Cloning is the medical process where doctors take the genes or chromosomes from one person and ‘grow’ a new person from them. The new person could be considered as an identical twin to the original – it’s just that their birthdays might be 30 years apart! They do not share anything else with the original person except their genes. So they will look identical and have the same characteristics like their voice or body build. But as they grow up, their environment can lead them to become quite a different person.

Just like identical twins, God gives each one their own unique human spirit so they are individuals. Just like identical twins, a clone can be baptised and live a full spiritual life – they are a normal person in every way, except for the fact that there is someone else in the world who has exactly the same genes.

The problem with cloning is not with person who is cloned, but with the people who do the cloning. There are a number of issues involved here:

a. Cloning (and IVF or test tube babies) normally involves creating a number of embryos which are then frozen and stored. The doctors then take them out, one or two at a time and implant them in a mother’s womb. If they fail, they just go and get a couple more from the freeze and try again till they succeed in causing a pregnancy. If they succeed, they eventually throw away the unneeded embryos or (worse still) use them for experiments. But an embryo is a human being! From the moment it forms, it has its God-given spirit and is considered a new individual. To destroy an unused embryo is to murder an innocent human being.
b. In a sense, doctors who clone people are sort of ‘playing God’, deciding who should live and who should die. This comes from the pride of humanity and is similar to the mindset of the people who built the tower of Babel!
c. There is a very real danger that such technology may be misused in the future. “The Boys from Brazil� was an old movie about some people who cloned a whole army of Adolf Hitlers, with frightening results! What if some future government should decide that no one but geniuses and athletes should be born, and just clone a group while preventing anyone else from having babies!
d. There are many psychological problems that can come from cloning. Who is my father? Who is my mother? Is it the one who gave birth to me or the one who donated my genes? How should such a child be brought up? Etc. etc.
e. At present, there are still many, many problems with the cloning process. Animals that are cloned are always weaker and sicker than their normal peers are and they tend to die much earlier. It is almost certain that the same problems will be face if anyone stars cloning humans. To overcome them will need years of research, trial and error. But is it right to experiment on humans in this way?

There are so many ethical and moral issues that no one has found an answer for. Even most atheist scientists believe it is wrong to try to clone humans until we sort these questions out. The next few decades will be quite interesting!