Jerome Lejeune and the dignity of human Life

This month, we also celebrate the birthday of Jérôme Lejeune (13 June 1926 – 3 April 1994), a French pediatrician and geneticist, best known for discovering the link of diseases to chromosome abnormalities, especially Down Syndrome to an extra copy of chromosome 21; a discovery he made in 1958. In the next years, he observed with greatest concern that his discovery of trisomy 21 would lead to a medical holocaust, national health systems giving huge funds to track down and eliminate these children before they could be born. As Catholic and physician, he could not agree. In 1969, after receiving the Allan prize granted by the American Society of Human Genetics, Lejeune gave a talk to his colleagues which concluded by explicitly questioning the morality of abortion, an unpopular viewpoint in the profession. In a letter to his wife, Lejeune wrote “today, I lost my Nobel prize in Medicine”. He later became President of the newly founded Pontifical Academy for Life and carefully drafted its bylaws and the oath of the Servants of Life that each member of the Academy must take.

Update 03 April 2024: Dr. Lejeune first encountered Cardinal Karol Wojtyla in Krakow in 1975 during a conference focused on the beginning of life. Several years later, Cardinal Wojtyla was elected Pope John Paul II. Throughout his papacy, their paths crossed on multiple occasions in Rome. Notably, Dr. Lejeune and his wife shared a meal with the Pontiff on 13 May 1981, when an attempt was made on the Pope’s life. Following the scientist’s passing, John Paul II paid homage to his legacy by visiting his gravesite in 1997 during World Youth Day in Paris.

Sources: Wikipedia, MercatorNet, comments to our FB post

Scientists reflect on their faith (V)

Francis S. Collins is an American physician-geneticist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He is director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, United States. He is is an Evangelical Christian and an important voice in the dialogue between science and faith. He founded and served as president of The BioLogos Foundation and is a member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences since 2009.

Theodosius Dhobzansky: “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution”

Theodosius Dobzhansky (24 January  1900 in Nemirov, Ukraine –18 December 1975, Riverside, CA)  was a biologist, geneticist, philosopher of biology and Orthodox Christian. He was among the major 20th century scientists who studied evolutionary biology.

He authored the important work “Genetics and the Origin of Species” (1937), in which he synthesized Mendel’s genetics with Darwin’s evolutionary theory. His philosophical thought tended toward the idea of human nature as subject to transformations and mutations, which he used to challenge the racial outlooks of his time (the term “nature,” as used here, does not primarily refer to the metaphysical nucleus that individuates the human being as person).

Dobzhansky’s philosophical reflections on evolution are developed from the point of view of a believer, a point of view to which he remained, albeit discreetly, faithful. His work, “The Biology of Ultimate Concern”, published in 1967 a few years before his death, testifies to this. Here he said:

“Christianity is, among the great religions, most explicitly history-conscious, and in this sense evolutionistic. It affirms that the history of mankind and of the world is not merely an illusion or an irremediable evil. History is the vehicle of creation. The world had a beginning, and will have an end.”

In his famous article: “Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution”, he said:

“Does the evolutionary doctrine clash with religious faith? It does not. It is a blunder to mistake the Holy Scriptures for elementary textbooks of astronomy, geology, biology, and anthropology.”