Bioethics in Faith and Practice, Volume 1, Number 1

2 Sullivan ⦁ Welcome to Bioethics in Faith and Practice autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, and distributive justice. This is the view outlined by Beauchamp and Childress in their seminal work, Principles of Biomedical Ethics . 4 The influence of postmodernism has led to an even more radical approach, based on a rejection of absolute truth. Given all of these various trends, the current ethical climate is dominated by autonomy and utilitarianism. In other words, the primary standards for medical decision making are patient choices and outcomes. Christians have much to say to address the void left behind by this rejection of the Ultimate. Yet our voices have been marginalized. We must confront the moral wrongs of the world. Yet the world, steeped in pluralism and postmodernism, may not acknowledge the authority of Scripture. To meet this challenge, we must be thoroughly convinced of our religious ideals and their commitment to the life’s sanctity, but we must also be comfortable with cultural engagement across competing worldviews. We must continue to use the Bible as our one source of absolute truth, but we must also strive to become philosophically “multilingual,” in order to find additional ways to communicate moral truth. An understanding of ethics alone cannot make men good. Ultimately, our sense of values comes from a Higher Source, and is only possible as we are transformed by the Lord who made us. Christians who enter the health professions enter a battlefield strewn with broken and hurting souls, and dare not do so without deep thought and abundant prayer. Bioethics in Faith and Practice , through insightful articles, both theoretical and practical, will endeavor to help in that noble calling. 1 Cameron N. The New Medicine: Life and Death after Hippocrates. Chicago: Bioethics Press; 2001. 2 Ibid. 3 Rae SB, Cox PM. Bioethics: A Christian Approach in a Pluralistic Age. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans; 1999. 4 Beauchamp TL, Childress JF. Principles of biomedical ethics. 7th ed. New York: Oxford University Press; 2013.