“Did they find what they were looking for?”
“Apparently, yes. My notes indicate they were allowed to make copies of some of the records. Please understand, Father Murphy, the original events took place years before my tenure began here. The record indicates that a number of attempts at artificial conception were made by a doctor attached to the center—one who is now dead, by the way.”
“When you say artificial conception, are you referring to in-vitro fertilization?” Steve asked as a test, knowing that if the answer were yes, the director would be attempting to cover up the cloning.
“No,” the director answered honestly. “The doctor was a researcher, perhaps one of the first to experiment with human cloning. You might say he was way ahead of his time. There is evidence that he performed a number of cloning and genetic experiments while here.”
“I understand,” Steve said, “but I’m really only interested in the records pertaining to me and my family. With your permission, I would like to review those.”
*****
A short time later, Steve was sitting at a desk in a small study adjoining the director’s office, reviewing the file that detailed numerous attempts at cloning by a scientist at the center. A file titled: Larkin-Murphy, detailed the dozen or so cloning attempts performed on Steve’s mother. But the faded documents were so riddled with medical jargon and abbreviations, Steve found he understood little about the experiments. He realized how naive he had been when he thought he would simply drive up to the center, look over the information, digest its full import and return home.
After a time, Doctor O’Neill entered the study. “How are you doing?” he asked. “Getting a clear picture are you?”
“Not really,” Steve replied in a tone of disgust. “In fact I understand little of what I’m reading. These accursed documents seem more intended to obscure than reveal what happened.”
“The priest who came up here had similar difficulties,” the director said smiling. “I am willing to explain the protocols to you the way I had to explain them to him if you like.”
“Please do,” Steve replied, dropping the stack of papers on the desk, completely frustrated.
Doctor O’Neill took a seat facing Steve. “As you know, certain types of cloning have become commonplace. For example, the world now has dairy farms with high output cloned cows and cloned pigs that produce lean, very low fat cuts of pork, etc.”
“Yes, I know all that,” Steve said, “but what I don’t really understand is why cloning was considered such a breakthrough.”
“You’re referring to the fairly recent adult mammal cloning like Dolly, for example. The one that was hyped in the media.”
“Yes.”
“Before I explain the breakthrough, let me first raise an important question that I thought you would ask. In fact, I’m surprised you haven’t. As you well know, Dolly was only cloned in 1997; really not that many years ago. You are, roughly about fifty. Correct?”
“Almost fifty.”
“Then how could you possibly be a clone? To explain this, let me first say that something like cloning has been known and used in botany and agriculture for many, many years. Only it wasn’t referred to as cloning. The clone went under the name: variety. Completely new plants were grown from tiny sprigs. Cells also have been successfully cloned for many years. Let me ask a related question: How long ago was DNA first identified?”
“Ten years?”
“The structure of DNA was identified in 1953. Now I admit that our experimenter was far ahead of his time, but the records show he successfully cloned a few humans way back in the sixties. Although you are aware of your status—if you want to call it that, where the others are and whether they are aware of their origin is unknown.”
Steve was not sure he believed what he was hearing. “So why didn’t all this come to light before?”
“Quite honestly, it was considered so ethically, morally wrong, it was stopped almost immediately and covered up. And now, of course, many countries have declared that human cloning is illegal.”
“Biological procedures,” the director continued, “have evolved in the last few years. Embryonic stem cells, for example, are not specialized which gives them potentially wide application, but going back, concerning all the hullabaloo about Dolly—apparently the first adult animal to be cloned—let me explain that. The touted breakthrough was in the production of newborns cloned from adults. Let’s get down to the basics: a fertilized human egg contains all of the genetic material needed to form a complete human being. However, as the cells multiply, they become specialized—some become muscle cells, some nerve cells, some can only produce skin tissue, others connective tissue, and so forth. Thus it was originally thought impossible to clone cells from a fully grown adult because the cells had become specialized and could not produce a complete being. The breakthrough in cloning began with a mature specialized cell from an adult which had its ‘clock’ reset back to the beginning, so that it was capable of producing a complete human being—arms, legs, skin, brain, liver...the works. Different techniques have been discovered to reset the clock which I won’t go into now. A single adult cell can then be implanted in a woman’s egg from which the genetic material has been removed. The egg is then replanted, if you will, and the woman comes to term with a cloned newborn—an identical human copy of the original.”
The director stood up leading Steve to think the interview was over, but the huge lumberjack of a man began pacing the floor. He said it helped him think. “There is not much point to early-stage cloning, you understand, that is, in the production of fetal twins, but tremendous potential in cloning of adults, both human and animal. For example, if an adult animal was the last of its endangered species, a few cells could be removed and the animal cloned over and over again. If a particular cow was found to give a supernormal amount of milk, it could be cloned and a complete dairy stocked with its high-output ‘offspring’. Exact copies of famous scientists and world leaders could be produced and presumably produced in quantity. You see, although there are obviously ethical objections to cloning of humans in particular, the benefits could be fantastic.”
