Bioethics in the Ruins of Christendom: Why John Paul II's Diagnosis Requires a More Radical Cure Than May and Colvert Provide

William May’s and Gavin Colvert’s and rich and insightful essays on the moral theology of John Paul II critically diagnose a profound shift in moral commitments within the dominant intellectual culture of western Europe and the United States. As each notes, these changes have been especially prominent in medicine and medical morality. Where abortion had once been forbidden, it is now widely practiced. Where the destruction of human embryos had once been understood as equivalent to murder, it has become more or less routine. Third-party assisted reproduction, such as in vitro fertilization, frequently results in both embryo wastage and elective abortion for fetal reduction. Such practices enjoy legal protection as part of a tradition of procreative liberty and for all practical purposes no longer appear outside of the social norm. Moreover, there exists the expectation that significant medical developments will follow from basic research on human embryos. The dominant secular bioethics simply fails to comprehend the destruction of embryos or fetuses as homicide. Indeed, as May and Colvert are aware, the bioethics dominant in the United States and western Europe frequently lays claim to a universal account of proper moral deportment, including the foundations of law and public policy to guide healthcare decisions and medical research, divorced from traditional Christian moral and religious commitments.