The 2019 Book of Common Prayer contains a liturgy of thanksgiving for the birth of a child and one of thanksgiving for the adoption of a child. When our daughter was born in September 2024, we asked our pastor to come to the hospital to pray both these prayers for our new baby. Not genetically related to me or my husband, our daughter came to us through embryo adoption.
By God’s grace, in 2019 I spent hours during our last year of seminary researching and writing about infertility, assisted reproductive technologies, and the ethical issues surrounding their use. At the time, I thought of this as my latest theological hobbyhorse. It was interesting and important to me, but it wasn’t personal. All that research and writing occurred a year before my husband and I started trying to conceive.
When it suddenly applied to my own life—after nine months of trying to conceive, waiting, and praying, only to be disappointed again and again—I found I wasn’t emotionally or spiritually prepared for the heartache I experienced.
My emotions weighed on me constantly. My spirit felt weak. But my time spent studying assisted reproductive technologies in seminary wasn’t wasted because, intellectually at least, I was ready. I knew what to expect from our fertility clinic once we started pursuing medical help. We knew what treatment options our doctor would present to us, and we knew what we were and weren’t willing to try.
Infertility affects approximately 12 percent to 15 percent of couples in the United States. Many of those couples will ultimately pursue in vitro fertilization (IVF) to grow their families. Almost 3 percent of babies born in the United States are conceived via IVF. Since the technology’s inception, millions of people have been born as a result.
If that’s something you (or someone you love) is considering, I would love to share the way my husband and I approached this theologically—and how the Lord redeemed our infertility.
Why Not IVF?
Criticizing IVF, even among pro-life Christians, is an uncomfortable exercise. As IVF becomes more common, more Christians have used IVF or know someone who has. Most who pursue IVF do so because they’re following an intense longing rooted in the biblical desire for the blessing of children (Pss. 113:9; 127:3–5).
For those with children or loved ones conceived via IVF, these critiques feel deeply personal. Yet I want to make clear that critiques of IVF have nothing to do with the value and dignity of children conceived via IVF. These children are image-bearers made by God, and the circumstances of their conception don’t change that (Ps. 139:13).
IVF is a process by which fertility specialists create embryos (babies at the earliest stage of human development) in a laboratory with egg and sperm collected from the parents. These embryos are then transferred to the mother’s uterus in the hope they’ll continue growing through a full-term pregnancy to a live birth. To achieve the highest odds of success, doctors will typically create multiple embryos per IVF cycle, selecting only the healthiest for implantation.
Most embryo transfers are done one embryo at a time. Unused embryos are then either frozen to be transferred at a later date or destroyed. Genetically testing embryos is routine, as it allows couples to discard embryos with a higher likelihood of genetic disorders.
If pro-life Christians agree that a unique human life begins at fertilization, then just as early-term abortion that kills an embryo inside the womb is wrong, destroying embryos developed outside the womb is wrong. If couples who conceive naturally shouldn’t abort a pregnancy because the baby has a genetic disorder, then embryos created via IVF shouldn’t be destroyed for the same reason.
Just as early-term abortion that kills an embryo inside the womb is wrong, destroying embryos developed outside the womb is wrong.
Technically, it’s possible to do IVF without freezing or destroying any embryos (by purposely creating and implanting only one embryo at a time and forgoing genetic testing). But to do IVF this way is prohibitively expensive for most couples. And many doctors won’t agree to this strategy because of the diminished chances of a successful pregnancy. (Our doctor, for example, told us this wasn’t something he’d be willing to do.)
Some couples choose to create multiple embryos with the plan to implant them all over time. To me, this seems too risky—what if a pregnancy complication keeps you from carrying again, a divorce causes an embryo custody dispute, or one or both partners pass away before the embryos have been transferred? At that point, you’d be left with an almost impossible decision about what to do. However, the intention here is good, and my objection is mostly due to unknown hypothetical risks. Christians could disagree with me in good faith. But this wasn’t a path my husband and I wanted to take.
Why Is Embryo Adoption Different?
Since we knew IVF wasn’t an option for us, we kept embryo adoption in mind in the event more conservative treatment options were unsuccessful. After testing left us with a diagnosis of “unexplained infertility,” and we’d exhausted what medications and other treatments could do for us, we asked our doctor about embryo adoption, which set us on the path to our beautiful now two-year-old daughter.
Unlike in IVF, no new children are created through embryo adoption. Rather, a child who already exists gets a chance to live and be part of a family. An estimated 1.2 million frozen embryos exist in the United States at any given moment. Of these, hundreds of thousands have been abandoned by their genetic parents, and an untold number will remain frozen indefinitely until the parents choose either to donate or destroy them.
