Ethicist to speak about human embryos

Professor Paul Lauritzen of John Carroll University will give a presentation titled “Reflections on the Morality of ‘Adopting’ Frozen Embryos” on Wednesday March 25, at the St. Thomas Aquinas Center, 46 North Eagleville Road, beginning at 7:30 p.m.

The event, part of this year’s Loyola Colloquium series, is hosted by the Aquinas Center, the Roman Catholic Campus Ministry at UConn, and St. Thomas Aquinas Chapel. It is free and open to the public.

Lauritzen graduated with a B.A. in political science and religious studies from the University of Virginia, where he also earned a master’s degree in religious studies.

He earned his Ph.D. at Brown University. Since 1985, he has been on the faculty of John Carroll University in University Heights, Ohio.

He has served as director of the Program in Applied Ethics at John Carroll since 1997, and was chair of the Department of Religious Studies for four years.

He also has been a visiting faculty member at St. John’s University in New York.

Lauritzen is the author of four books, including Pursuing Parenthood: Ethical Issues in Assisted Reproduction (1993) and Cloning and the Future of Human Embryonic Research (2001).

He also has authored more than 30 research articles and book chapters, and more than 30 professional reviews of the work of other scholars.

A member of many prominent professional societies, he serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Religious Ethics, and has a collection of interviews archived as podcasts on the Commonweal Magazine web site.

For more information, call 860-429-6436.