Theology and Medicine – serie

Religious beliefs and attitudes have long been recognized as playing an important role in sexual functioning, but the relationship between religion and sexual behaviour has rarely been studied in a comprehensive way. The essays in this volume bring the views of sex counsellors, therapists, theologians and bioethicists to bear on the relationship between religion and sexuality. A major theme emerging from these esasys is that religion and counselling need to learn from one another. Religious traditions, at the popular or theological levels, are often marked by ignorance and misinformation about sexuality and can benefit by the insights of those who work closely with patients in medical and counselling settings. Counsellors, in turn, need to develop a sensitivity to past and present religious attitudes toward sexuality in order to assist their patients achieve sexual health.

What does religion or the religious traditions have to contribute to the discussion and resolution of contemporary bioethical issues? Each of the 15 essays written for this volume addresses this question by treating a limited area within the volume's title area, "Religious Methods and Resources in Bioethics". The essays keep in touch with the very concrete and specific nature of bioethics by illustrating their points with selected bioethical problems or cases. Some discuss the basic resources, methods and/or presuppositions which characterize the approach to bioethical issues of an entire tradition or a significant element thereof. Traditions represented include Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Islam and Judaism. Other authors, while working primarily within their own traditions, most frequently in this section in Christian thought and practice, address methodological issues which arise in a number of traditions. Such matters include casuistry, feminism, principalism and its rivals, virtue ethics, and the issue of ethics' impartial rationality. A final group addresses methodological questions within a given tradition.These include the use of scripture and of non-canonical authoritative documents, and the role of religious practices in Christian bioethical thinking, and the use of "responsa" in the Jewish tradition. This volume should be of interest to any persons, beyond beginning undergraduate levels, concerned about religious contributions to bioethical issues.

Efforts to evaluate the clinical encounter, in terms of autonomous agents governed by rationally justified moral principles, continue to be criticized. These essays, written by physicians, ethicists, theologians and philosophers, examine various models of the clinical encounter emerging out of these criticisms and explore the prospects they offer for theological and religious discourse. Individual essays focus on the reformulation of covenant models; revisions of principles approaches; and topics such as power, authority, narrative, rhetoric, dialogue, and alterity. The essays display a range of conclusions about whether theology articulates generally accessible religious insights or is a tradition-specific discipline. Hence the volume reflects current debates in theology while analyzing current models of the clinical encounter. Students, professionals, and scholars who find themselves at the intersection of theology and medicine should find this book of value.

Despite reservoirs of moral discourse about duties in religious communities, professional care-giving traditions, and philosophical perspectives, the dominant moral language in contemporary biomedical ethics is that of "rights". This text begins to correct such imbalance in our ethical language through theoretical expositions of the ideas of duty and of the "other", and by applied exemplifications of particular duties to identified others that arise in the context of health care. A pronounced multidisciplinary orientation informs this analysis of our moral call to respond to the needs of others. The essays in this volume offer an intellectual freshness through a continual engagement of theological, professional, and philosophical understandings of the duties that arise in our relationships with others in medicine, nursing, and social contexts. "Duties to Others" provides provocative challenges about the terrain of our moral world for both students and professionals in biomedical ethics, medicine, philosophy, and theology.

The vulnerability of the ill highlights the importance of trust in physician/patient relationships. Previous work in theological ethics on the fiduciary principle or the virtue of trust has not fully appreciated the effect on relations between physicians and patients of a professional and organizational frame of reference grounded in the image of the physician as keeper of knowledge and expertise. In recent years, these relationships have been characterized by an economy of domination in which the physician or patient secures his or her autonomy at the expense of the other; trust becomes a commodity bartered betweenself-interested parties. As a result, the profession's traditional declaration of a commitment to the patient's interests is becoming illusory. If God is envisioned as a presence enriched by relationship with humans, trust-as-faith or a commitment to trust in spite of our vulnerability becomes the basis for social relationships of mutual dependency and a model for the physician/patient relationship. The book should be of interest to moral philosophers, physicians, religious ethicists, and theologians.It is suitable for use as a textbook and as supplementary reading in graduate courses in philosophy of medicine, theological ethics, and medical ethics.

