The National Pro-life Religious Council
109 Second Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002
202-546-8329

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Rev. Rob Schenck 703-447-7686

NATIONAL PRO-LIFE RELIGIOUS COUNCIL DENOUNCES CREATION OF EMBRYOS FOR SCIENCE

Washington, DC, June 17--Leaders from Catholic and Protestant religious groups today strongly denounced recent revelations by researchers at Eastern Virginia Medical School’s Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine in Norfolk, VA, that created human embryos from donated eggs and sperm for the sole purpose of harvesting their stem cells and the Advanced Cell Technology company in Worcester, MA, for starting a series of experiments aimed at creating cloned human embryos from which their stem cells will be derived.

"After studying the facts in this matter, we are united in denouncing the practice of creating and manipulating human embryos, in the strongest possible terms," said the Reverend Rob Schenck, president of the National Pro-life Religious Council (NPRC). "This practice is absolutely Hitleresque."

"Destroying human beings to help humanity is self-contradictory," said Fr. Frank Pavone, one of America's best known pro-life advocates and director of the 40,000 member Priests for Life. Fr. Pavone is a member of the NPRC board of directors. The NPRC board of directors includes representatives from organizations that are Baptist, Catholic, Conservative Christian, Episcopal, Evangelical, Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, Reformed, and United Church of Christ.

The NPRC is calling on its constituent groups to write their representatives and senators urging immediate legislation to stop human embryo creation for experimentation and human embryo cloning.

Spokespersons from the NPRC are available for further comment.