For the unity of the person

“Dialogue is aimed not at reaching a consensus”, but “at working so that minds may, in debating with each other, formulate paths that may always lead to progress”, said Archbishop Pierre d’Ornellas of Rennes, chairman of the Work Group on Bioethics set up by the French Bishops’ Conference in autumn 2007. The archbishop was commenting on the Church’s commitment to informing and raising the awareness of public opinion on bioethical questions through a book, a DVD, and a blog open to all French citizens, who can dialogue with each other and interact with various experts on bioethics on the website www.bioethique.catholique.fr. On 4 February the Elysée launched a national process of consultation, the “States General (Etats Generaux) of Bioethics”, defined by the Minister of Health Roselyn Bachelot-Narquin as “an unprecedented democratic event” because it permits a debate to be begun at the national level with a view to the reform of the Law on Bioethics of 2004, due to take place between the end of 2009 and the first quarter of 2010. The new provision will have to take account, explained the Minister, “of constant scientific progress and the evolution of society and states of mind”.The national consultation will be held till June 2009: to coincide with this process the French Agency for Biomedicine has since 16 February activated its own website www.etatsgenerauxdelabioethique.fr on which it is possible to consult relevant documents, the calendar of events and the contribution of visitors: experts, ordinary citizens, representatives of the religious confessions and exponents of the various currents of thought. The materials, collected and classified, will then be brought to the three citizens’ forums planned to be held in June with the participation of experts, philosophers, jurists, sociologists, moral philosophers, representatives of faiths and associations: the first in Marseilles on 9 June, the second at Rennes on 16 June, and the third at Strasbourg also on 16 June. A final colloquium in Paris on 23 June will conclude the public debates with a synthesis of the forums. Seven particular bioethical issues will be reflected on in the context of the planned reform of the law: research on the embryo; removal and transplant of organs, tissues and cells; modalities for the expression of consent in research protocols; the principle of the inviolability of the human body; medical assistance in procreation; the development of predictive medicine; and extension of recourse to prenatal diagnosis and preimplant diagnosis.The Church’s commitment. “All Catholics are invited to participate in the debate – says Mgr. d’Ornellas -. What’s at stake here is so important for the society we wish to build that only a mutually respectful dialogue, which takes into account what there is in the depths of each person, can lead to a proper French approach to bioethics”. To this end, various awareness-raising meetings are being promoted in the dioceses with the participation of experts in law, biomedicine and theology, appointed by the bishops. In recent months, the Work Group of the Bishops’ Conference has also held auditions with experts in bioethics and brought together a score or so Catholics involved in the bioethical field: the first result of this consultation was a dossier compiled for the plenary of the Bishops’ Conference in April 2008. That was followed by the volume “Bioethics, proposal for a dialogue” which tackled the above-cited issues debated with a view to the legislative reform, and by the DVD and the blog. With the title “Life in discussion. Bioethics with reference to the Gospel”, the DVD has been available in bookshops since 1st March and offers various reflections of physicians and experts, and also testimonies in the field of obstetrics, associations of handicapped children, and assisted conception. The blog in turn proposes each week a reflection written by an expert, on which anyone is free to intervene.With a view to the common good. According to Monsignor Pierre Leveneur, professor of civil law at the Faculty of Assas, “in response to the emergence of subjective rights and the cries of individual sufferings” we need to reconsider “the civil law, its mission and its role with a view to the common good”. “If legislating on bioethics seems legitimate – warns the jurist -, the multiplication of exceptions” risks “weakening inviolable principles such as that of the protection of the embryo”. “What kind of man do we wish? What society do we intend to build? What place do we intend to give to fragility in a society ‘of performance’ like our own?” asks Mgr. Gérard Defois, Archbishop emeritus of Lille and one of the seven bishops of the Work Group. He points out that the law must “be defensive and restrictive”, establish “the goal we wish to achieve”, balance the interests of everyone, define firm points “of humanity”, and also have the “moral task” of “pursuing the common good”. According to Xavier Lacroix, member of the National Committee for Ethics, the Church should safeguard “the unity of the human person” and the “principle of vulnerability” in order to be “the voice of the voiceless”.