Kevin Kelly/Key photo Attorney Nikolas Nikas, left, speaks with Benedictine Father Albert Bruecken during a break in a daylong information session on Missouri Amendment 2, the initiative that seeks to protect embryonic stem-cell research and human cloning from regulation.

"This initiative is the worst piece of deception I have ever seen," said attorney Nikolas T. Nikas of the Bioethics Defense Fund.

"This is the most exquisite fraud on voters that's ever been seen," said Fred Sauer Sr., of the Missouri Roundtable for Life.

"By lies, deception and half-truths, they are trying to circumvent the legislature," said the Rev. Dr. Rick Scarborough, a Southern Baptist minister. "If your position is that innocent life can be destroyed, then lying about it is not a stretch."

Added Kansas City-St. Joseph Bishop Robert W. Finn: "This isn't a battle we asked for. They want to have a piece of our state constitution to have a pre-eminent right to carry out one particular area of biological research to take stem cells out of human embryos."

Amendment 2, if passed, would bar any state, county or city government in Missouri from passing any regulation on embryonic stem-cell research or the cloning of human embryos for the express purpose of destroying them in order to harvest their stem cells, the experts told priests, deacons and the pro-life coordinators at two sessions at St. Therese Parish in Parkville.

With Rockhurst University's Dr. John Morris explaining the false promises of "cures" that aren't even close to reality from embryonic stem-cell research, other experts hammered home the point that the proposed Amendment 2 does exactly the opposite of what its claims to do.

For example, voters on Nov. 7 will read a summary on the ballot that the initiative will "ban human cloning."

In fact, Nikas said, the "ban" is only accomplished by redefining cloning. The measure, if approved, will actually constitutionally protect cloning as scientists define it and lay people understand it.

The redefinition is done in the text of the proposed amendment, which voters won't see in the polling booth.

The text reads: "'Clone or attempt to clone a human being' means to implant in a uterus or attempt to implant a uterus anything other than the product of fertilization of an egg of a human female by a sperm of a human male for the purpose of initiating a pregnancy that could result in the creation of a human fetus or the birth of a human being."

That definition turns the scientific and common meaning of cloning on its head, Morris said.

Cloning, through the somatic cell nuclear transfer method used to produce Dolly the Sheep and other lower mammals, occurs when the nucleus of a human egg is removed and the nucleus of another body cell containing all 46 human chromosomes is inserted in it's place, and a human embryo begins to develop. At that moment, an exact genetic copy of the donor of the body cell is produced and begins to develop.

"Nothing happens in the implantation (in the uterus) other than the embryo gets a steady supply of nutrition," Morris said, noting that the National Academies of Science and embryologists around the world defined an embryo produced by the SCNT method as "cloned."

Nikas said the attorneys who rewrote the definition of cloning in the amendment knew exactly what they were doing.

"They were very clever," he said. "By the way they redefine this, they will not only permit cloning, they will enshrine it into the Missouri Constitution. Absent another constitutional amendment, the legislature and the people will not be able to do anything about it."

Sauer said that the false provision to ban cloning is aimed right at pro-life Christian voters.

"This grand scheme goes right after the Christians: 'This bans human cloning? Great, my church wants to ban human cloning,'" Sauer said many Christian voters will conclude.

That's where the state's pastors come in, Rev. Scarborough said. He told the priests and deacons to set the record straight between now and election day, and to tell their congregations exactly the kind of deception the proponents of Amendment 2 are trying to sell.

"This is the hour; now is the time," he said. "God help us if we won't stand up now. If we won't stand up for innocent life, who will stand? How can laymen find courage in themselves if they can't find courage in us?"

If Amendment 2 passes, it could lead to consequences such as the exploitation of young women and poor women for their eggs at great risk to their health, both Nikas and Sauer said.

Although the amendment purports to ban any research facility from paying women for their eggs, it actually permits research clinics to pay for human eggs acquired by any means - including direct payment - from another agency.

Nikas noted that some agencies are already advertising in campus newspapers, offering to pay young women upwards of $5,000 for their eggs. The amendment permits research facilities to reimburse those agencies for the costs of the eggs, plus any other "expenses" they incur in the collection of them.

"It puts women at risk," Nikas said. "The potential for the exploitation of woman is massive."

"They will have a constitutional right to pay anything they want to pay for eggs," Sauer said.

Adrienne Hynek, director of the Diocesan Respect Life Office, urged the priests and the deacons to rely on parish-based respect life coordinators to help them carry the message.

Hynek outlined several steps that priests, deacons and parishes can take between now and Nov. 7, including homilies against Amendment 2, intercessory prayers, a rosary crusade, and letters from pastors to parishioners explaining the issue.

Bishop Finn urged every pastor and every parish to campaign vigorously to defeat Amendment 2.

"For us as church, clearly the most important reason is that this is wrong," he said.

An embryo "has to be regarded as a human life from the earliest moment, and deserves all the protection of human life," the bishop said.

"When our critics say it is not a human being, then what is it?" he said. "Clearly, it is certainly a human being. Nobody should be able to say that the Catholic Church is vague or ambivalent about what it teaches about this subject."

Bishop Finn urged the pastors and parish pro-life coordinators to be "zealous" in their efforts to defeat Amendment 2.

"I want to be able to say we did everything we were able to do to make known the clear teachings of the church and to help people understand why the church teaches this," the bishop said.

Rev. Scarborough predicted that Christians across the state standing together will defeat Amendment 2.

"If you and I and thousands of others will stand shoulder to shoulder, the people will see us standing, and they will hear a resounding message," he said. "And if Christians will not stand together on this issue, then we deserve what we will get."

END