This work deals with the relevance of "embodiment" to bioethics, considering both the historical development and contemporary perspectives on the mind-body relation. The emphasis is on the importance of the body in defining personal identity as well as on the role of social context in shaping experience of the body. Among the perspectives considered are Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, and African-American. Feminist concerns are important throughout.

This volume examines the work of four Christian theologians who have influenced the field of bioethics in the United States: Richard McCormick; Paul Ramsey; Stanley Hauerwas; and James M. Gustafson. Each theorist's writings are explored in turn, in order to compare and contrast their foundational theological premises, their particular approaches to moral reasoning, and their considered responses to selected medico-moral issues. The final chapter reflects some of the author's own critical responses in dialogue with the study's four subjects, and offers general suggestions about the moral perspective afforded by Christian theology. This volume should be of interest both to those seeking an understanding of contemporary discussions in bioethics and to those studying Christian ethics in the modern era.

This volume is concerned with how we ought to evaluate the individual and collective actions on which the existence, numbers and identities of future people depend. It discusses the "problem of contingent future persons" as it seems that those future persons who are brought into existence by such actions cannot benefit from or be harmed by them in any conventional sense. This is a relatively novel problem in ethics and as yet there is simply no consensus on how we ought to evaluate such actions or, indeed, on whether we can. However, the pursuit of a solution to the problem has been employed by moral philosophers to press the limits of ethics and to urge a reconsideration of the nature and source of value at its most fundamental level. Intended for professional ethicists, policy researchers, and graduate students, this volume explores the theological implications of the problem and advances the investigation of it both in philosophical and in theological terms.

Religious beliefs and attitudes have long been recognized as playing an important role in sexual functioning, but the relationship between religion and sexual behavior has rarely been studied in a comprehensive way. The essays in this volume bring the views of sex counsellors, therapists. theologians, and bioethicists to bear on the relationship between religion and sexuality. A major theme emerging from these essays is that religion and counselling need to learn from one another. Religious traditions, at the popular or theological levels, are often marked by ignorance and misinformation about sexuality and can benefit by the insights of those who work closely with patients in medical and counselling settings. Counsellors, in turn, need to develop a sensitivity to past and present religious attitudes toward sexuality in order to assist their patients achieve sexual health.

What does religion or the religious traditions have to contribute to the discussion and resolution of contemporary bioethical issues? Each of the fifteen essays written for this volume addresses this question by treating a limited area within the volume's title area, Religious Methods and Resources in Bioethics. The essays keep in touch with the very concrete and specific nature of bioethics by illustrating their points with selected bioethical problems or cases. Some discuss the basic resources, methods and/or presuppositions which characterize the approach to bioethical issues of an entire tradition or a significant element thereof. Traditions represented include Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Islam and Judaism. Other authors, while working primarily within their own traditions - most frequently in this section in Christian thought and practice - address methodological issues which arise in a number of traditions. Such matters include casuistry, feminism, principalism and its rivals, virtue ethics, and the issue of ethics' impartial rationality. A final group addresses methodological questions within a given tradition.These include the use of scripture, and of non-canonical authoritative documents, and the role of religious practices in Christian bioethical thinking, and the use of responsa in the Jewish tradition. This volume will be of interest to any persons, beyond beginning undergraduate levels, concerned about religious contributions to bioethical issues.

Efforts to evaluate the clinical encounter in terms of autonomous agents governed by rationally justified moral principles continue to be criticised. These essays, written by physicians, ethicists, theologians and philosophers, examine various models of the clinical encounter emerging out of these criticisms and explore the prospects they offer for theological and religious discourse. Individual essays focus on the reformulation of covenant models; revisions of principles approaches; and topics such as power, authority, narrative, rhetoric, dialogue, and alterity. The essays display a range of conclusions about whether theology articulates generally accessible religious insights or is a tradition-specific discipline. Hence the volume reflects current debates in theology while analysing current models of the clinical encounter. Students, professionals, and scholars who find themselves at the intersection of theology and medicine will welcome these voices in an ongoing conversation.

