Headlines in the secular newspapers are so focused on the state's bleak financial outlook - quoth Gov. Jon Corzine: "New Jersey is on the verge of fiscal disaster" - that readers can't be blamed for overlooking scant coverage of the ongoing attempt to fund construction of the Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey.

So once again, the Catholic bishops of New Jersey call your attention to it and urgently request that you contact the governor, your state senator and two Assembly members and deliver the following message: "I am opposed to legislation which funds construction of the Stem Cell Institute and (embryonic) stem cell research grants."

It's critical to send that message as quickly and as clearly as possible because a bill - S1471 - which provides $150 million to fund the institute which would be run by Rutgers University and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and $50 million to another facility run by Rutgers and the Coriell Institute for Medical research, was released from the Senate Budget Committee March 6.

Again, it's important to stress that the Catholic bishops support stem cell research that doesn't rely on the destruction of human embryos. Since great medical strides are being made daily in the field of adult (non-embryonic) stem cell research, it's so very hard to understand why the powers that be can't sit down like adults and discuss the possibility of limiting the research to the use of non-embryonic cells.

Pending that dialogue, it's only natural that the bishops and millions of people philosophically, ethically and morally opposed to the use of embryonic cells remain adamantly against having their money - yes, their money - used for such objectionable research.

In written testimony to the Senate Budget Committee March 6, William F. Bolan Jr., executive director of the N.J. Catholic Conference, once again stressed that the legislation as written raises profound moral questions.

Not the least of those questions, Bolan stressed, "is whether state government should subsidize and force morally opposed taxpayers to subsidize research that requires the destruction of human life."

He noted that the bishops remain supportive of the use of non-embryonic cells that come from adult tissue, placentas or umbilical cord blood which can be retrieved without harming the donor.

"Adult (non-embryonic) stem cells have helped thousands of patients, and new clinical uses expand almost weekly," Bolan testified. "After two decades of research, embryonic stem cells have not helped a single human being. (See, for example, www.stemcellresearch.org)

"Thus, the burdens of those failures are being placed on the backs of the taxpayers in New Jersey," Bolan wrote. "As Daniel Callahan of The Hastings Center has observed, since venture capitalists are not willing to invest, researchers look to the government for money since 'taxpayers can more easily bear the cost of economic failure'."

He ended his testimony urging the governor and the Legislature to unite in support of promising medical research that everyone can live with.

To join the bishops in this effort please contact the governor by telephone at 609-292-6000; Fax (609) 292-3454, or e-mail at www.state.nj.us/governor/govmail.html

If you don't know who your senator or Assembly members are, call the Office of Legislative Services at 800-792-8630 or go to the Legislative Website at www.njleg.state.nj.us