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Organ Donation: What is the Position of the Catholic Church?

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MIDEAST-ISRAEL-PALESTINIAN-OPERATIONStephen R. Napier PhD, ethicist at the National Catholic Bioethics Center (Philadelphia, USA) gives a 3 minutes explanation of the position of the Catholic Church on Organ donation. This position is first and foremost a positive one. It is considered to be an act of generosity and charity. (Video)

 

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Eight facts about physical and psychological consequences of abortion for women

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depressed-woman1-240x334Contrary to popular opinion abortion hurts women. The UnChoice.com is an evidence-based Elliot Institute campaign to raise awareness about unwanted abortions, post-abortion issues and maternal deaths and to provide help, hope and healing. The US-based Elliot Institute publishes research and educational materials and works as an advocate for women and men seeking post-abortion healing.

The following figures, referenced below from an Elliott Institute publication, are eight evidence-based facts about the consequences of abortion for women’ health.

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The Erosion of Ethics in Organ Transplantation

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zenit-612x300Zenit, ‘the world seen from Rome’, reports from Washington, D.C.: “Caleb Beaver died at age 16 on Christmas Day in 2011 due to a previously undiagnosed congenital malformation of his blood vessels. His devastated parents agreed to the donation of his heart, kidneys, lungs, liver, and pancreas. Several months later, his mother and father were able to meet with the grateful recipient of Caleb’s heart and hear their son’s beating heart in this new body. While the meeting could not erase their grief, the meeting offered Caleb’s parents a small bit of consolation that his death had brought life to someone else. Organ donation can certainly be a supreme act of generosity. Pope John Paul II endorsed organ transplantation in both his encyclical Evangelium Vitae as well as his 2000 address to the 18th International Congress of the Transplantation Society as a way to build up an “authentic culture of life”. However, Pope John Paul II was also careful to insist that this lifesaving technology must be governed by critical ethical principles in order to fulfill its life affirming potential.”

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Conscience and Morality

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Another part of a video series from Wordonfire.org. Father Barron will be commenting on subjects from modern day culture. For more visit www.wordonfire.org


The Pope’s Academy for Life

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If you are interested in biological science and faith, you cannot ignore the existence of an ‘Academy for Life’ created on February 11, 1994 by the leader of the largest religious organisation on the planet, the Roman Catholic Church, pope John Paul II. The academy was established in order to promote ‘the study, information and formation on the principal problems of biomedicine and of law, relative to the promotion and defense of life, above all in the direct relation that they have with Christian morality and the directives of the Church’s Magisterium’.

The first president of the Academy was the famous French professor Jérôme Lejeune, pediatrician and geneticist, best known for his discovery of the link of chromosome abnormalities to Down’s syndrome. The academy has some seventy members named by the pope, who represent different branches of biomedical sciences and those that are closely linked with problems concerning the promotion and defense of life, belong to the academy.

‘The Mystery of Life (“Vitae Mysterium”) and of human life in particular’, as pope John Paul II puts in his Motu Proprio, ‘is attracting the increased attention of experts who are drawn by the extraordinary opportunities for investigation that scientific and technological advances offer their research today. While this new situation opens up fascinating horizons for intervention at the sources of life itself, it also gives rise to a variety of new moral questions that man cannot ignore without the risk of taking steps that could prove irreversible. With this awareness, the Church, … “intends to put forward (…) the moral teaching corresponding to the dignity of the person and to his or her integral vocation.” This is a particularly urgent task in our days (…) as a ‘culture of death’ threatens to take control.”

It is clear that in an era in which abortion, human cloning, experimentation on embryonic stem cells and euthanasia have become common goods, a religious institution as the Roman Catholic Church sheds it’s light on these issues, as a service to mankind in finding the right paths to deal with life as it is given to him. Since 1994, the Academy has been publishing about numerous topics that we will try to summarize on this website.

Links
Pontifical Academy for Life
Motu Proprio of John Paul II

(A document issued Motu Proprio is from the Pope on his own initiative, and not in response to a request or at the  initiative of others. Its legal determinations carry the full force of papal authority, though it does not derogate from existing laws unless specifically stated. It can be any category of document.)


Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services

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imgresIn their ‘Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services’, Fifth Edition, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops states: “Health care in the United States is marked by extraordinary change. Not only is there continuing change in clinical practice due to technological advances, but the health care system in the United States is being challenged by both institutional and social factors as well. At the same time, there are a number of developments within the Catholic Church affecting the ecclesial mission of health care. Among these are significant changesin religious orders and congregations, the increased involvement of lay men and women, a heightened awareness of the Church’s social role in the world, and developments in moral theology since the Second Vatican Council. A contemporary understanding of the Catholic health care ministry must take into account the new challenges presented by transitions both in the Church and in American society. 

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