Imagining a Future for Religious Bioethics
Bharat Ranganathan, PhD, Beamer-Schneider SAGES Fellow in Ethics, Case Western Reserve University
In concluding his book, The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and Care of the Dying, Jeffrey Bishop proposes that bioethicists might “learn once again not from history—a static past—but from living traditions.” Since they are informed by different understandings of space and time, location and story than naturalism and scientism, Bishop believes religious traditions may be the source of a “humane medicine.” Such a humane medicine thinks together the bodies of patients with their capacities, histories, projects, and purposes, all of which are molded in communities. What might a more humane medicine, caring for our persons and projects, our pasts and futures, look like? In other words, how might we imagine a future for religious bioethics? To be sure, such a bioethics must overcome the reductive and problematic paradigms set forth by naturalism and scientism. Moreover, such a bioethics must take into account the increasingly globalized and pluralistic communities in which we live.
I will begin to develop a framework for religious bioethics. I will proceed as follows. First, I will rehearse Bishop’s criticisms about the reductive and problematic elements of contemporary medicine. In particular, I will highlight how dominant epistemological paradigms ignore our humanity and view us instead as machines needing to be repaired. Then, I will turn to religious ethicist Richard B. Miller’s proposals about religious ethics and medical ethics. I will discuss how living religious traditions provide important moral insights about how we ought to relate to one another as humans in a common endeavor. I will also note the ways in which we might pursue interreligious exchange toward these ends. And finally, to explicate and refine this framework, I will consider cases involving humans with severe cognitive disabilities. For many secular ethicists, such people either lack or slowly lose the characteristics associated with “personhood.” For many religious ethicists, however, severely cognitively disabled people are still capable of non-cognitive well-being. Such views remain deeply contested in ethical debate. Building on Bishop and Miller, I will explore how the voices of living religious traditions might be brought to bear such that we can care for those marginalized members of our human moral community.
I will begin to develop a framework for religious bioethics. I will proceed as follows. First, I will rehearse Bishop’s criticisms about the reductive and problematic elements of contemporary medicine. In particular, I will highlight how dominant epistemological paradigms ignore our humanity and view us instead as machines needing to be repaired. Then, I will turn to religious ethicist Richard B. Miller’s proposals about religious ethics and medical ethics. I will discuss how living religious traditions provide important moral insights about how we ought to relate to one another as humans in a common endeavor. I will also note the ways in which we might pursue interreligious exchange toward these ends. And finally, to explicate and refine this framework, I will consider cases involving humans with severe cognitive disabilities. For many secular ethicists, such people either lack or slowly lose the characteristics associated with “personhood.” For many religious ethicists, however, severely cognitively disabled people are still capable of non-cognitive well-being. Such views remain deeply contested in ethical debate. Building on Bishop and Miller, I will explore how the voices of living religious traditions might be brought to bear such that we can care for those marginalized members of our human moral community.