IVF

The Courageous Christian Doctor Waging War Against the Fertility Industry 

Dr. John David Gordon was a reproductive endocrinologist without a home.

With a medical degree from Duke and his residency at Stanford, the Boston native, who was raised Jewish and converted to Christianity in 2000, is a skilled physician committed to helping infertile couples have children. His credentials and skills are unassailable and unbeatable.

But there was a problem – and it was a moral and ethical one of major proportions. 

Serving in a leadership role at a fertility clinic just outside of Washington, D.C., for over twenty years, Dr. Gordon began having significant misgivings about how his facility was doing business.

Like almost every fertility clinic these days across the reproductive medicine industry, the establishment was employing nearly every available technology to help maximize success. This included creating as many embryos as possible with each patient, a strategy that allows physicians to be choosy when it comes to selecting which ones to transfer to the mother.

At fertility clinics across the world, embryos are literally graded and evaluated, and those statistically most likely to implant and grow are the winners. Those that don’t make the cut are either frozen or discarded.

While nobody knows for sure, it’s estimated that more than thirty million embryos are created around the world each year because of IVF technology. A typical IVF cycle in a traditional clinic will result in up to 15 embryos. Most clinics recommend transferring only three or four.

Although his motives were redeeming, Dr. Gordon began feeling the ethical burden of being part of this industry that had grown increasingly reckless and mercenary. “It’s too morally problematic,” Gordon concluded. “I don’t know where you draw the line.”

After consulting with his wife, Allison, who also shared his deep Christian convictionsand unease over the direction of reproductive medicine, Dr. Gordon decided to leave the Washington, D.C. clinic and open one that would operate within biblical moral and ethical boundaries.

Setting up shop in eastern Tennessee, “Rejoice Fertility was created with a clear vision: to deliver an unparalleled patient experience where couples could openly discuss their moral, ethical, spiritual, and religious concerns about reproductive medicine.”

Specifically, Rejoice Fertility is a “no-discard” IVF clinic. Patients are encouraged to create only the embryos they will transfer or use for a future IVF. 

Any embryos created are either used for fresh transfer or preserved for future frozen embryo transfer.

For decades, Focus on the Family has been asked by married couples on how best to navigate the myriad of ethical considerations and challenges surrounding IVF. The ministry has recognized that across Christendom, believers may view the issue very differently.

While the Catholic Church has remained steadfast in their opposition to it, the Southern Baptists traditionally supported it but have since expressed a growing concern. The denomination’s convention passed a resolution decrying the ethical lines most clinics regularly cross. In doing so, they were correctly calling out the rise in embryo destruction, elective reduction, genetic screening, and the astronomical number of frozen embryos. They stopped just short of calling for an all-out ban. 

Given that the Bible doesn’t offer clear guidance on the overarching technology, we’ve thoughtfully and prayerfully studied the question. We’ve long said that doctors can take proactive steps to address many of the moral and ethical concerns associated with IVF – steps that Dr. Gordon and his team appear to be acknowledging and grappling with on a daily basis.

In the instances where couples may be unable to transfer frozen embryos, Rejoice Infertility strongly advocates for the couple agreeing to make the baby available for adoption. “Snowflake” embryo adoption has been a wonderful program that seeks to find forever homes for these babies locked in a perpetual frozen state.

In a world swirling with countless moral and ethical conundrums, we applaud Dr. Gordon for his efforts to care for his patients and prayerfully address and wage a fight that far too many medical professionals have long ago abandoned. 

Related articles and resources:

IVF: Moral and Ethical Considerations

Christians Must Consider the Moral and Ethical Hazards of IVF

South Dakota Makes Fertility Fraud a Felony

South Dakota legislators passed a bill last week criminalizing fertility fraud.

Fertility fraud, or medical rape, occurs when a fertility doctor secretly replaces the intended father’s sperm with his own or that of another donor’s. South Dakota’s HB 1164 makes fertility fraud a felony and creates a way for victims — including children conceived through fraud and men who involuntarily father children — to sue perpetrators.

The South Dakota House and Senate passed HB 1164 in unanimous votes before Governor Larry Rhoden signed the bill into law on March 10.

