The Catholic Weekly 21 March 2021

THE CHAPLAIN IN UNIFORM ADVOCATE FOR BELIEVERS P8 P14 Celebrate Mary MacKillop's 10th Anniversary of Sainthood Call 02 8912 2763 today for your FREE Prayer Book! $2 AUSTRALIA’S CATHOLIC bishops have called on the Federal Government to con- sider serious safety and eth- ical concerns as it considers legalising technology to allow children to be born with ge- netic material from three peo- ple. Federal MPs will be given a conscience vote about wheth- er mitochondrial donation should be legalised. The process, legal in the United Kingdom, uses one of two techniques using assist- ed reproductive technology aimed at preventing mito- chondrial disease, a severe genetic illness, from being passed on from a woman who has the disease, to her biolog- ical child. Bothinvolvethecreationand destruction of fertilised eggs to allow for healthy mitochondria to be made available for the development of a child whose mother carries the disease. Mitochondria are present within the body’s cells and provide necessary energy to them. According to the Garvan Institute, mitochondrial dis- ease is the most common type of inheritedmetabolic disease in Australia, affecting about one in 500 births. It can present at any age, af- fecting children and adults, in any organ, with a wide spec- trum of symptoms ranging from mild chronic disease to acute severe episodes or fatal illness. In the submission, the bishops said that concerns about safety, ethical practice and efficacy “should not have approval to proceed in Aus- tralia”. They outlined five main concerns including that the methods used do not respect the right to life and the human dignity of the individuals con- cerned and “would create a child with three parents, con- fusing the biological parent- age of any children born”. The bishops also point to the use of pronuclear trans- fer in one of the methods as a form of human reproductive cloning which is unethical, “significant risks and incon- venience” to the women who would provide eggs to enable the procedures, and poten- tially dangerous biological risks to the community “as these techniques can change the human germline, which means altered genes might be passed on to future gener- ations”. Alternative ways of form- ing a family while avoiding transmitting the disease are already available, they added, including adoption and IVF with egg donation, the latter of which “is prevalent and provides a legal, if not ethical option” . CONTINUED ON PAGE 4 It’s a dangerous step Bishops warn of serious risks around potential solution for transmission of mitochondrial disease ¾ Marilyn Rodrigues THOUSANDS OF students in WesternSydneywill haveaccess to a new state-of-the-art facility with the opening of Australian CatholicUniversity’s (ACU)new campus at Blacktown. Officially opened by Feder- al Minister for Education and Youth, Alan Tudge MP and blessed by Bishop of Parramat- ta, Vincent Long Van Nguyen OFM Conv, the Saint Josephine Bakhita Campus will provide a place of learning close to home for more than 18,000 tertiary students who would otherwise have to travel across the city to attend university. More than two years in the planning, the vertical campus in Main Street, offers undergradu- ate, postgraduate and pathway courses for study in the faculties of education and arts, health sciences, law and business, and theology and philosophy. CONTINUED ON PAGE 3 ¾ Debbie Cramsie New Catholic uni campus opens 21 March 2021 A milestone for ACU (left to right): Bachelor of Nursing student Ana Seini Fekitoa, Stephen Bali MP, Member for Blacktown, Darug traditional custodian Julie JonesWebb, ArchbishopAnthony Fisher OP, Blacktown City Council CEO Kerry Robinson OAM, ACUVice Chancellor and President Prof Zlatko Skrbis, BishopVincent LongVan Nguyen OFM Conv of Parramatta, acting Chancellor Julien O’Connell AO, Canossian Sister Melissa Dwyer FdCC, and Blacktown Mayor Tony Bleasdale OAM. PHOTO: GIOVANNI PORTELLI