial womb. Although it is still only a theoretical possibility for human gestation, artificial wombs have been successfully tested in animal reproduction…
In 1933, Aldous Huxley imagined a Brave New World in which human reproduction was entirely artificial. No longer science fiction, the use of “artificial wombs” is news of the past. Researchers demonstrated the capacity to gestate animals in 2017, when a team at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia published the results of their study growing fetal lambs in what they termed a “biobag.”
Yesterday was the feast day of St. Catherine of Siena. She was a medieval mystic, and one of the first female Doctors of the Church. Her influential writing on prayer and politics transformed the Church of her time and continues to inspire us today. She even wrote letters chastising the pope and changed his mind. Basically, St. Catherine was a badass.
She also had issues.
Mere moments on Twitter are enough to alert us that our culture is plagued with demons. We live in a culture that responds to polarized politics and social values with contempt and hateful accusations that serve only to drive us further from one another, rather than seeking common ground. Even voices claiming to speak for our good God are raised in accusation and derision. Among so many voices and so much anger, through all the noise, how do we hear a God who whispers? Why doesn’t God speak more loudly, to be heard above the hate, or better still – to silence it forever?
Today is the feast of St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, a religious sister who died in a concentration camp in Holland on August 9, 1942. She began life as Edith Stein, a Jewish atheist, philosopher, and professor. After her conversion in 1922, Stein spent 11 years writing, teaching and living as a witness to her Catholic faith before entering a Discalced Carmelite monastery in 1933.
