Katelyn Walls Shelton

An absolute honor to launch my Novak Fellowship project last night at the @TFASorg Journalism Awards Dinner. It’s called Technically Human: The End & Future of Emerging Reproductive Biotechnologies. Excited to begin a yearlong probe into reprotech & what it means to be human.

Welcome home Reid, Victor, Christina, and Jeremy! 🫶 The Artemis II astronauts have splashed down at 8:07pm ET (0007 UTC April 11), bringing their historic 10-day mission around the Moon to an end.

My four little earthlings would like to wish our @NASA astronauts Godspeed on their return journey to Earth!

"'So much of our adult lives are spent marking the traditional milestones you hear about your whole life — engagements, marriages, babies, first homes,' Ms. Bart, 43, said. 'For women who aren’t partnered, there’s often no external occasion prompting this kind of celebration, so creating one yourself is a genuine declaration of self-worth.'" This totally misunderstands why we celebrate the milestones. Having a child or getting married isn't in any way a "declaration of self-worth" nor is that the thing that really needs declaring. Weddings and baby showers and baptisms are celebrations of the formation of the most essential building block of society: the family. And there is a somber element, a seriousness to these things: Our community is called together to recognize that they must see us through the good times and the hard ones. (That's part of why people gravitate toward churches to mark these milestones, even if they're not believers.) Life isn't just a series of aesthetic pursuits. Please believe that it is so much more than that.

We should see the human embryo as worthy of protection. After all, Jesus Christ Himself, the incarnate God, once existed as a human embryo. @AnnaKateShelt wng.org/opinions/survi…

Ad hominem attacks aren’t reason, but fallacy. If it’s a reasonable discussion you’d like to have, I’m all about it. Although it’s difficult to have a reasoned discussion with an anon, whose own credentials are purposefully unverifiable. I think we just fundamentally disagree about IVF and the realities of PGT. And that’s okay.

@DavidClosson @AnnaKateShelt This was written by someone who doesn’t understand IVF or PGT-P at all. There are better ways to promote life affirming policies. Advocating from a place of knowledge, not just passion, is important

Great writing from @AnnaKateShelt: "With one in six couples facing infertility worldwide, stories like the Boozers’ are only the first of many about reproductive tech’s impact on our children, families, and humanity more broadly. But when pastors don’t know how to counsel their members on these technologies, the primary conscience-shapers become their doctors, and the cathedral collapses into the exam room. It’s time for that to change." wng.org/opinions/survi…

“Embryo” is a stage of human development. “Fetus” is a stage of human development. “Infant” is a stage of human development. “Teenager” is a stage of human development. Not one of these stages makes you more human than another. It’s all the same life… just growing.

Great article. Well worth the read.

@sjpusey Thanks so much!

@AnnaKateShelt Great article!

“Duke’s twin basketball stars, Cameron and Cayden Boozer, would not exist if their older brother Carmani hadn’t been dying from sickle cell disease. But while this success story resulted in the lives of three young men, it also destroyed the lives of at least eight others.” My latest for @WNGdotorg

Kinda insane to see people dunking on this who have zero understanding of human embryology. As a physician, I’ve held miscarried babies between 7-12 weeks gestation. This is what their limbs look like. Think about why this might make you uncomfortable. embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/embryology/ind…

@ProLifeIVF @jayshelt Pretty sure it would stop if we stopped adding to the number of frozen embryos too. But what does “addressing the risk vectors” even mean?

@AnnaKateShelt @jayshelt You stop it by addressing the risk vectors.

Duke’s Boozer Twins: IVF’s Promise & Hidden Costs “The lives of those created by IVF are as precious and as dignified as those conceived naturally… But when parents become designers rather than stewards, our orientation toward our children radically changes” — @AnnaKateShelt

@ProLifeIVF @jayshelt Best way to address that number is to stop adding to it. Completely.

@AnnaKateShelt @jayshelt That’s the US government’s estimate with <10% destruction/donation to research etc. The best way to address that number is to understand it. We know the risk vectors

@_MimiTeixeira Thank you, Mimi!

@AnnaKateShelt Fantastic piece!

@ProLifeIVF @jayshelt Oh please excuse the high estimate. On your estimate, “only” 600,000 embryos would beg to differ with you.

@AnnaKateShelt @jayshelt The US estimates ~600,000. The 1.2 mil comes from this study which didn’t account for thaw/implantation failure rates at a time they were higher or aneuploidy. It also didn’t include any transfers after 2013 fertstertreports.org/article/S2666-…

Christian parent here 👋 I’m seeing the negative effects of gentle parenting, but very few Christians willing to speak up about it. A prominent Christian news site told me they couldn’t publish anything critiquing gentle parenting, lest they get dragged through the mud. We desperately need strong Christian voices writing on why gentle parenting may be well-intentioned, but misguided, and how authority isn’t bad in itself, but God-given and good. Maybe you??

Pastors, are you experiencing this? @Awana hosted a KidMin Influencers round-table today. The loudest theme that emerged was the toxic nature of “Gentle Parenting” (their boots on the ground perspective). Some parents are even asking kids pastors to not discuss the crucifixion. They are afraid of “church trauma” and kids pastors are concerned these kids will lack resiliency (overall & spiritually).

@Seth_Troutt @WNGdotorg Thanks so much, Seth!

@AnnaKateShelt @WNGdotorg This was great, Katelyn!

@ProLifeIVF @jayshelt The million+ embryos in cryostorage would beg to differ. “It has been estimated that 1.2 million frozen embryos are currently in storage in the United States alone.” pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11…

@AnnaKateShelt @jayshelt Which would be evil if it worked. Their brand of evil is selling snake oil. ehud.co/publications/2… sciencedirect.com/science/articl… Thankfully this isn’t a common use in the IVF community. You can’t beat biology. Excess embryos is uncommon.

🚨BREAKING: The Trump admin just extended Biden-era Planned Parenthood funding, citing “legal challenges.” 3 out of 4 GOP voters support defunding Planned Parenthood. Is anyone listening?!

And yet companies like Orchid, Nucleus, Genomic Prediction, and others are promoting technology to screen scores of embryos to select the “best” one, based on whatever criteria the parents choose: predicted height, eye color, IQ, sex, likelihood for certain diseases, etc. It’s eugenics.

@jayshelt @AnnaKateShelt This is an unusual use of IVF. It’s in the single digits how many people use PGT-M let alone to select based on matching an already born child

Duke’s Boozer twins show what IVF can do for the living, but the lives of the lost are routinely forgotten, @AnnaKateShelt argues. "When parents become designers rather than stewards, our orientation toward our children radically changes." wng.org/opinions/survi…

@DavidClosson Thanks so much, David. It’s so important, and so widespread