Each frozen embryo is a unique human being, made in God’s image and deserving of life. Embryo adoption is a redemptive choice that offers them that chance. It’s possible to lament the broken circumstances that led to the child’s need for adoption while also rejoicing in the gift of becoming that child’s parents—as parents of traditionally adopted children do. Though I lament the need for embryo adoption in the first place, I’m deeply grateful that through embryo adoption, the Lord saved my daughter’s life and made me her mother.
Embryo adoption is significantly more affordable and less physically demanding than IVF. It offers women the chance to carry and give birth to their adopted children, and offers those children the earliest opportunity for attachment with their adopted parents. During infertility, I grieved the loss of the gift of pregnancy, of knowing what it’s like to nurture a new life with my body. Though my daughter doesn’t share my DNA, she did share my body throughout pregnancy, and I was able to nurse her after birth.
Not a Perfect Solution
Though I long to see more Christians pursue embryo adoption, it isn’t necessarily a fit for every infertile couple, and it carries risks and complications. For some couples, embryo adoption isn’t medically viable. Certain causes of infertility inhibit not only conception but also a woman’s ability to carry and give birth safely.
The average success rate for a donor embryo transfer is between 43 percent and 45 percent, a discouraging prospect. We’re so grateful that our first embryo transfer led to the healthy birth of our daughter, but we were mentally prepared for the prospect of multiple failed transfers. A failed embryo transfer carries the same emotions as a miscarriage—a life deeply longed for lost prematurely.
Additionally, as with natural pregnancies, miscarriage or stillbirth can occur with adopted embryo pregnancies. Genetic disorders are still possible. Most complications that can occur in a natural pregnancy occur at slightly higher rates in pregnancies achieved through embryo transfer.
Even assuming a successful embryo transfer and a healthy pregnancy, raising a child born through embryo adoption comes with complications. As with traditional adoption, these children are likely to have confusing feelings about their origin stories and questions about their genetic parents that may be difficult or impossible for their adoptive parents to answer.
Despite these complexities, for many infertile Christian couples, embryo adoption can be a redemptive option that offers a child a chance at life and the couple the gift of a child, while avoiding the ethical quandaries of IVF.
Interested in Embryo Adoption?
If you’re walking through infertility and wondering whether to consider embryo adoption, first pray and seek counsel. Ask the Lord to align your heart to his plans for you, even if those plans don’t include having a child. Much of my spiritual formation throughout our infertility was based on learning to trust God amid deep suffering and unfulfilled longing. The book of Job gave me words for this: “The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD” (Job 1:21).
Seek the counsel of a pastor or mentor who knows you well and can pray with you as you process your grief, consider your options, and ask for the Lord’s guidance. Seek advice from friends who have experienced infertility or done embryo adoption themselves. Being able to talk to just one person who could share her experience and answer my questions gave me the insight I needed to step forward in faith and pursue embryo adoption.
If you’re already working with a clinic, ask your doctor if embryo adoption is available with their practice. If so, this allows you to keep working with the same medical team that already has your diagnostic information and prevents you from having to travel for treatment.
Several Christian services are dedicated specifically to embryo adoption. Though you’ll have to travel if you’re not local, working with a Christian medical team can be a real gift when navigating the complexities of embryo adoption. Services like Snowflakes, the National Embryo Donation Center, Embryos Alive, and the Christian Embryo Adoption Network are worth looking into.
Redeem the Wait
As I write this, my daughter is asleep in the next room. And at 24 weeks pregnant, I can feel the kicks of her little sister in my womb. When we adopted our first daughter, we also adopted her sibling embryo, hoping to conceive and carry again as soon as possible after her birth. We praise the Lord for two successful embryo transfers in a row, and that we get to call these two little girls, who are full biological siblings, our own.
Much of my spiritual formation throughout our infertility was based on learning to trust God amid deep suffering and unfulfilled longing.
When, Lord willing, our second daughter is born in a few short months, they’ll be almost exactly two years apart, even though their embryos were created at the same time back in 2015, 11 years ago and a full year before my husband and I married.
It gives me such hope and gratitude to know that even before we married, God knew these two girls and knew they’d be ours. He knew we’d struggle to conceive and that we’d suffer through years of longing, but he also knew that as long as we waited for our girls, they waited even longer for us. Their stories are imperfect and complex, but miraculously the Lord “knitted [them] together in [their] mother’s womb,” and they’re so loved (Ps. 139:13).
Infertility taught me that protection from suffering isn’t guaranteed in the Christian life. In fact, suffering with and for Jesus is promised. Even with one daughter healthy and with us, and one healthy and on the way, “happily ever after” isn’t guaranteed for our family.
But I can look to the cross and know God is in the business of redeeming suffering to bring about his kingdom purposes. Our suffering through infertility—and our daughters’ suffering through years of frozen waiting—were redeemed with embryo adoption. I hope more Christians experiencing infertility will consider embryo adoption, too, and find their suffering redeemed.
The Gospel Coalition