For this issue of Dignitas, we have essays by CBHD executive director Paige Cunningham and guest contributor Ryan Fields. Both articles explore the intersection of bioethics and the church from quite distinct perspectives. While Paige Cunningham presents her quantitative research on the state of bioethical education among clergy in different denominations, Ryan Fields discusses the relationship between idolatry, bioethics, and the church’s witness in an age of flimsy cultural narratives. Hence, the two essays together outline the unavoidability of bioethical issues in ecclesiastical contexts, in theological education, in ministry practice, and in everyday Christian life.
In his article “Sounding Out the Idols,” Ryan Fields explores how the advancing MedTech world might be served by a modern day “prophet of suspicion” calling out various idolatries the church has become comfortable with in our technologically and medically saturated reality. According to Fields, the great critics of Christianity of the 19th century (Freud, Marx, and Nietzsche) served a similar role: as they applied criticisms to the Christian faith that were true all too much of the time, they “sounded out” the idols the church was not able or unwilling to see.
Fields’ project is both theological and pastoral in orientation. He attempts to inquire into areas where Christian engagement with medicine and technology testifies to cultural idolatry (rather than faithful living as the Image of God) and reveals faulty compromises with secular plastic narratives. For instance, if the church adopts a welcoming posture towards new technologies aiming at radical life extension, its actions do not align with its proclamation of resurrection life in Christ and the limitations of existence on this side of eternity. Fields calls his readers to listen to the prophets of secularism speaking within the context of bioethics in order to understand where Christian do not live out their role as the Image of God.
Paige Cunningham’s quantitative study also explores the relationship between bioethics and the church, albeit from a markedly different perspective and focused more exclusively on the pastorate. This work, which originated as a research project during her doctoral studies, closes a gap in both bioethical and practical theological scholarship, namely, an assessment of awareness among clergy regarding bioethical issues by means of a survey in which 173 pastors participated. Those familiar with the work of The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity may recall announcements regarding the research phase of this study a few years back, and we are pleased to see the results of the study now published publically for the first time.
Dr. Cunningham’s research revealed both the necessity for pastors to engage with bioethical issues (over 75% of participating clergy had discussed such issues before) and the reluctance to undergo formal training in matters pertaining to medical ethics. Clergymen appear to primarily use biblical and theological resources in order to deal with the intersection of rising MedTech issues in the everyday life of the church. The results of this preliminary study were used to inform Dr. Cunningham’s research for her doctoral dissertation, and we look forward to the future publication of those findings and additional work in this area to better understand the ways in which bioethical issues are engaged from a pastoral perspective in the years to come.
As Dr. Cunningham notes in her article, bioethics for the Church has been an ongoing interest of the Center, and one that has taken on more prominence as one of the two strategic emphases in our recently announced BioethicsNEXT. With BioethicsNEXT, CBHD is looking to equip a new generation of leaders in the church and the academy, and specifically to help pastors guide their congregations to wisely face difficult decision about medicine, science, and technology. In a future issue of Dignitas, Dr. Cunningham will unpack her vision for these strategic emphases for the coming years of the Center’s work.
Michael J. Sleasman and Mario Tafferner, “Editorial,” Dignitas 25, no. 2 (2018): 1.
