Second Coming Group Wants To Clone Jesus

Maranatha Christian News Service

November 4, 2000

NEW YORK, NY (MCNS) -- A secretive group called the Second
Coming Project, apparently foreseeing Jesus's second coming
happening via a petri dish and modern technology, intends to
one day clone Him.

Fox News reports that the 13- or 14-member alliance hopes to
obtain a small DNA sample from one of the historic artifacts
that some people trace to Christ's body, perhaps the Shroud
of Turin. The resulting cloned fetus would be placed in a
female's womb.

"I'm hoping it will bring world peace," said a source within
the group. "Not some Armageddon as a tremendous battle where
everyone dies, as some people believe."

The female mother would not have to be a virgin, but it
would be an immaculate conception. December 25, 2001 has
been targeted as the day the cloned baby would be born, Fox
reported.

The infant would appear like any other baby. He would not be
raised in a lab nor would he be inculcated with beliefs, the
group's spokesperson said.

"If this child is what we hope he is, he won't need to be
raised that way," the spokesperson added.

Questions encircle the historic artifacts from which DNA
would have to be pulled, perhaps a sample of blood or a
hair. The authenticity of most of these relics, including
the Shroud of Turin, has been challenged by scholars.
Furthermore, it is not known if 2,000-year-old DNA samples
can be cloned.

"Any damage to the DNA would likely result in damaged,
deformed or just non-starting cloning material," Biologist
Arthur Caplan, director the Center for Bioethics at the
University of Pennsylvania, told Fox.

Aside from the scientific problems, established religious
groups do not buy the idea. Bill Merrell, vice president of
convention relations for the Southern Baptist Convention,
told Fox the project is "the height of foolhardiness," "the
highest silliness in the category of neither science nor
religion" and "perfectly reprehensible."