“I understand that, but there are some things about the process as it relates to me which I don’t understand.”
“Such as?”
“Well, like the word ‘chimera’ which seems to appear here and there in these reports. What the devil is a chimera?”
“Ah yes, you have put your finger on what is most likely the real problem. As I recall, chimera seemed to be the principal concern of the Murphy cloning that most interested the priest from the archdiocese. Frankly, he seemed far more concerned about the chimerian aspects than the cloning itself. Familiar with Greek mythology? Perhaps not. Very simply, ‘chimera’ refers to a mixture of species. For example, a mixed breed of a human and an animal, or a mixture of several animal species. On the one hand, it might be a beast with a human head. Conversely, it could be a human with an animal head. You understand of course, that these examples are mythological, not actual. However, production of certain kinds of chimeras has been performed a number of times. Perhaps you’ve heard of animals like the genetically manipulated sheep-goats. They are not sheep; they are not goats. They are a new species: sheep-goats, although I feel a new name would be appropriate rather than constantly referring back to the original mix.”
Steve’s face was ashen. “Are you telling me that cloning experiments were conducted here mixing species, and in my case, human and animal cells?”
“Afraid so, but please remember that all of this took place some sixty years ago, or thereabouts. No one currently employed at the center is responsible. In addition, we like to feel that any combination of human and animal genetic material was very limited and was terminated almost as soon as it started. I have some records that suggest the director at the time put a stop to it as soon as he became aware of it.”
“But it did happen,” Steve said laconically, his white-knuckled hand
s gripping the edge of the desk. “And from the little that I know on this subject, if a heart valve from a pig were placed in a human, as has been done many times in surgery, it is clear that the valve implant doesn’t make the person any less a human. But in a case where the cells of different species are mixed at the very beginning, will the being produced be categorized as an animal or a human? And if as you say, it is a mixed breed, how can we tell how much of this thing that results is human and how much animal?”
“We really can’t,” the director said solemnly. “Even if only a few cells of an animal, say a primate, were added, no one knows whether the being produced would have a proportionate response; that is, would a human egg with ninety percent human cells produce a ninety percent human? Or, might the primate cells, perhaps genetically “stronger,” if you will, eventually produce a disproportionate response?”
“Meaning?” Steve asked angrily.
“Meaning...” the director responded, sympathetic but growing wary of his visitor’s violent reaction and the potential for a lawsuit, “...meaning that the human so produced might become less human and more animal as it matured.”
“You are admitting,” Steve said, rising to his feet with hands trembling, “that animal cells were added to the ‘soup’ that was then implanted in my mother.”
“Why yes. Remember the record is not complete but it does refer to a chimera. I can’t deny that.”
“What animal, for God’s sake?” Steve almost shouted as he stood glaring down at the director.
“That’s one question I can’t answer, because the last two pages of the report on the Murphy woman have been lost. Believe me, I searched long and hard for them in the archives, but they just weren’t there. We don’t know what animal, and we don’t know how much of the animal genetic material was mixed in. But my best guess is that he used cells from a primate like a baboon or a chimp. Baboons, as you may know, are probably the closest primate species to humans.”
“Well, can you tell me this: why did the procedure have to mix in animal cells? What was the point? Merely to see what monstrosity might turn out?”
The director glared at Steve. “Please don’t assume that scientists are necessarily callous. The notes tell me that your family has had a long term genetic medical condition—Lou Gehrig’s disease. I suspect the scientist who did the cloning was trying to prevent the disease from occurring in the clone. Humans get Lou Gehrig’s disease but the scientist may have believed that primates do not. So, you see, the scientist’s intentions could have been beneficial. A genetic manipulation to benefit the human—it’s done every day now.”
“There is also another reason that seems to make sense,” the director continued. “The doctor performing the experiments wrote that the age of a newborn adult clone was uncertain. Would it actually be a newborn—with the expectation of a long life, or might it be the age of the adult who donated the cells? This is an important issue in cloning, you understand. If, for example, you cloned an aging scientist with a life expectancy of say another ten or fifteen years, the ‘newborn’ clone might die in ten or fifteen years. It might not live a day longer than the original. I am uncertain of course, as I said before, but I would suspect that the original experimenter took care to use cells from a young animal as further insurance that the clone would have a full life span. Makes sense, doesn’t it?”
“In some cockeyed way, yes. How long do baboons live, by the way?” Steve asked bitterly.
Seeking to end the session which had degenerated into an argument, Doctor O’Neill rose and walked back into his office. After the director left the room, Steve sat for a long time in stunned silence. He had first thought the Archdiocese of Washington was after him, intending to get him out of the priesthood when they found out he was a clone. Now he knew the problem was far more serious. Trembling, he looked down at his arms. Every hair seemed to tell some kind of story. He thought about the dark stubble on his face. If, in fact, he was a chimera, how much of him was human, how much animal? And, if so, what breed of animal? Was he unique or were there other human-animal chimeras around?
