Review of Christianity and Modern Medicine: Foundations for Bioethics

Mark Wesley Foreman and Lindsay C. Leonardo, Christianity and Modern Medicine: Foundations for Bioethics.
Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Academic, 2022.
ISBN: 978-0-8254-4756-3, 384 pages, $29.99.

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What is a human being? This question stands at the center of the interface between Christianity and bioethics. On the one side, Christian theology addresses this question by identifying a human being in relation to the triune God as informed by the redemptive narrative of the Bible. On the other side, bioethics addresses various tensions within modern medicine between poles such as life and death, right and infringement, or therapy and enhancement by taking on some meaningful definition of a human being. There is, therefore, a Christian stake in bioethics. The church has an imperative to clearly lay out a biblical vision of a human being as the principle and the criterion for the determination of bioethical conundrums. One corollary of this imperative is an equally important obligation for the church to investigate the contours of bioethics so that the light of the Gospel may be proclaimed to the domain of modern medicine in an appropriate and effective manner. There is a need for Christians in the modern world to be acquainted with bioethics.

A capable, friendly, and effective answer to this need is found in Christianity and Modern Medicine: Foundations for Bioethics by Mark Wesley Foreman and Lindsay C. Leonard. The book is a survey of the legal and ethical landscape of key domains in bioethics, taken from a Christian standpoint by authors who do not shy away from their Christian commitments in evaluating controversial issues. Its content is based on Foreman’s survey of the ethical landscape in his previous book, Christianity and Bioethics: Confronting Clinical Issues, with an addition of four new chapters covering bioethical principles, procreational ethics, clinical ethics, and research ethics. Leonard complements Foreman in each chapter with a survey of relevant legal events and issues.

The authors begin by equipping readers with basic tools necessary for exploring the world of bioethics. Chapter 1 offers an introductory summary of major ethical theories, as well as a more specific definition of bioethics as “the analysis and study of ethical conflicts and problems which arise due to the interrelationship between the practice of the medical/biological sciences and the rights and values of human beings” (16). Chapter 2 follows by enumerating ethical principles that are particularly relevant for bioethical issues, demonstrating how these principles may be applied as rules for specific contexts or be employed to make ethical judgments for individual situations.

The following four chapters cover various bioethical issues under the theme of life and death. Chapter 3 considers arguments for and against abortion in light of various views on the personhood of a fetus. Central to Foreman’s position on the personhood of a fetus is his claim that “existence must always precede action” (102). Accordingly, he rejects a functionalist definition and opts for a definition of personhood based on the continuum of existence. For Foreman, although a fetus might not be capable of performing various functions unique to a human person, the stage of being a fetus is nevertheless part of the continuum of human existence. Therefore, a fetus is a human person, and there is an ethical duty to do no harm to a fetus.

Similar conclusions are found for other life and death issues. Chapter 4 addresses infanticide the way Chapter 3 addresses abortion. As with abortion, the authors argue that if infants are human persons regardless of their functional capacities, then there is an ethical duty to do no harm to an infant. Euthanasia receives a similar treatment in Chapter 5. As with abortion and infanticide, the principle that existence precedes action deters this practice. Human persons whose certain capacities cease to function are nevertheless human persons, and we have an ethical duty to do no harm to such persons. Physician-assisted suicide, the topic of Chapter 6, introduces the notion of self-determination to the bioethical issue of life and death. That is, unlike abortion, infanticide, and many cases of euthanasia, the subject and the object of bioethical decision are identical. Nevertheless, the principle that we ought to do no harm to human persons holds. Consistent throughout all these chapters is the authors’ conviction that there are better alternatives to death as the solution for these issues.

The next two chapters address bioethical issues pertaining to procreation. Chapter 7 surveys technologies that prevent, enable, or enhance procreation. Much of the ethical tension lies between the claim that these technologies are good gifts of God to humanity on the one hand and the claim that some essential elements of human procreation ought to be left to God and away from human manipulation. Similar tensions are present in Chapter 8, which dives deeper into manipulations of human genes for screening and intervention. In all these issues, the inherent dignity of a human person warns against ethical judgments that reduce procreation to production and commercialization. An additional issue is at stake for Christianity: that of replacing the image of God with images of man. That is, human desires to have a baby, to not have a baby, or to improve a baby ought not to be the highest good when making judgments on these bioethical issues.

The final two chapters consider clinical ethics and research ethics, respectively. These are not as much concerned with the question of what to do as they are with the question of how to do them. Accordingly, there is a shift from a patient-centered perspective to a practitioner-centered perspective. Chapter 9 examines the dynamics of relationships between healthcare workers and patients, providing general principles to guide practitioners as they seek to make ethically sound decisions. Chapter 10 focuses on medical research that involves human experimentation. Special attention is given to embryonic stem cell research, which returns to the principle of the personhood of embryos that was introduced in Chapter 3. In both chapters, emphasis is placed on the moral status of patients and volunteers as human persons, which informs and restrains ways in which medical practitioners proceed with treatment or research.

Overall, Christianity and Modern Medicine: Foundations for Bioethics provides an excellent starting point for all Christians who are interested in addressing bioethical issues from the viewpoint of Christian faith. Its survey of major bioethical issues is comprehensive, with just enough detail to invite its readers to begin making bioethical judgments of their own. The legal section of each chapter is a plus, providing readers with contextual information that gives bioethics a fresh sense of relevance and urgency.