In the June 2025 issue of America, senior editor J.D. Long García explored the struggles with infertility faced by many Catholic couples attempting to conceive. Our readers responded with their own thoughts about the church’s teaching on in vitro fertilization and related topics.
After invention, there is compulsion. When science comes up with a way to do something that was once thought impossible, there is a feeling that everyone ought to make use of it. Doctors may not be pressuring all patients to pursue in vitro fertilization, but there is a cultural attitude that says, “Well, there’s an obvious solution to your problem.” It’s the church’s job to help us sort through these developments and to hold them up against the Gospel in making moral judgments. Often, it can be hard to accept its teaching, and we turn away.
That’s why we need to pay close attention to the places in Mr. García’s story where couples said that in their suffering, isolation and confusion they didn’t find support from their parishes. Online support groups are great, and they help to fill a gap. But if anyone is going to have the strength to go against the overwhelming tide of popular scientific thought, they’re going to need the closeness of a parish family that really knows and cares about each other.
Laura Fratus
If the church teaches that the important part of marriage is to bring children into the world—or, worse yet, to give your husband a child—something is drastically wrong. If the church would teach that having a child is a gift from God if you are physically able, in addition to walking your journey together with your spouse in seeking God, it seems there would be a lot less anxiety over whether or not you are able to be a biological parent.
I do pray for those who are unable to conceive, but no matter how they are conceived really, it always is up to God. The whole process is a conundrum, filled with the possibility of heartbreak. Perhaps a question to reflect on is, “What else can we, as a couple trying to walk in the footsteps of Jesus, give birth to that may be a benefit to the world?”
Mary Nausadis
The Catholic Church opposes I.V.F. because it separates procreation from the marital act. Life is a sacred gift from God, not a right, and children should be conceived through the conjugal love of their parents. It is in listening to and following Catholic teaching that women and men become what God wills them to be.
Amelia Chavez
Did you know you can adopt embryos from another family and treat them as your own children? This is what my wife and I did, and now we have a 6-month-old baby girl who is one of the best things that has ever happened to us.
Brian Jens
Dr. [Marguerite] Duane’s assertion that “infertility is not a disease” undermines the decades of advocacy efforts by patients and health care providers alike to get insurers to recognize infertility as a disease and provide insurance coverage for infertility diagnosis and treatment.
In addition, the notion that fertility doctors don’t treat underlying causes of infertility is insulting to those of us who provide holistic fertility care, including I.V.F. Now, could fertility physicians be more aware and sensitive to our Catholic patients’ specific needs? Sure. We should not roll our eyes when couples or patients ask to limit the number of eggs fertilized or decline preimplantation genetic testing. As long as patients understand that this may limit their success rates, accommodating these requests is consistent with patient autonomy.
Paula Amato
As a medical writer for 40 years, I have done deep dives on both the “assisted reproductive technology” industry and the Catholic-approved alternatives. There is value and also dishonesty on both sides. The I.V.F. business is acknowledged as a “Wild West” even by insiders; it spins out promises to desperate couples (as Mr. García’s article notes) despite abysmal success rates to the older couples most likely to seek their services. It also makes no effort to track the long-term consequences on women’s bodies of unnatural and stressful procedures like ovarian stimulation.
“Natural” alternatives also warrant skepticism. Their approach, at least for baseline evaluation and management of infertility, is brilliant, and should be standard. However, there is a cultish, stand-apart atmosphere around NaPro [natural procreative technology]. Their efficacy statistics are also suspect, and their data is not robust.
There is no secret sauce or magic cure for infertility beyond intense monitoring and testing, counseling, and treatment for fixable problems.
Brenda Becker
