Already a subscriber? - Login here
Not yet a subscriber? - Subscribe here

Browse by:



Displaying: 1-17 of 17 documents


1. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Edward J. Furton

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

2. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
William L. Saunders

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

essays

3. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Ralph M. McInerny

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
On its release, the Instruction on Respect for Human Life was accused of obstructing the technological enhancement of human life by using slippery slope arguments to impose the Magisterium’s opinion that accepting certain new technologies, like homologous artificial fertilization, would weaken resistance to practices the Church traditionally has opposed. To the contrary, the instruction calls attention to the fact that by using these technologies, we have in principle accepted all sorts of thigs, with or without technology, which are destructive of human life.
4. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Carr J. Smith, Thomas H. Fischer

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
Although conflated in the public mind, science and technology are separate though overlapping enterprises. While technological progress is advancing rapidly, the more philosophically oriented scientific fields are experiencing an epistemological crisis. In the following text, we examine the origins of this epistemological crisis. Although the crisis is multifactorial in origin, with the factors interacting in a nonlinear fashion, several distinct contributors can be identified. These include a decline in confidence in Western culture and a concomitant rise in exaggerated self-criticism, diminution of cause-and-effect relationships, the rise of relative truth, and a transition from an agnostic to an atheistic stance among scientists.
5. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Gary Michael Atkinson

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The aim of this essay is to demonstrate three main points: (1) that many of the widespread appeals made to conscience in the time of COVID display little understanding of conscience’s fundamental nature; (2) that they assume for conscience a sacrosanct status it does not possess; and (3) that because of the first two points, conversation regarding conscience and COVID has generated considerable confusion. In support of these points, this paper (1) shows what conscience is, (2) employs St. John of the Cross’s examination of attachments to suggest that possession of a well-formed conscience is frequently a most difficult achievement, and (3) examines various expressions associated with the COVID debate to illustrate how much of the conversation has stemmed from or resulted in little real understanding.
6. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Teofilo Giovan S. Pugeda III

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
In vitro gametogenesis is the process of deriving gametes from embryonic stem cells or induced pluripotent stem cells. While not as well-known as in vitro fertilization, IVG could lead to more moral issues that would require corresponding responses from the Magisterium. Because IVG remains at the experimental stage, mainly using mice, the Magisterium has not issued any such responses in a document along the lines of Donum vitae and Dignitas personae. This essay situates IVG within Catholic moral teachings for those who are unfamiliar with the teachings of the Church but who are interested in forming their consciences and those of others on what is undoubtedly a peculiar medical technique with many moral ramifications.

articles

7. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Steven Dezort

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
According to the contralife argument, because both contraception and natural family planning (NFP) entail at least a contralife motivation to have marital intercourse but avoid pregnancy, both should be forbidden—a conclusion rejected by the natural law tradition and Church teaching, which forbid contraception but permit NFP. This paper argues that the principle of double effect (PDE) can be applied to explain why contraception is forbidden but NFP is permissible. This double-effect analysis evaluates the good effect of procreation and unity against the bad effect of lustful sexual pleasure. This paper argues that contraception fails to meet the conditions of the PDE, because it intends sexual pleasure in isolation from procreation and unity and is therefore forbidden. Conversely, NFP meets the conditions of the PDE because, as with all permissible sexual intercourse, it intends sexual pleasure in conjunction with procreation and unity and is therefore itself permissible.
8. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Angela Baalmann

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
This essay seeks to establish that Catholic community pharmacists should refuse to verify, dispense, and counsel on hormonal medications used for contraception on the grounds of professional and personal beliefs as these services constitute immoral immediate material cooperation. In this controversial area of patient care, pharmacists are more frequently being called upon to facilitate medication use for contraceptive purposes. Contraceptive acts are believed by some healthcare providers to be morally harmful to a patient’s well-being. Pharmacists who hold beliefs that contraception does not promote positive patient outcomes are professionally bound to refuse immediate cooperation through providing pharmaceutical services related to contraception.
9. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Melissa Moschella

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
Irene Alexander’s article in last spring’s issue of this journal criticizes the new natural law (NNL) account of sexual ethics, including Melissa Moschella’s defense of that view in a previous article also in this journal. Alexander claims that the NNL account adopts an empiricist view of nature and that NNL’s rejection of the perverted faculty argument is contrary to the Magisterium. Here Moschella responds to Alexander’s criticisms by (1) clarifying NNL theorists’ understanding of the distinction between speculative and practical reason through an explanation of Aquinas’s account of the four orders, (2) correcting Alexander’s erroneous portrayal of NNL arguments against contraception, and (3) arguing that the NNL account of sexual ethics is not only in line with magisterial teaching, but offers a better philosophical defense of that teaching than the view Alexander proposes.

verbatim

10. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Pope Pius XII

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

notes & abstracts

11. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Stacy Trasancos

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
12. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Vince A. Punzo

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
13. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Christopher Kaczor

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

book reviews

14. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Lisa Gilbert

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
15. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Brian Welter

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
16. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Colten P. Maertens-Pizzo

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
17. The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly: Volume > 22 > Issue: 1
Francis Etheredge

view |  rights & permissions | cited by