Catholics are called to walk compassionately with couples experiencing the heartache of infertility, and to help them access “life-giving and restorative options” to conceive a child, while resisting the appeal of in vitro fertilization, or IVF, which “remains replete with moral difficulties,” Bishop Michael F. Burbidge wrote in a new pastoral letter.
The diocese published the letter, titled “The Christian Family, In Vitro Fertilization, and Heroic Witness to True Love,” in English and Spanish Jan. 22. It includes a list of resources where readers can find more information and two dozen endnote citations, including papal encyclicals, resources from the Vatican and U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and various articles.
IVF is the combination of male sperm and female eggs in a clinical setting to create embryos for implantation in a woman’s uterus or freezing in storage for future use. Public opinion surveys indicate broad support for the process, with a June 2024 Gallup poll finding that 82 percent of Americans consider it morally acceptable. Even among respondents who attend weekly religious services, 63 percent said IVF was acceptable and just 25 percent labeled it morally wrong.
Statistics like this reflect a lack of understanding of the “why” behind church teaching on the sensitive topic, according to Bishop Burbidge. In an interview, he mentioned two primary reasons for issuing the letter now.
“More and more pastors share with me how this is becoming a very frequent topic in their own counseling with parishioners,” he said. “And also, we’re seeing that political parties are weighing in on the issue.”
“I think the thing that penetrates a lot of hearts is when people hear that every successful IVF procedure results in a living child with many missing siblings,” Bishop Burbidge added. “This is a hard reality, but it’s one we must face.”
He also has something to say to that living child.
“You’re a human person, and every person has that dignity as a child of God,” he said. “There is a difference between the person and the procedure.”
In his letter, Bishop Burbidge, who completed his term as chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities in November, addresses the ethical hazards of IVF; highlights acceptable infertility treatments; and encourages government officials to enact new regulations on IVF rather than promote its more widespread use.
“IVF both creates life and destroys life,” Bishop Burbidge writes, noting that since its advent nearly 50 years ago, an estimated 12 million children were born through the process, while tens of millions of other embryos were discarded, subjected to medical experimentation or frozen indefinitely.
Even if the destruction of embryonic children was avoidable, “IVF would remain unjust and morally wrong,” Bishop Burbidge wrote, because it replaces rather than assists the marital procreative act, citing Pope Francis’ warnings against technology threatening “the human being in his or her irreducible specificity.”
As an alternative, the letter recommends NaProTechnology, or Natural Procreative Technology, which it defines as “a women’s health science that monitors and maintains a woman’s reproductive and gynecological health, provides medical and surgical treatments that
work cooperatively with the procreative and gynecologic systems” to support child conception. If such treatments are ultimately unsuccessful, Bishop Burbidge suggests couples consider adoption or embracing “spiritual motherhood and fatherhood” in the community to “make their marriage life-giving.”
An Alabama Supreme Court ruling last year that IVF-produced embryos are considered children under state law brought national attention to the topic, which became an election-year issue. According to the Virginia Catholic Conference’s 2024 presidential candidate comparison, both then-Vice President Kamala Harris and President Donald Trump expressed support for IVF, with Trump saying his administration would pay for or mandate that health insurance companies cover it.
Turning to the public square, Bishop Burbidge wrote that the government should not pay for or promote IVF, but instead increase oversight and regulation of the industry.
A federal IVF entitlement or mandate “over time would invite abuse, domination, and even subjugation to the raw power of the state.” Comparing it to the Affordable Care Act’s contraception coverage mandate, he wrote that an IVF mandate “would inevitably result in the widespread coercion of healthcare workers and the evisceration of their professional right of conscience,” adding that it “represents a grave threat not only to human rights, but to the future liberty of a free people.”
Providing examples of European nations such as Italy, Germany and Spain, which limit how many embryonic children may be created per IVF procedure, Bishop Burbidge said elected officials should adopt similar limits, and require informed consent disclosures notifying prospective parents of “the ethical and medical consequences of the IVF process and effective life-affirming alternatives.”
Bishop Burbidge concludes the letter by asking the faithful to “pray for those married couples experiencing infertility,” and “engage in greater thoughtful and rational reflection on the costs associated with the IVF industry, which are evident by human reason.”
“The Christian family has a powerful spiritual ally in the Church, whose members are called to walk with those couples experiencing infertility, offering them life-giving and restorative options, while also addressing those moral injustices that would make impossible our experience of true happiness.”
Find out more
Read the pastoral letter here, or listen to a special edition of the “Walk Humbly Podcast,” on which Bishop Burbidge reads the full letter here.
