Greg Ciola basing himself on Gn 1:11-12 states, "The author of all life is God and according to the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, He created every species to reproduce after its own kind. Thus, there is no room in God’s creation for man to step in and start modifying DNA by cross transplanting the genes from one organism or species into the DNA of another. In essence, man is now creating species variants that God never intended to exist. Such alteration of species specificity is a serious violation of God’s natural order, and I believe it to be a corruption of life and an abomination unto the LORD."

 

 

Unfortunately Greg only quotes selectively from Genesis. We also read in Genesis,

 

"Then God said: 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground.' " (Gn 1:26)

 

There is also a darker side to man's role in nature, that is his fall from divine love and wisdom and its consequences as we read,

"Cursed be the ground because of you!
In toil shall you eat its yield all the days of your life.
Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to you,
as you eat of the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your face shall you get bread to eat,
Until you return to the ground, from which you were taken;
For you are dirt, and to dirt you shall return." (Gn 3:17-19)

 

The question we must face is not whether man has a right to modify the life forms on earth but rather "Do we have the wisdom to bring about these genetic changes without harming the ecosystem at the same time?" Pope John Paul II stated, "The dominion granted to man by the Creator is not an absolute power, nor can one speak of a freedom to "use and misuse," or to dispose of things as one pleases. The limitation imposed from the beginning by the Creator himself and expressed symbolically by the prohibition not to "eat of the fruit of the tree" (cf. Gen 2:16-17) shows clearly enough that, when it comes to the natural world, we are subject not only to biological laws but also to moral ones, which cannot be violated with impunity ." (Encyclical, Sollicitudo rei Socialis #35)

Genetic Modification has its limits imposed by the nature of things as willed by God.

At the right you see the classical Chimera of Greek Mythology. It was a monstrous beast which ravaged the countryside of Lykia in Anatolia. It was a composite creature, with the body and maned head of a lion, a goat's head rising from its back, a set of goat-udders, and a serpentine tail. (Wegpage: Theoi Greek Mythology) "Thus it would be unacceptable to create a chimera, in which half the genes were mixed from two different species, or to mix the egg nucleus of one species with the cytoplasm of another. In contrast, to add one or two genes from another species would [not] be a violation of the nature of the animal or plant, unless that particular change greatly altered some very basic capacity or property of the organism." (Report of the Church of Scotland General Assembly, 11 May 1999)

2. Genetic Modifications in Perspective