In this episode we talk with Dr Dan Fleming, group manager of ethics and formation for St Vincent’s Health Australia. We discuss Catholic bioethics in end-of-life care, the Sydney Archbishops' letter to the Prime Minister regarding the ethics of the Oxford COVID vaccine, and the need for careful and attentive communication.
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Undisciplinary - a podcast that talks across the boundaries of history, ethics, and the politics of health.
Follow us on Twitter @undisciplinary_ or email questions for "mailbag episodes" undisciplinarypod@gmail.com
In this episode we talk with Dr Dan Fleming, group manager of ethics and formation for St Vincent’s Health Australia. We discuss Catholic bioethics in end-of-life care, the Sydney Archbishops' letter to the Prime Minister regarding the ethics of the Oxford COVID vaccine, and the need for careful and attentive communication.
Audio Clips and Art
References
Undisciplinary - a podcast that talks across the boundaries of history, ethics, and the politics of health.
Follow us on Twitter @undisciplinary_ or email questions for "mailbag episodes" undisciplinarypod@gmail.com
Christopher Mayes: Welcome to Undisciplinary, a podcast where we're talking across the boundaries of history ethics and the politics of health.
Today we are recording today on the unceded land of the Wathaurong and Wurundjeri peoples of the Kulin Nation in Geelong and Melbourne.
And I'm joined as always by my co host Courtney Hempton.
Courtney Hempton: Hello.
Christopher Mayes: And Courtney, what are we talking about today?
Courtney Hempton: Today we are talking about some theological issues in Australia, and particularly relation to pandemic ethics, and today we are delightfully joined by Dr Dan Fleming.
Dan is the group manager of ethics and formation for St Vincent’s Health Australia, and this is a role which sees him leading ethics education, advice, and strategy, as well as supporting formation across the St Vincent's Health Australia network.
Dan is also a Fellow in the Law, Health and Justice Research Centre in the Faculty of Law at the University of Technology Sydney, a Senior Lecturer in Theology and Ethics with the Sydney College of Divinity, and an Adjunct Lecturer for the Institute of Ethics and Society at the University of Notre Dame, Australia. So welcome Dan.
Dan Fleming: Thanks, Courtney and thanks, Chris. It's a joy to be with you here.
Courtney Hempton: So Dan, your research is rather undisciplinary, as we like to call such things for pod purposes. So you hold a PhD in moral philosophy and theology, you've published widely in the areas of moral philosophy, theological ethics, moral and religious education, and theology, and your research really attends to the interdisciplinary work between these fields, and you variously draw and continental philosophy, ethics and moral theology.
So as a starting point, I guess I'm just wondering if you want to expand on your interdisciplinary or ‘undisciplinary’ approach to research and ethics?
Dan Fleming: Yeah. Thanks, Courtney and I love the term undisciplinary it's the most complimentary way anyone's ever put that.
It seems a little messy, when you look at the CV, but somehow it's all come through together. So for me this this journey starts a long way back, and it starts in my undergraduate degree, where I was doing a Bachelor of Theology, but majoring in biblical studies, and so that means in the context of studying the texts in their original context and dabbling a little bit in the old languages; for me it was Greek studying the New Testament texts in that. Which gave me a real appreciation of understanding things in their context and trying to appreciate what the meaning meant for those who originally wrote the texts. But my interest has always been kind of the next level of that which is, well, what, what does this mean for people today, so I have a particular interest in how worldviews, particularly, but not only religious worldviews show up in in ethical commitment. So the commitments we make around what kind of people were going to be or what kind of decisions were going to make in a particular moment in time, and I predominantly write and think out of the Catholic ethical tradition, but that tradition in itself has a heavy focus on the combined sources of ethical insight, which come from both faith and reason, so it tends to dialogue, a lot with different philosophies and worldviews to. When it's at its best, sometimes like or religious traditions, it can get into a bit of a internal facing kind of silo mentality as well.
So that kind of led to a an honours in a PhD in in Theological Ethics, but with a heavy dose of philosophy as well. And as you indicated there, a substantive focus of that for me was on continental philosophy. So I studied in depth of thought of Emmanuel Levinas, and I tried to bring him into dialogue with Catholic ethical teaching on conscience, which is something I'm sure we'll come back up, back to in our conversation today, but also virtue ethics and natural law theory, so really that work tried to pull together all of these sources of deep ethical insight and understand what they might teach us about a methodology for doing ethics.
