Final tearful plea as embryo fight fails.
A WOMAN left infertile after cancer therapy yesterday made a final plea to her ex-partner for permission to use frozen embryos, after her five-year legal fight ended in failure.
Natallie Evans broke down in tears as she spoke of her anguish at the prospect of never becoming a mother using her own embryos.
The 35-year-old appealed to her former partner, Howard Johnston, to change his mind and allow her to use the eggs he fertilised in 2001. The embryos are due to be destroyed within 28 days, after the European Court of Human Rights yesterday ruled against her.
She said: "I am distraught at the court's decision. It is very hard for me to accept the embryos will now be destroyed and I will never become a mother.
"Whilst a lot has been said about the rights of Mr Johnston, I was fighting for my right to be a mother and the rights of the embryos.
"I would ask Howard to consider whether he could permit me to have the children I long for, and which he was happy to consent to when the procedure took place to create these embryos."
Asked if she would make a last-ditch appeal to Mr Johnston, she said: "I have pleaded with him before and it has not worked; now there is nothing I can say to him.
"Last time I pleaded with him and asked him, 'Please rethink', and he didn't. He said nothing is going to change his mind."
Mr Johnston, 30, said he and Ms Evans had discussed other ways she might become a mother when the couple were undergoing IVF.
He said: "Being a mother is still an option to [Ms Evans] that does not involve me.
"I had hoped that commonsense and the legal framework would hold up. I'm grateful and relieved that it has done so."
Mr Johnston added:
"I don't think I have acted selfishly. If you turn this on its head and if I was infertile with a new partner, I wouldn't expect Natallie consenting to me using them."
He said he had not spoken to Ms Evans, but acknowledged she had been through an "emotional rollercoaster".
He added: "I've had every sympathy with Natallie from the first moment I knew I didn't want to have children with her, and it's the same now.
"I don't regret meeting her. At one point in our relationship, she was Miss Right."
The human rights judges said the central dilemma was an "entirely irreconcilable" conflict between Natallie and her former boyfriend. The issues raised by the case were "undoubtedly of a morally and ethically delicate nature", said the judgment.
There is currently no standard European approach to questions in the field of IVF.
The UK is not alone in permitting the storage of embryos and giving both partners the right to withdraw consent up to the moment of implantation, but different rules and practices are applied elsewhere in Europe.
There is no European consensus about the stage in IVF treatment when the sperm donor's consent becomes irrevocable.
LAST HOPE OF MOTHERHOOD
Q: Why did Natallie Evans have the embryos frozen?
A: In 2001, her ovaries were removed after pre-cancerous cells were found. The treatment would leave her infertile, so she first underwent in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) with then partner Howard Johnston. His sperm fertilised her eggs and six embryos were frozen - her only chance of having her own children.
Q: What is the process for IVF from frozen embryos?
A: Embryos are frozen in liquid nitrogen. They can be stored for up to five years.
There's a great deal here. Let me boil it down for you.
First, human life begins at conception. If that is not the starting point, then what is? Birth?
Births occur naturally after pregnancies of different lengths of time; for example, nine months and one week vs. eight months and three weeks. Additionally, the labor can be induced medically, and operational procedures can result in a birth without labor. No matter how it happens, the baby can be expected to come out alive and living. That means the baby was alive and living inside "Mom". Consequently, to suggest that "birth" is when human life begins is quite arbitrary; it just doesn't pass the idiot test.
Even more foolishly has it been argued that humal life begins when a person is sentient, conscious, self-aware. This is extremely sinister, since self-awareness is hard to prove. A computer could be programmed to appear to be self-aware. Conversely, a person who, for whatever reason, has difficulty sensing surroundings or communicating about them, could appear to be not self-aware.
For that matter, how do I know that you are self-aware?
If sentience is the yardstick by which human life is measured, then there is no such thing as murder, and the door is wide open for a madman to decide that no one exists besides himself, and decide to abort all of humanity.
Human life begins at conception. That is when our Creator establishes the connection between an other-worldly spirit or soul and the this-worldly biological entity of a fertilized egg.
Once that is understood, then it logically and obviously follows that abortion is murder. So is the destruction of these "fertilized embryos".
When Mr. Johnston agreed to fertilize Ms. Evans' eggs, he became a father to her offspring. Those children are now held in limbo under what appears to be a death sentence.
It's amazing what science can do.
2:1 Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you,
2:2 not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of Christ had come.
2:3 Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition,
2:4 who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.
[...]
2:9 The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders,
2:10 and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.
2:11 And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie,
2:12 that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
(from the Second Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Thessalonians)
Humanity has eaten of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Now, that knowledge is advancing far, far beyond our "wisdom" to deal with it, and, instead of serving us, we have come to serve it.
It is time to eat of the Tree of Wisdom, Which is God.
26:26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, "Take, eat; this is My body."
26:27 Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you.
26:28 For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.
26:29 But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom."
(From the Gospel according to Matthew)
The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is the Tree of Death. The Tree of Wisdom, the Tree of Knowledge of the Lord, is the Tree of Life, Which stands in the middle of the Garden of Eden.
23:39 Then one of the criminals who were hanged blasphemed Him, saying, "If You are the Christ, save Yourself and us."
23:40 But the other, answering, rebuked him, saying, "Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation?
23:41 And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done nothing wrong."
23:42 Then he said to Jesus, "Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom."
23:43 And Jesus said to him, "Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise."
(From the Gospel according to Luke)
Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth!
Psalm 46:10
"Lord, remember when You come into Your Kingdom."
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