Fertility fraud doesn’t just constitute medical rape. It deprives parents of their right to raise their biological children and, conversely, children of their right to be known and loved by their biological parents.

But most American states remain poorly equipped to deal with this and the myriad other ethical problems created by modern fertility technologies. According to the U.S. Donor Conceived Council, more than two-thirds of states still have no legislation explicitly criminalizing fertility fraud.

Indiana became the first state to make fertility fraud illegal in 2019, following the trial of former Indiana fertility doctor Donald Cline.

Cline fathered more than 90 children through medical rape during the 1970’s and 80’s. One of Cline’s sons began unraveling the mystery after an at home DNA test showed he was not related to the man he believed to be his biological father.

Netflix documented Cline’s children’s search for justice in the 2022 documentary Our Father.

When Cline went to trial in 2017, Indiana had no law classifying his conduct as a crime. He pled guilty to felony obstruction of justice and paid a $500 fine.

“The charge silenced [Cline’s victims] when it came to their ability to describe the underlying harm to the court,” Jody Madeira, a professor at Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law and one of the experts who testified against Cline, told Netflix’s Tudum.

“The entire narrative got changed,” Madeira expanded. “It became about Cline lying to the state of Indiana and not about these illicit inseminations, not about the medical rape, not about the harm [and] not about the identity issues.”

Identity issues lie at the heart of all ethical problems arising from the rapid, unregulated expansion of fertility technologies.

The biological ties between parents and children are practically and spiritually crucial to a child’s development and identity formation. That’s why Focus on the Family believes children have the right to be raised by their biological mother and father.

While adoption redeems broken relationships between parents and children, surrogacy intentionally separates children from one or more of their biological parents. Babies conceived through in vitro fertilization frequently suffer the same foundational trauma.

“By making fertility fraud a felony, South Dakota affirms a simple truth: a child’s biological identity isn’t anecdotal or interchangeable,” child advocacy organization Them Before Us noted on X.

“Parentage is critical to a child’s humanity and rights; thus, their genetic origins deserve legal protections.”

The Daily Citizen thanks South Dakota legislators for protecting women’s, parents’ and children’s rights by criminalizing fertility fraud. But children and families still need comprehensive, nation-wide protections from unregulated fertility technologies.

Until all states prioritize children’s rights over adults’ desire for children, crimes and abuses like fertility fraud will continue to occur.

Additional Articles and Resources

Florida to Regulate Surrogacy After Pennsylvania Sex Offender Purchases Baby

Male ‘Throuple’ Buys Toddler from Quebec Government

President Trump Acts to Expand Access to IVF

Why Adoption is Beautiful and Surrogacy Isn’t

House Passes Annual Defense Bill Enacting Conservative Priorities

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed a massive $900 billion annual defense bill, sending the measure to the Senate before the year-end deadline.

The House passed the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in a 312-112 vote; 94 Democrats and 18 Republicans opposed the bill.

The NDAA includes a 3.8% pay raise for U.S. troops, blocks the Pentagon from reducing the number of U.S. troops “permanently stationed in or deployed to” Europe below 76,000 for longer than 45 days, and authorizes $400 million in annual security assistance for Ukraine, The New York Times reports.

According to Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, the bill codifies all or parts of 15 of President Trump’s executive orders, including:

  • Restoring America’s Fighting Force
  • Ending Radical and Wasteful DEI Programs
  • Declaring a National Emergency at the Southern Border
  • Securing Our Borders
  • Clarifying the Military’s Role in Defending U.S. Territorial Integrity
  • Modernizing Defense Acquisitions & Spurring Innovation
  • Building the Golden Dome for America
  • Deploying Advanced Nuclear Reactor Technologies for National Security
  • Restoring American Airspace Sovereignty
  • Unleashing American Drone Dominance

The speaker’s office also highlighted multiple “major conservative victories” the bill delivers, including:

  • Ends wokeness and DEI by eliminating programs, offices, and training across the Department of War (DOW).
  • Secures the border by expanding DOW support for Department of Homeland Security operations, National Guard deployments and National Defense Areas.
  • Revitalizes the defense industrial base: Grows U.S. defense manufacturing jobs, onshore critical supply chains, and expands surge capacity.
  • Ensures allies pay their fair share: Adds new tools to push allies to shoulder more of their own defense costs.

