Transhumanism 101: Vatican To Face Tough Questions Over What It Means To Be Male, Female, HUMAN!?
Thomas Horn
April 25, 2007
This week the Vatican's second-highest ranking doctrinal official called gay marriage "evil," adding that "parliaments of so-called civilized nations where laws contrary to the nature of the human being are being promulgated, such as the approval of marriage between people of the same sex ..."
The comment comes at a time when a highly controversial law is being considered in Italy that would give homosexual couples legal recognition. Groups opposed to the law are planning a national rally in Rome next month.
Religious organizations such as the Presbyterian and the United Church of Christ have gone the opposite direction of the Vatican, allowing ministers in their denominations to conduct domestic partnership ceremonies.
The debate over recognizing homosexual unions will undoubtedly continue in public opinion polls, but a related issue of unusual proportions is on the horizon and is certain to make resolutions by Vatican and similar councils interesting. It not only will involve changes in laws regarding "gender definition" as a result of sex-change operations, but a related subject, transhumanism, both of which will challenge the orthodox rendering of "the divine order."
Until now, people submitting to sex-reassignment remained legally defined as a man/woman regardless of physical enhancement or alteration. Legal definitions were based on existing reproduction limitations. Sex-change operations did not acquire necessary internal organs for procreation during the procedure and individuals continued to be defined by birth gender.
Such concepts are slowly changing. The catch phrase has gone from "sex reassignment surgery" to "gender reassignment surgery." The language is viewed by some as intentional. The goal is to change state and federal definitions of male and female to existing physical characteristics, rather than gender at the time of birth. Additionally, cloning and alternative conception and gestation methods are being developed that satisfy the legal requirements of genetic reproduction by sex-altered couples.
Over the next 10 years gender confusion could rapidly escalate through biotechnology. Transgenics and other forms of genetic engineering could alter humans by combining their genetic structure with synthetic or animal DNA, a process already occurring at the embryonic level in some countries. So-called animal-human chimeras are being created by researchers who claim the opportunity to study gene development and disease processes through biotechnology is important and will lead to advanced medical treatments such as organ development for human transplantation, called xenotransplantation.
Critics of genetic manipulation worry that the technology could spawn new diseases through breaching the species barriers. Nobody knows for sure what pestilence the mutations could unleash, and studies in genetically modified foods have produced mixed results and raised charges of organ damage in laboratory mice.
Others are concerned about more exotic ramifications. In addition to potential plagues, GM science is viewed by Vatican officials and similar institutions as an affront to "the divine order" where so-called "Pharm animals" are being produced whose molecular DNA has been altered to include human genes, designer babies are an emerging reality and where clones raised for food have already been approved by the American Food and Drug Administration.
Transgenics and other forms of life altering technology will move forward despite some early bad publicity, but when such sciences involve 'enhancing the human species,' the warning bells should start ringing for all reasonable people, not just the Vatican.
For people of faith, the question might be why the Creator required humans, animals, and plants to reproduce "after their own kind." Species integrity, including the idea of male and female was required by God. Was this because the alternative violates the 'divine order,' that it could open a Pandora's box to a molecular biological nightmare, or both?
Transgenics may indeed violate Biblical laws concerning bestiality [sex between humans and animals]. Leviticus 18:23 says it is 'confusion,' and the punishment for participating in such was death. The Hebrew word confusion (tebel) means a 'violation of nature or of God's divine order.'
Yet today, the Levitical code surpasses the physical act of intercourse and speaks to the issue of 'confusion' of the species through biotechnology. By this standard, transgenically altered humans would no longer be human at all. In fact, we don't know what they are. We cannot know because introducing animal genes into human DNA creates an unclassified mutation outside the 'divine order.' Thus even by advocates of biological enhancement these beings would be called transhumans and posthumans.
In a six-part radio series called "Conspiracy Theory: Special Edition" available for free download on the RaidersNewsNetwork.com site, one learns how molecular biologists classify individual genes by function yet how none of the scientists know for sure if a gene's coding will function the same way from one species to another. The series has been downloaded over 20,000 times already and warns that interspecies differences could effect gene protein interactions, altering hereditary traits for generations to come and ultimately producing animal characteristics within humans and visa versa, opening the gateway for a new Nephilim according to the series, the Old Testament creatures some believe were the first results of species mingling.
Will future church councils be forced to further amend bylaws to allow chimeric civil unions? The marriage of superhumans, posthumans, transhumans and "gods"?
The Vatican's position on gay marriage as "evil" is probably nothing compared to the issues to be faced in the next decade. The Nephilim Goliath and the rephaim below us are undoubtedly rolling over in their huge graves.
You can listen to "Conspiracy Theory: Special Edition" on the network's podcast page at http://www.raidersnewsnetwork.com
Thomas Horn is a well known radio personality and CEO of RaidersNewsNetwork.com and SurvivorMall.com. Over the last decade, he has authored several books and dozens of published articles. His works have been referred to by writers of the LA Times Syndicate, MSNBC, Christianity Today, WorldNetDaily, NewsWithViews, NewsMax, White House Correspondents and dozens of newsmagazines and press agencies around the globe. His latest book "The Ahriman Gate" fictionalizes biotechnology used to resurrect Biblical Nephilim as the fulfillment of prophecy.