More Humane Medicine: A Liberal Catholic Bioethics

Rating:
Summary: Winner of the "Outstanding Book of the Year Award"
Review: James F. Drane provides a very refreshing look at all the major moral issues in contemporary medicine: issues of life and death, scientific research, technology, sexuality, and justice. He looks at issues in contemporary medicine from a distinctly Catholic Natural Law perspective, and from that perspective provides an alternative way of understanding what is and what is not morally acceptable. This book is both distinctly Catholic and distinctly different in its reasoned arguments from official Church teachings on many topics. Drane shows that many of the moral stands of today's Church officials, on issues like birth control, abortion, euthanasia, withdrawal of nutrition and hydration, etc., are not the only way of formulating a truly Catholic moral teaching. He provides an alternative ethical perspective that is very convincing and badly needed.

Drane's work will make an excellent classroom text. He is successful in crafting moral stands which many students will find respectable. But, he aspires to do more. He wants to overcome the polarization in today's Church between conservatives and liberals. He uses medicine and moral issues in medicine to bring left and right together. His way of understanding the moral problems of contemporary culture would help to keep this generation of young Catholics from falling away from the Church. He gives the term "Catholic" a broader, richer, more open and more attractive meaning.