House Democrats had pushed for the inclusion of a provision covering the cost of in vitro fertilization (IVF) for service members and their families.

Thankfully, Speaker Johnson “intervened during final negotiations to kill that provision,” the Times reports, over concerns it would lead to the destruction of many embryos.

Speaker Johnson is entirely correct. The provision he killed would have used taxpayer money to subsidize an industry that routinely creates and discards hundreds of thousands of tiny human lives each year.

In fact, the baby-making industry (fertility clinics) destroys more human lives every year than the baby-taking (abortion) industry.

Kristi Hamrick, vice president of media and policy for Students for Life of America, applauded the speaker’s intervention.

“IVF is not an industry that deserves blanket support and funding. We can do better,” she said in a statement.

Lila Rose, president of Live Action, also thanked Speaker Johnson for “ensuring TRICARE was not used to subsidize this destruction of life.”

The House’s original version of the NDAA contained additional conservative priorities, “including a ban on the Pentagon covering [transgender] surgeries for troops. But that provision and several others were stripped out in final negotiations,” the Times notes.

Though the provision doesn’t appear in the NDAA, the Pentagon stopped funding transgender medical interventions for U.S. soldiers earlier this year after President Trump signed an executive order prohibiting transgenderism within the military.

The NDAA still includes a prohibition on biological males participating in women’s sports at U.S. military academies.

The Senate is expected to overwhelmingly approve the legislation, with President Trump signing it into law before the end of the year.

Related articles and resources:

Counseling Consultation & Referrals

IVF: Moral and Ethical Considerations

Frozen Embryos: Ethical Issues, Cryopreservation Risks, and IVF

Court Upholds Trump Ban on ‘Transgender’ Service Members

Photo from Getty Images.

Creating Babies Without Mothers Must Remain Frankensteinian Fiction

Scientists are calling it a pioneering DNA breakthrough – a Frankensteinian development where material from skin cells are transformed into human eggs capable of being fertilized and turned into human embryos.

What this means is scientists creating a baby without the need of a mother.

Sadly, it’s not merely theoretical. It’s already taken place at a laboratory inside the Oregon Health and Science University.

“It is very preliminary work at this stage,” explained Dr. Paul Amato, a reproductive endocrinologist and professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the school.

However early in the process, the frightening turn is yet one more evil and wicked manifestation of what happens when you try and detach God’s perfect institution of one-man, one-woman marriage from procreation.

Scientists are trying to put a positive spin on the news, especially appealing to the sympathies of those struggling to conceive a child.

“If it were to be successful, it would offer hope for couples and people suffering from infertility, particularly older women who have run out of eggs,” observed Dr. Amato.

“In theory, the technique could result in a limitless number of eggs,” she stated. “The skin cell DNA however can come from anyone, even if they personally don’t have any eggs or remaining eggs – older women, women after cancer treatment, people born without eggs, men.”

And there you have it – the true motivation and energy behind the emerging technology.

Dr. Amato claims, “A same-sex male couple could potentially have a child genetically related to both partners.”

If the prospect of enslaving a child to growing up in life without a biological mother doesn’t sadden or burden you, then you’re obviously not paying attention to facts.

In addition to the countless frightening aspects of lab engineered human beings, the absence of a mother in a young person’s life are significant and consequential. The social science shows growing up without a mother leads to a greater risk of emotional problems, increased risk of drug abuse, compromised emotional self-regulation, lower self-esteem and lower educational attainment.

Mothers are more than egg donors – they’re everything in the life of a child.

The unparalleled selfishness driving this craze is what’s behind Katy Faust’s organization, Them Before Us. The non-profit “strives to put children before adults in every conversation about marriage and family.”

In other words, it’s not about what the “parent” wants but rather what’s in the best interest of the child.

On a recent podcast, Katy wisely noted, “The baby-making industry and the baby-taking industry are two sides of the same child-commodifying coin.”

The lab process in question is called “mitomeiosis” and is a version of cloning. The team in Oregon produced 82 functional eggs, seven of which were developed into embryos. All of them had chromosomal abnormalities.

Sadly, scientists are now back in the lab and trying to modify and make adjustments in an effort to create healthy babies without the need of biological mothers.

