“Making Sense of Bioethics” CMS – The National Catholic Bioethics Center
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column # 221 : Catholic Hospitals and “Gender Reassignment” for Minors? October 30, 2024Catholic hospitals may never condone or participate in... the range of practices coming under the heading of “gender transition.” This is especially important when these involve offering puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, "top surgeries" and "bottom surgeries” to children and young people.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #220 : Evaluating Medical Use of Marijuana During Pregnancy August 30, 2024Cannabis use during pregnancy and lactation raises the prospect of adversely affecting not only neurodevelopment, but also subsequent neuropsychiatric, behavioral and executive functioning of the child.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #219 : Contextualizing Near-Death Experiences June 28, 2024... we should generally prefer a natural explanation for a phenomenon, unless and until the evidence for a supernatural explanation becomes truly compelling or overwhelming.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #218 : The Most Serious Miscalculation of All? May 23, 2024In considering our own death, we may entertain a strong wish that there be no more sufferings on the other side, especially when it comes to justifying our decision to engage in physician-assisted suicide. Simply having such a wish, however, does not actually make it so.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #217 : Poking the Hornet’s Nest of IVF March 29, 2024IVF involves at least two major moral problems —the ‘collateral damage problem’ and the ‘intrinsic problem.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #216 : Surrogacy and Child Trafficking February 29, 2024Surrogacy involves a form of “trafficking” of children, implying that children are being bought and sold, treated as property and often transported across international borders, which, all in all, sums up many contemporary aspects of surrogacy.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #215 : The Ethics of Neuroimplants and Brain-Computer Interfaces October 24, 2023Brain-Computer Interfaces could offer important medical and therapeutic uses in the future, they also are poised for dubious or clearly immoral uses.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #214 : Genetic Privacy- Should Law Enforcement Have Access to Your Newborn’s Blood? July 31, 2023Our DNA and our genetic code contains important personal information about us. This means that our individual ‘bio-informatics’ should not be used or brokered by others without our awareness and consent.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column #213 : Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria and the Tragic Seduction of Our Daughters June 30, 2023Sex touches us at a deeper level than other activities, binding us to another. It speaks a language not of autonomy, but of communion and enduring self-gift.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 212: What About Synthetic Embryos? May 31, 2023A great deal is at stake in these kinds of synthetic embryo experiments that threaten to manipulate and destroy human life.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 211 : Setting a Moral Vision as Parents April 28, 2023Setting a moral vision for one's children can be a Herculean task requiring enormous dedication.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 210 : Suicidal Fears and Authentic Accompaniment March 31, 2023We need to care for them in a more truthful way — accompanying, supporting, and helping them to address underlying issues — so they can begin to find real healing.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 209 : Holding the Line on Brain Death February 28, 2023Even to be “slightly alive” is still to be alive. If the language of the UDDA ends up being changed to allow for a declaration of brain death even with continued hypothalamic functioning, individuals who are not-quite-dead will be treated as if they were already dead.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 208 : Young Women Giving Themselves Away For Nothing January 31, 2023When young women immodestly display their feminine attributes and participate in pornography, they end up objectifying themselves, trivializing their sexuality, and harming their interpersonal relationships.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 207 : Dissolving the Dead December 30, 2022We can ask whether alkaline hydrolysis or liquification of the human body meets the standard of reverent treatment of our earthly remains.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 206 : Did I Make the Right Choices as Dad was Dying? November 30, 2022We need to “lovingly support our family members through the dying process and to make careful and morally correct decisions on their behalf as they decline in health.”Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 205 : Seeking the Spiritual Side of Dementia October 28, 2022As the symptoms and complications of dementia unfold, the challenges we face from the disease can unexpectedly become an invitation from God.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 204: Psychedelic Drugs and New Mental Health Treatments September 30, 2022Although these powerful psychoactive substances can be abused for their hallucinogenic/psychedelic properties, several strategies can help assure their therapeutic use in an ethically-sound way for the treatment of mental illness.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 203: Homosexual Men and Chaste Friendships May 31, 2022Cultivating a chaste heart demands a deep prayer life, strong spiritual support, and good fellowship, not to mention frequent reception of the sacraments…Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education
- Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 202: A Great Nation Begins to Come to Its Senses April 29, 2022As new legal initiatives begin appearing on state legislative dockets, Americans will have an opportunity to mount a full court press to bring abortion to an end in their home states.Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of Education