It occurred to him that some present-day basketball players in the NBA, some approaching eight feet tall, might well be chimeras. The three-hundred-and-fifty-pound pro football players might also have been produced as clones with some type of primate cells in the soup. Of course, all of that was strictly outlawed, so it couldn’t be—or could it?
Certainly an Olympic swimmer cloned with webbed feet or gills, would have been recognized immediately as such and disqualified, but a somewhat taller basketball player or somewhat heavier football player—when the trend had for a long time been in the direction of taller and heavier, might not have raised suspicions, or if it did, might have been almost impossible to prove. And it was obvious that big money was at stake.
The only thing that kept Steve from total despair as he drove back to New Hampshire was the admonition he had learned years before in the seminary: uncontrolled despair was a grave sin because it negated God’s love. It was an abandonment of a person’s relationship with God. It renounced His mercy and the promise of everlasting life. However, in this case, he thought dourly, maybe a part-human creature has a somewhat legitimate right to despair.
26
It was early fall in New Hampshire. The summer tourists were gone; the children were all back in school. Gone from Pine River Pond were the speedboats, party boats, canoes, and jet skis. The pond was ringed with brilliant fall colors that supplanted the green of summer. Days were balmy, the nights cool, the air filled with the pine-scent of fall. Steve was finishing his fourth month at St. Mary’s. Although things were going well and attendance at Mass was good, he was troubled by the continued absence of Henrietta and a number of the women in her circle.
One evening, he planned a visit to Henrietta’s to coincide with the ending of her Saturday evening ‘Mass’. He stood outside in the shadows on the front porch leaning against a pillar for a few minutes and finally heard voices inside growing louder as the women approached the front door. Stepping up, he tapped lightly on the door. When someone inside opened it, he saw five women standing in the entrance hall getting ready to leave. Henrietta was giving each one a hug in turn.
“Good evening, Ladies,” Steve said smiling warmly as he stepped inside. “Isn’t it a lovely evening? Can I count on seeing all of you at Sunday Mass tomorrow morning?” But despite his attempt at a simple pleasantry, there was no reply as the women filed past him without so much as glancing in his direction.
Steve, somewhat unnerved, decided they might be embarrassed rather than rude as he watched them walk down the street. He turned to Henrietta. “Good heavens, what have I done?” he asked smiling, trying to make light of the situation.
Henrietta was in no mood for levity. “Why are you here?” she asked with an angry glare. “And why does it happen you come precisely as we are finishing our evening service?”
“You mean your evening ‘Mass’, don’t you?”
“Yes, it was a Mass,” Henrietta said guardedly. “And I’m sure you don’t approve. I hear you might be taking action to have us excommunicated.”
“No, that’s not true. I never said I was going to try to excommunicate anyone. That’s the pope’s role, not mine.”
“But you are the instrument of the pope.”
“That’s correct, but let me put it this way—you’re kidding yourselves if you think your Masses are real—if they have any real meaning. But, I’m curious. I could understand your difficulty when there was no priest available, although even then, you could always go to the church in Wolfeboro which is not very far away. So, I suspect there has been more going on here than simply the absence of a priest in Wakefield.”
“You’re right, Father. I’ll tell you straight out. At first, when priests stopped coming around here, many of us piled into cars and drove to Wolfeboro. Then some of us began reading the encyclical letters of Pope John Paul II especially as regards the ordination of wom
en, which he strenuously denounced claiming that women have not been created in the image of Christ. According to the pope, only men qualify because they are males like Christ. They supposedly look like Christ, although no one in this world has any idea as to what Christ really looked like. I suspect he looked like a bearded Jewish carpenter. Show me a bearded Jewish carpenter priest and I’ll believe he looks like Christ. And so, women have been permanently excluded from one of the sacraments—Holy Orders. And this then excludes them from being able to perform any of the other sacraments for the faithful like saying Mass, hearing confessions, administering Extreme Unction. And even being able to come in from the sidelines to attain a position of authority in the church. When you really think about it, the premise on which all of this is based adds up to pretty thin stuff. And, we believe, the product of a male-dominated church.”
“Henrietta, I agree. Does that surprise you? And I can’t explain why things should be this way, but the fact is...they are. If we are to be part of the Holy Roman Catholic Church we are bound to follow the dictums of the pope whether we like them or not and really whether we think they are right or not.”
“Fine Father, but consider this: At the Last Supper, when Christ consecrated the bread and wine, he said, ‘When two or more of you are gathered together, do this in memory of me.’” Henrietta added acidly, “Christ did not say: ‘When two priests or bishops get together, or simply two men, do this in memory of me’.”
“And so you ladies feel you have the right to say Mass and your Mass is supposedly valid.”
“That’s right. And while I’m on the subject, Father, let me say one more thing: Christ’s apostles were bishops. In the beginning there were no priests. Right?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“But as the church grew in numbers, the bishops couldn’t handle all of the chores, so the concept of a bishop’s helper, or priest was invented. Christ ordained no priests. Priests were unknown. They came along several centuries later strictly out of administrative necessity. And all of the sacramental powers of the bishops were conveyed to them.”