Even Mary Shelly, the famed novelist best known for writing Frankenstein, might well find this current narrative both horrifying, mortifying and moral sense-defying, especially for non-fiction.

Image from Getty.

Oh, Baby: Pro-Life Senators Prioritize Women’s Health Over Ethically Concerning Cures

It might seem to the casual observer that modern medicine is increasingly prone to treating the symptom rather than the cause.

This is certainly the case when it comes to the heartbreaking issue of infertility, which is medically defined as the inability to conceive after twelve months of trying to have a baby.

The infertility treatment market in the United States is estimated to be nearly $8 billion in 2025, up from just under $6 billion this past year. A large portion of those dollars are spent on IVF or In vitro fertilization, a fertility treatment where sperm and eggs are combined in a lab to create an embryo.

While it’s possible to reduce the ethical concerns surrounding IVF, the industry has become increasingly problematic. Millions of human embryos are being created in labs and later destroyed or frozen for seemingly ever. Donor eggs and sperm are being used, surrogates are being contracted, couples are ordering up designer babies, and little to no concern is being paid to how children who do survive the fraught process will fare in the long-term.

You may ask: Why is IVF increasing and becoming so popular? There are many reasons, but almost all of them are rooted in a woman’s inability to conceive. Only IVF doesn’t really address or try to correct the biological issues at play leading to the infertility. Instead, it’s the equivalent of heart bypass surgery where doctors simply find another way to solve the problem. Or it’s akin to taking a pain reliever for a massive headache for weeks rather than addressing the cause of the affliction itself.

When it comes to trying to address the difficult issues of infertility, there are other ways to come at the challenge.

It’s this belief and conviction that’s behind Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith’s bill, “The Reproductive Empowerment and Support through Optimal Restoration (RESTORE) Act.” It was previously introduced in the 118th Congress.

“So many couples of today’s childbearing-aged generations face an uphill battle with fertility struggles that are complex and unique to every woman and man,” Senator Hyde-Smith stated. “The holistic fertility policy promoted through the RESTORE Act aims to treat the root causes of infertility, many of which stem from chronic conditions and environmental factors that are the focus of President Trump’s MAHA movement.”

She added:

“If we are going to truly support women and men who are ready to embrace parenthood, then we should promote substantive fertility solutions that ensure access to restorative reproductive medicine—fully healing couples and empowering them with autonomy over how they start and build their families.” 

Senator James Lankford, a cosponsor of the Act, agreed and offered both an empathetic and practical justification for the legislation. 

“Infertility is one of the most difficult challenges couples can face, and most Americans have either faced or know someone who is facing the difficult journey to have a baby,” said Senator Lankford. “IVF is an incredible scientific advancement that allows families to bring life into the world, but IVF is very expensive and shouldn’t be the only option available to families.  The RESTORE Act prioritizes addressing underlying causes of infertility to help families to bring the miracle of life into the world.”

The legislation puts a spotlight on some of the many health conditions that contribute to infertility, including endometriosis, adenomyosis, polycystic ovary syndrome, thyroid issues and hormone imbalances, to name just a few.

According to Senator Hyde-Smith’s office, key provisions of the RESTORE Act include: 

  • Developing educational tools for women seeking information about reproductive health conditions and restorative reproductive medicine.
  • Providing training opportunities for medical professionals to learn how to diagnose and treat reproductive health conditions.
  • Directing the Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health to conduct data collection and implement ongoing reports to assess the access women and men have to restorative reproductive medicine and infertility care through proper testing, diagnosis, and treatment of reproductive conditions.
  • Promoting, through existing funding opportunities in Title X and the HHS Office of Population Affairs, medical training for medical students and professionals who feel called to truly help women and men struggling with reproductive health conditions and infertility.
  • Advancing lifestyle medicine prescriptions as a method for treating male infertility.
  • Directing HHS, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and all relevant panels to update the diagnostic and procedural codes related to infertility that implement the practice of restorative reproductive medicine.

Senators Hyde-Smith and Lankford and other supporters of the bill are looking at the cause and not just a possible or seeming cure. We applaud, support, and pray for this much needed effort.

Image from Shutterstock.