So ultimately that came out in a book recently called Attentiveness to Vulnerability, and that was the heart of the finding was that at the centre of ethical, of all ethical considerations is a deep attentiveness to the vulnerabilities that play so that we can avoid some of the evils that that Levinas spoke about in his work, having written as a as a Jewish man post- the Second World War and post- the Holocaust.
So that kind of leads me in my work into a focus on conscience and how conscience itself functions to, I suppose, start and stimulate that attentiveness to vulnerability and how that, I don't know spurring on of conscience, you might say, how that sense of moral commitment which is very demanding in the thought of Levinas and also in certain aspects of Catholic theological ethics, how that spurs on a particular way of doing ethics. And I'm also interested in how conscience is formed. So, we don't kind of arrive on the scene with ready, set answers to many of the ethical conundrums we find ourselves in. We have to search for them, and whatever communities we belong to help us to do that search, and they form us they teach us, they help us to notice things we might not have otherwise noticed.
So that led to a whole lot of work on moral education and then eventually, after some time in the tertiary education sector. St Vincent's or the opportunity at some instance came up to do this kind of work within a health care system, and a health care system which I think represents the best of the Catholic ethical tradition,when it comes to health and aged care, alive and well. And and tries to uphold the commitments of the ethical tradition. And so my role now is kind of a combination of education, some thought leadership, which, ongoing writing and publishing and all those kinds of things, a little bit of teaching here and there, and also helping the organisation to think about strategy and then from time to time support on when a complex case comes up in our health services which, which does happen with some regularity and we've got a number of different ethical resources to help with that. So, undisciplinary yes but hopefully a kind of pathway, which has led to a good contribution today.
Christopher Mayes: Okay. Excellent. Thanks, Dan. That's really really fascinating to get that background and, you know, there's lots of different avenues like to ask questions on particularly, my own interest in continental philosophy and its potential or under utilised uses in ethical thinking and reflection, but something a bit more mundane, but also I think quite interesting to the history of these developments of ethics in hospital spaces is, what you were mentioning then towards the end about your role at St Vincent's, and I think while it's relatively common in the US to have the influence of clinical ethicists, and ethicists based in hospital environments, it's not something that has been widespread or as widespread in Australian and hospitals, particularly Australian public hospitals. Yet, as you point out some Vincent's has taken on this, this initiative and this role of the ethicist in the hospital environment and so I’d be interested to hear a little more about not just your role, but perhaps the, the institutional norms that have seen the, the valuing and the need to have emphasis in the hospital context.
Dan Fleming: Yeah. Thanks, Chris. It's a, um, it is a new move in Australia, and it comes out of a, our health and aged care services, the Catholic health and age care services in Australia have been so very well and continue to be so very well by consultant ethicists, who are called on by the services to support and come in and help often in complex cases. Often these ethicists will sit on research ethics committees or bioethics committees at our different hospitals and so on. And really offer their expertise to the work at hand.
And one of the things that, that the manager I now report to at St Vincent’s, Dr Lisa McDonald, started to see in our services, was that our consultant ethicists were being called in to do work, which was really foundational work, formative work. And that's why that word formation is in my title as well, and in such a way that you know as our as our staffing based changes and as a whole diversity of people come into work in our organisation which we absolutely love, whereas once upon a time there was akind of a common sense of what our ethical tradition was and what that meant for the way in which we delivered care, and at least the basics might have been in place. Today, it's quite different. Because, understandably, we have staff from many, many different persuasions, many different worldviews, and so on, who are actually committed to what it is we do, but might not have had the opportunity to engage with some of the ethical reflection that, that we would want to be a part of our, our service delivery all the time. And so what Lisa recognised was that, if we were going to continue to do this work well and bring our ethical tradition alive in a rigorous way going into the future, then it would be important for the organisation to have someone internal who's doing this work as well. So doing a lot of education from the ground up, accompanying this, the health and age care services as they go through their discernment about what it is they should do and so on.
And it's led to some really beautiful fruits. And I mean, my favourite example of this is I get to do work frequently with our Chief Financial Officers from around the network, which happens because I'm a member of the family, and I can be called in regularly to help that group of people think about the ethical questions that come up in their roles as leading the finances of the organisation. But also to, to do that in a way as not somebody from the outside coming in but somebody who's part of the community. And I can get to know them over time and build up understanding over time, which ultimately, I mean that the goal is really to embed this really deeply into the culture of St Vincent’s.
