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Bishop Strickland laments Trump’s IVF support: We are ‘without a profoundly pro-life candidate’ – LifeSite

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(LifeSiteNews) — Bishop Emeritus of Tyler, Texas, Joseph Strickland, has said that President Donald Trump’s support for in-vitro fertilization has left voters without a truly pro-life candidate in the 2024 race for the White House. 

In two X posts issued one and two days after the former president made his stunning announcement in the swing state of Michigan, Strickland warned against the immorality of the practice while lamenting its implications.  

“IVF ignores God’s design and condemns many embryos to destruction. The bottom line is that IVF is one more example of playing God,” he said. “Biden is an atrocity, but Trump is wrong about IVF. So sad that we are left without a profoundly ProLife candidate.” 

Strickland followed up his remarks by sharing a post by Crisis Magazine editor-in-chief Eric Sammons. Sammons had argued that Catholics “cannot for any reason obtain or support IVF treatments” for three main reasons.  

“1) It separates procreation from the conjugal act, which undermines the sanctity and purpose of sexual relations. 2) It stores human embryos in freezers, which is an affront to human dignity. 3) It typically involves discarding ‘leftover’ embryos, which is direct murder,” he said. 

Strickland’s comments come amid intense debate between pro-life activists and conservative supporters of Trump. Lila Rose of Live Action has come under intense criticism by the latter after hinting that she may not vote for Trump due to his continued moderation on social issues.  

Catholic podcaster and author Taylor Marshall, who was previously involved in the group “Catholics for Trump” in 2020, expressed similar dismay at Trump’s about-face.  

“We Catholics are 100% against Trump taking our tax-payer money to fund IVF procedures! Somebody tell Trump that this is wrong.  Catholics (and many Protestants) will not support this. Extremely disappointing,” he said. 

Advocacy group CatholicVote has weighed in on the controversy as well. The group endorsed Trump for re-election earlier this year. 

“Kamala Harris poses a far greater threat [than Trump],” CatholicVote president Brian Burch said in a statement. “She gets both the means – and the ends – wrong. No Catholic can support her. That much is obvious. But Catholics also cannot write a blank check to Trump. Sometimes pushing back is needed. Today is such a day.” 

“Prudently tolerating problematic existing laws is one thing,” Burch continued, but “it’s entirely different to actively call for a change in law that would expand federal policy that involves an intrinsic evil, particularly those involving the destruction of innocent human lives.” 

“Gutting existing state laws that protect women and children, and forcing Americans to pay for IVF, which involves the destruction of countless living human embryos, is unacceptable. Trump is simply wrong that IVF is the answer. While he shares the goal of helping America bring more children into the world, he misunderstands how we should get there.” 

Bruch concluded that “lobbing criticism at the President who helped overturn Roe, cut taxpayer funding for abortion, and filled his administration with pro-life leaders may feel good. But we’re not interested in scoring points. We’re interested in moving the ball.  And that means working pragmatically with candidates and policymakers to achieve real progress. The fact remains, allowing Kamala Harris to win would be catastrophic.” 

LifeSite’s own editor-in-chief, John-Henry Westen, has said that Trump’s remarks were “heartbreaking” because by mandating insurance companies to cover IVF treatments he is forcing Christians to violate their conscience in a similar manner to President Barack Obama’s birth control mandate in the 2010s. 

“IVF is a measure which costs the lives of millions of children,” he said. “It’s horrific. We’re killing kids.” 

To learn more about why in-vitro fertilization is intrinsically evil, read this essay, “7 reasons why IVF is morally wrong and must be opposed,” by Michael Cook.  

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