Despite reservoirs of moral discourse about duties in religious communities, professional caregiving traditions, and philosophical perspectives, the dominant moral language in contemporary biomedical ethics is that of `rights'. Duties to Others begins to correct this imbalance in our ethical language through theoretical expositions of the ideas of duty and of the `other', and by applied exemplifications of particular duties to identified others that arise in the context of health care. A pronounced multidisciplinary orientation informs this analysis of our moral call to respond to the needs of others. The essays in this volume offer a stimulating intellectual freshness through a continual engagement of theological, professional, and philosophical understandings of the duties that arise in our relationships with others in medicine, nursing, and social contexts. Duties to Others provides provocative challenges about the terrain of our moral world for both students and professionals in biomedical ethics, medicine, philosophy, and theology.

Embodiment, Morality and Medicine deals with the relevance of `embodiment' to bioethics, considering both the historical development and contemporary perspectives on the mind--body relation. The emphasis of all authors is on the importance of the body in defining personal identity as well as on the role of social context in shaping experience of the body. Among the perspectives considered are Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, and African-American. Feminist concerns are important throughout.

Contemporary discourse in biomedical ethics has been greatly shaped, sustained and enriched through the insights and perspectives offered by its theologian-contributors. This volume examines the work of four Christian theologians who have significantly influenced the field of bioethics in the U.S.: Richard McCormick, SJ; Paul Ramsey; Stanley Hauerwas; and James M. Gustafson. Each theorist's writings are explored in turn, in order to elucidate, compare and contrast their foundational theological premises, their particular approaches to moral reasoning, and their considered responses to selected medico-moral issues. The final chapter reflects some of the author's own critical responses in dialogue with the study's four subjects, and offers general suggestions about the moral perspective afforded by Christian theology. This volume should be of interest both to those seeking a fuller understanding of contemporary discussions in bioethics and to those studying Christian ethics in the modern era.

This book is about trust and its implications for a medical theological ethics. Beginning with its earliest work, there has been attention to trust running through the bioethics literature in the United States, and much of this discussion has examined its theological elements. Clearly, trust is indispensable when describing the patient-physician relationship, so why is there a need for yet another study? There is no doubt that people generally trust physicians. Traditionally the physician is the patient's fiduciary agent, whose sole obligation is to act only in the patient's best interest. In recent times, however, there is a perception on the part of people within and without health care that physicians have other obligations that compete with their obligation to the patient. If we acknowledge that one price for the successes of technological biomedicine is high in terms of financial cost, another price of Sllccess seems to be distrust, cynicism, and suspicion directed by the public toward the medical profes­ sion. If this uneasiness is the price society pays for medical success, what is the price of success for the doctor? Because of their role within the social order, physicians have claimed and been granted autonomy, authority, and special status. In return, the profes­ sion has pledged to serve the well-being and interests of humankind. This fiduciary commitment becomes a taken-for-granted aspect of the physician's identity, both for the physician for whom this dedication is definitional and for the public which expects trustworthy service from this person.

How ought we evaluate the individual and collective actions on which the existence, numbers and identities of future people depend? In the briefest of terms, this question poses what is addressed here as the problem of contingent future persons, and as such it poses relatively novel challenges for philosophical and theological ethicists. For though it may be counter-intuitive, it seems that those contingent future persons who are actually brought into existence by such actions cannot benefit from or be harmed by these actions in any conventional sense of the terms. This intriguing problem was defined almost three decades ago by Jan Narveson [2], and to date its implications have been explored most exhaustively by Derek Parfit [3] and David Heyd [1]. Nevertheless, as yet there is simply no consensus on how we ought to evaluate such actions or, indeed, on whether we can. Still, the pursuit of a solution to the problem has been interestingly employed by moral philosophers to press the limits of ethics and to urge a reconsideration of the nature and source of value at its most fundamental level. It is thus proving to be a very fruitful investigation, with far-reaching theoretical and practical implications.