I was listening to a Christian call-in show and someone raised the subject of genetic engineering. That made my mind jump to cloning, and the ethical implications that come with it. The subject is slowly becoming harder to ignore. Every month or so in the news you see or hear a story of scientific or technological advancement in the field of cloning. If you didn't hear about it, the first human embryo was "cloned" in 2001.

The competition among a few groups of scientists to produce the first viable human clone. Ethically speaking, how do Christianity and cloning ummmm, get along? Do we accept it as something moral or reject the practice out-of-hand as something wrong in the eyes of God. We can't exactly go to the Bible and do a word search on "cloning" or "clones." We can however, look to the Bible for foundational answers to questions like this which seem to present a modern, moral impassability.

For example, Genesis 1:27 tells us; "God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." This tells us that every human being was planned and made by God to be a reflection if you will, of God. In Colossians 1:16 we are also told that everything was created by God, for God. Proverbs 16:4 says that "all things were created by Him and for Him." That means us, too.

You can find just about any reason you can think of being given to the media that makes cloning sound necessary, including the want to harvest stem cells for genetic research, or even to create usable, transplantable organs for those on a waiting list. And yes, I have heard some say that they are okay with the idea of harvesting organs from a living, breathing clone. I have a huge problem with that. Our time and place on this earth are supposed to be ordered by the Lord. Those who do not know Jesus, or that do not trust Him with their lives are out of His will. It shouldn't then be surprising that they would try to take matters into their own hands where creation is concerned.

God has a divine plan for the family. Every kid is a one of a kind, unique person in His eyes, and we, each one of us has the amazing opportunity in this life to know God personally. We were all born from a mother and a father. I don't care if one is termed a, "sperm donor." The reproductive processes that God provided for men are still involved. The first children on this planet were born of a man and a woman whom God created. Cloning would produce a baby that would have only the genetic material from a single person. It would be a child "engineered" in a way that flies in the face of God's plan for the family. It seems to me that men are trying to usurp somehow, God's place as the Creator.

God designed man in His image, to be compatible with Him for fellowship with Him and to worship Him. Cloning seems to be the desire by men to duplicate a unique creation of God as a product, to be marketed for man's worldly purposes.

If we're here long enough, a "viable" human clone may be created. What do we do then? Will the process introduce some horrific new virus as product of man's meddling in the affairs of God's creation? I've seen enough reality and read enough sci-fi to believe that's an entirely possible scenario. Look at HIV AIDS, a terrible disease that is widely believed to have been a bi-product of experimental polio vaccinations given to African people in the Belgian Congo.

Will he/she still be a part of God's creation? I think so. It would be impossible to produce a clone without what God created first. Will he/she have a soul? I think so, and I think that person would have sin and need a Savior too.