Pope John Paul II, expressing concern about people who desire to have children "at all costs," urged nations to enact ethically sound laws regulating artificial procreation.
"A certain commercial logic, allying itself with modern technologies, can sometimes take advantage of human desires, in themselves good, such as becoming a mother or father, to push them to want a child at any cost," John Paul told pilgrims and tourists gathered Sunday in St. Peter's Square for his traditional weekly blessing.
"In reality, human life can never become an object - from conception to natural death, the human being is entitled to inviolable rights, in the face of which freedom must know where to draw the line," the pontiff said.
"It is thus indispensable," he said, "that nations give, in such complex subject matter, systematic and clear laws, founded on solid ethical bases, to safeguard the invaluable worth of human life."
The Roman Catholic Church opposes in vitro fertilization, partly because it dissociates sex from procreation; the church also condemns human cloning.