Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 187 : The “Quality of Life” Error

Our focus should be on the benefits and burdens of a proposed medical intervention rather than on trying to impose our own conclusion that certain individuals no longer have enough value or meaning in their lives.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJanuary 29, 2021Caring for the Elderly and Infirm, Death and Dying, Disabilities and the Disabled, End-of-Life Issues, Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia, Pain Management-Palliative Care and Hospice

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 186 : Vaccines and Other Entanglements with Abortion

I’m often asked whether sample letters are available to help with writing to vaccine manufacturers who use abortion-derived cell lines.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationDecember 30, 2020COVID-19, Vaccines and Vaccination, Abortion

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 185 : Must Catholics Refuse a COVID-19 Vaccine Made with a Cell Line from an Abortion?

If we end up facing a choice among multiple COVID-19 vaccines of similar or equal safety and efficacy, as appears likely, it will clearly be preferable to choose alternatives with a better ethical profile.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationNovember 30, 2020COVID-19, Vaccines and Vaccination, Conscience, Abortion

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 184: Should I Get Vaccinated?

When a vaccine is determined to be safe and effective, it will often make sense for healthy individuals to choose, on their own initiative, to get immunized.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationOctober 30, 2020COVID-19, Vaccines and Vaccination, Conscience Rights, Fetal Tissue Harvesting

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 183: Is Mandating a COVID-19 Vaccine Ethical?

Coercion through a universal vaccine mandate raises ethical concerns, especially when appropriate exemptions are unavailable.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationSeptember 30, 2020COVID-19, Vaccines and Vaccination, Conscience and Civil Liberties

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 182: COVID-19 Vaccine Myths

…we shouldn’t argue against vaccines in ways that make neither ethical nor scientific sense.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationAugust 28, 2020Vaccines and Vaccination, COVID-19

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 181: Tragedies in Human Medical Experimentation

Many questioned how such ethically offensive research could have continued unabated for so many decades.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJuly 30, 2020Eugenics, Research

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 180: Language — Veiling or Unveiling Moral Truth?

The careful hijacking of language by purveyors of wrongdoing is a widely-deployed tactic in the battle for the soul of every culture.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJune 30, 2020Human Sexuality, Imposing Our Beliefs, Natural Law, Universal Morality, Conscience, Bodily Enhancement-Mutilation, Medical Profession — Ethics and Pastoral-Spiritual

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 179: Spiritual Lessons from the Pandemic

While scientists may promise new treatments, and politicians may promise safety through contact tracing and lockdowns, these measures are stopgaps in the face of our larger human questions.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationMay 30, 2020COVID-19, Suffering

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 178: Accelerating Vaccine Development

Vaccines are real “game changers” in public health. As a society, we must continue to insist that vaccine development and production be held to the highest ethical standards.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationApril 30, 2020COVID-19, Vaccines and Vaccination, Research Ethics, Fetal Tissue Harvesting, Research

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 177: Thinking Through the Rationing of Ventilators

When ventilators are in short supply, several key ethical principles can assist clinicians.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationMarch 30, 2020COVID-19, Ventilators, Death and Dying, End-of-Life Issues, Proportionate and Disproportionate Means

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 176: A Hundred Love Letters

Each of our loving human gestures speaks volumes about the singular power of love to overcome fear, and to strengthen us in adversity.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationFebruary 28, 2020Death and Dying, Suffering, Caring for the Elderly and Infirm, Pain Management-Palliative Care and Hospice, Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 175: Christian Girls and Abortion

Mothers and fathers may have never discussed the possibility of an unplanned pregnancy to let their children know ahead of time that, even if they act contrary to their advice and conceive a child, they will still be there for them.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJanuary 30, 2020Abortion, Human Sexuality, Parenting, Premarital Sex, Sex Education, Cooperation in Evil

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 174: The Foxes and the Henhouse

There are few, if any, ‘bottom lines’ when it comes to research ethics. The lines have become exceedingly flexible, if the price is right or if a particular political administration wants to redraw them.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationDecember 30, 2019Genetics and Genome Editing, Imposing Our Beliefs, Law and Ethics, Science and Religion, Universal Morality, Cooperation in Evil, Research

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 173: Medicine and a Sense of the Sacred

We need to attend carefully to the graced realities we regularly handle lest we end up squandering or losing our sense of the sacred.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationNovember 30, 2019Abortion, Caring for the Elderly and Infirm, Death and Dying, Disabilities and the Disabled, Imposing Our Beliefs, Universal Morality, Sacraments, Medical Profession — Ethics and Pastoral-Spiritual, Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 172: Pushing Back Against Evil

We need to recognize how God has entrusted to each of us a small garden that he asks us to tend.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationOctober 30, 2019Universal Morality, Cooperation in Evil, Conscience, Imposing Our Beliefs

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 171: Palliative Sedation While Approaching Death

When we find ourselves nailed to our hospital bed, it can become an important personal moment for us to engage the possibility of a spiritual transformation opening before us.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationSeptember 30, 2019Caring for the Elderly and Infirm, Death and Dying, Pain Management-Palliative Care and Hospice, Proportionate and Disproportionate Means, Suffering, End-of-Life Issues

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 170: Contradictory Suicide Messaging

The moral outrage and public reaction to Michelle’s behavior reveals a striking irony at the heart of Conrad’s suicide, namely, that similar indignation about encouraging someone to commit suicide is almost entirely absent when it comes to “physician-assisted” suicide.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationAugust 30, 2019Law and Ethics, Suffering, Universal Morality, Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 169: An Authentic Democracy

Even as we benefit from the blessings of liberty, we can fall prey to erroneous conceptions about the meaning of freedom, as the rights of some begin to be subtly elevated over the rights of others.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJuly 30, 2019Abortion, Imposing Our Beliefs, Law and Ethics, Voting and Ethics

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 168: Securing Authentic Children's Rights

Notwithstanding rapidly changing social mores, a truly civilized society will never prioritize the desires of adults ahead of the innate rights of vulnerable children.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJune 30, 2019Artificial Insemination, In Vitro Fertilization, Surrogacy, Parenting, Same Sex Parenting

“Making Sense of Bioethics” CMS