The Stewardship of human dignity

1
The Stewardship of human dignity

• Bioethical application of the principle of
  stewardship

2
Playing God?

• Interviewer
• Are you not playing God?
• Craig Venter
• Oh, we are not playing

• Craig Venter was listed in Time Magazines 2008
  as one the 100 most influential people
• He led the private effort to sequence the human
  genome
• He builds chromosomes from scratch, inserts the
  new chromosomes in bacteria, and then "boots up"
  the organisms.

• What is playing God?
• Is playing God always wrong?

3
The Principle of Stewardship as it is

• Before 1979, almost exclusively referred to
  managerial skills relating to property and income
• Today, to ecological and environmental concerns
• As it is, it is
• too broad to be practical to discern specific
  acts
• what exactly is the difference between dominion
  and domination?

• Dominate the earth and all it contains
• Gn 126 215
• Shamar (Gn 215)
• To preserve, to keep, to watch to maintain
• To dominate is not an absolute power but a
  mission to take care

4
Objective and plan

• Objective
• To present how the principle of stewardship can
  help us to communicate bioethical teachings

• Plan
• A new insight
• Being precise
• Particular application from conception to death
• The core of the Christian message
• The core of religion
• The core of human secular ethics

5
Revising it in the light of the Light

• About ¼ of all the parables in the gospels refer
  to servants
• abad doulos oikonomos
• Servants slaves stewards
• who is the faithful and wise steward?happy that
  servant whom the lord (Lk 242, 43)
• Other parables refer to similar relationships
  tenants, sons, etc.
• Conclusion common denominator in the parables
• Not the sociological meaning,
• but the function, the ethos and the relationship

6
The precision of this principle

• Restrictions (negative)
• By excess abused
• As if one was an absolute owner
• By defect under-used or neglected
• As if one was not given the gift
• Duty (positive)
• Responsible trust
• As the lord would
• All stewards are equal in dignity (status)
• Only one is the lord

• In all these parables, the lord entrusts some
  property with some responsibility to the
  servants-stewards
• Behavior and relationship

7
Particular application

1. Stewards of fertility
2. Stewards of procreation
3. Stewards of the embryo
4. Stewards of the body
5. Stewards at the end of life

8
Stewards of our fertility

• Not absolute lords
• (abuse)
• Fertility is not a disposable property
• that we can dispose of (sterilization,
  contraception)
• that we can borrow it form others (naturally) or
  through technology (IVF, et al)

• Not irresponsible slaves (under-use)
• By living lives as if we were not endowed with
  the gift of fertility
• Fruitful stewards
• Biological or spiritual fertility is a way of
  being our brothers keepers (responsible use)

9
Stewards of procreation

• Responsible use and equality
• Stewards to the future offspring, beget children
  in loving and respectful equality
• Persons deserve to be loved and treated as
  equals in dignity
• But ONLY the sexual act begets individuals of
  equal dignity
• The marital embrace is a sign of marital love
• Human beings respectfully procreate other humans
  only in and through a loving sexual marital act
• Ethical technologies respect the principle of
  stewardship when they help (not substitute) the
  marital embrace to be fertile

• Abuse
• Lords of reproduction will try to produce a
  desired child at any cost (IVF, substitutive
  reproductive technologies)
• Absolute lords PRODUCE people through domineering
  actions

10
Stewards of the embryo

• Abuse
• In deciding to destroy or experiment on an
  embryo, people erect themselves as lords of the
  human embryo
• Equality
• To be stewards of embryos implies to be at their
  service
• To do for them ONLY what is good for them

11
Stewards of the human body

• Abuse
• Lords of their bodies use them as instruments FOR
  the person
• Responsible use
• Stewards serve the body as a dimension OF the
  person
• Application to genetic engineering, organ trade,
  plastic surgery, and others

12
Stewards to the end

• Equality
• Stewards will not judge which life has enough
  quality to deserve to continue to live
• Stewards will not determine who and when one dies
• Stewards will never kill, and will always care
• But stewards will treat when it means caring
  under the guidance of prudence
• be allowed to withdraw or withhold treatment when
  it is disproportionate

• Abuse
• Absolute lords usurp the power of taking their
  own lives or those who consent to be killed

13
Organ donation

• Equality
• Lords will tend to use the vital organ donor for
  the benefit of the recipient by hastening the
  death of the former
• Stewards will not decide on the life of the
  patient or try to measure or judge the dignity of
  the recipient against the dignity of the donor.
• They simply allot resources

14
Other applications

• Environment
• stewards, neither abusive exploiters nor victims
  of a laissez-faire policy
• Only persons are stewards, and should treat only
  other stewards as equals
• Social authority
• serving the common good to serve the people
• Neither a patronizing all for the people without
  the people nor abandoning the people to their
  resources

• Marriage
• Mutual subjection (Eph 5) mutual stewardship
  (sacramental ministers)
• Work
• the subject who works is not an extension of the
  machine
• The worker is never to be used as an instrument
  of production

15
Stewardship echoes in the human heart

1. In the secular heart
2. In the religious heart
3. At the heart of our faith

16
The secular steward

• The Golden Rule
• Treat others as another self ? a principle of
  equality
• Pure practical reason
• Never use a person
• Act in a way that you treat humanity, in your
  own person or in others, as an end and never as a
  means.
• Immanuel Kant
• Principle of stewardship
• Never become a lord to another person
• We are all equally stewards

17
Religion fosters stewardship

• In 1953, Sir Edmond Hillary and Tenzing Norgay
  conquered Mount Everest

• Mr Hillary took several photographs of the
  scenery and of Sherpa Tenzing waving flags
  representing Britain, Nepal, the United Nations
  and India.
• Sherpa Tenzing buried some sweets and biscuits in
  the snow as a Buddhist offering.
• One conquered an enemy the other thanked with
  reverence
• The believer accepts that he remains always a
  subordinate
• Principle of religious stewardship
• We are never lords (only One is)

18
The core of Christian spirituality

• Jesus is the model of servant
• not a servile slave nor an indifferent lord, but
  a responsible brothers keeper
• Beyond stewardship but not without stewardship
• I do not call you servants anymore (Jn 1515)
  
• Slaves are not free, sons are (Jn 833ff)
• Life of the believers
• This is how one should regard us, as servants of
  Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God
  (1Cor 421)
• Spirituality
• Acting as God would act can only be perfect with
  a co-naturality with God (VS 64 II-II 45. 2)

• In the beginning The root of all evil
• to pretend to be like gods without God (cf. Gn
  3)
• In the end The root of redemption
• to be gods with God, like the Son (cf. Jn 1034)

19
What to bring home

• The principle of stewardship is good
• It helps us to understand and communicate our
  relationship with others, with our bodies, as
  well as the medical and scientific duties
• It is reasonable and compatible with other
  religions

• We are not playing
• When we substitute the lord, or erect ourselves
  lords to others, we fail
• When we cooperate responsibly with the Lord, we
  triumph

The End