How Baptists and the G.O.P. Took Different Paths on I.V.F.

June 17, 2024

(New York Times) – Dr. Walker, 39, first publicly opposed in vitro fertilization five years ago, co-writing an article titled “Breaking Evangelicalism’s Silence on IVF” for the website of the evangelical organization the Gospel Coalition, which ran a companion essay by a high-profile theologian defending the procedure.

His friend and mentor R. Albert Mohler Jr., the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, where Dr. Walker teaches, has been writing about the ethics of “the reproductive revolution” for decades. Dr. Walker said he received a flurry of “nasty” emails after his article, including some from Christians, but that the hubbub soon subsided.

But Alabama thrust the issue into the national consciousness. Republican legislators in the state moved quickly to preserve access to the procedure. Among many anti-abortion activists and ethicists, however, the court ruling reflected a moral reality: If life begins at conception, then a procedure that regularly produces excess fertilized eggs that will eventually be destroyed or left frozen indefinitely is a moral calamity comparable to an abortion. (Read More)