Christopher Mayes: And has the I mean, because historically the emergence of bioethics or medical ethics was something, while some doctors were certainly at the forefront of wanting to bring, ethicists, health lawyers etc into the medical space, there were also many of the major medical institutions or, or associations were less keen about this intrusion from outsiders. So it's interesting, you're talking about being an insider in in the St Vincent’s community but, has there been, at least initially, or do you still get from time to time doctors or healthcare professionals, whether resenting, or, or perhaps less keen to have this ethical input or formation, or may feel that they've already fully ethically formed
Dan Fleming: It is a wonderful question, Chris. And actually, a lot of people said that to me before I started. You know, they said, oh, be careful of this that and the other group, because they're not going to want to kind of hear what you have to say. I haven't really experienced that I have to be honest. And part of that I think is this, the style and methodology I bring, so harking back to the intro before, a lot of my work in moral education demonstrates that really that the best way to, to undergo the task of conscience formation is, is to build up trust first of all. And I think some of that suspicion around ethics has been from people of good conscience and good intention, who have felt like sometimes ethicists charge in and don't really get it, and put down some impossible mandate that isn't really responsive to the context in which they're delivering, whereas, at least in my experience so far the groups, which I've been engaging with very, very heavily, we've, we've taken the time to build trust. They've taken the time to get to know what it is that I do, and I'm given the time to be able to understand their work, and ultimately that leads to a much more rigorous approach to whatever ethical issue might be at play now. There may be resistance here and there. And of course, we still have our debates and so on. But the reality is that it happens, with the sense of being part of one community and committed to a common goal, rather than with the sense of, of somebody coming in from nowhere and being the iron fist or something like that. And I actually think that this has also helped even our consultant ethicists, because it builds a proper bridge to their work and they don't feel like they're having to come in right at the last minute either when things are really complicated, or when a process is already underway, because some of that foundational work has already been done. So look, ask me again in the in a year, and I might have a different kind of story to tell you, but I haven't really faced that kind of resistance yet.
Courtney Hempton: Dan, just perhaps building on that, you mentioned the importance of addressing, you know, ethical and social issues as they arise from within, or kind of as part of these communities. So a couple of the kind of bigger projects that you've worked on recently, so you led the Catholic Health Australia response to the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act in Victoria, and that was a collaborative response among all Catholic health and aged care services in Victoria, and you're also currently co leading a project through Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church, and that's addressing, or trying responding to the crises of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church through the discipline of theological ethics. So I'm just wondering if you might expand on what you're just talking about, I guess the approach to addressing some of these issues as perhaps as a member of, of those communities that are being impacted?
Dan Fleming: Thanks, Courtney. Yes, sure. Perhaps if we start with the response to the voluntary assisted dying legislation. These are two quite different areas of operation. But in terms of methodology there are some, some real similarities. I think one of the, it came as a surprise, the leading of the Catholic Health Australia task force. So I was not long in my position at St Vincent's, and I was asked to lead that task force. And in fact, first I said no, and kind of hung up the phone, because I thought, my goodness, what a difficult issue to engage with, here you have kind of a constellation of different factors. I mean, at that time anyway, you couldn't get a politically more difficult or controversial area to be engaging in, given the Victoria was the first state to pass such legislation. The Catholic view on such legislation is, is well known, in that in our services don't participate in prescribing a lethal drug for a person to end their life and so, we hold a position of conscientious objection. So that's unpopular, and here I am only, you know, kind of, a year and a bit into the role thinking goodness, what, what would it be to lead this work?
But I put down the phone after I said no, and thought about it a little bit more. And one of the things, two things came to mind to me in my reflection. One was this this concept that comes out of Boston College, and theological ethicist there named Lisa Cahill who, she talks about what's called ‘participatory theological bioethics’, and what she means by that is a bioethics that isn't confined to the world of ideas and clarifications and, and even statements and and speech, but a bioethics that has as its dominant feature, the words I would use is something like ‘witnessing to a particular way of offering care’ and, and in doing that, expressing or telling a story about the ethical principles that one holds. So it shifts the focus from, from carefully defined ideas, if I can put it that way and, and clear principles, much more to who it is we are and what kind of a service, we are, and so on. So that, that's one thing that's kind of echoing in the back of my thoughts at this time.
And then the second thing was, one of the first things I was able to do when I arrived at St Vincent’s, is spend quite a bit of time with our palliative and end of life care teams both down here in Victoria, but also up in Sydney. And I just have to say, I mean this, these were my first few months in the role and I got to accompany some clinicians and hear about the work they were doing, and it was just beautiful, and which isn't to say there wasn't tragedy and pain and real challenges in what I saw. But the commitments that these practitioners upheld were stunning, really going to the edge to care for their patients doing everything they can, responding to patient needs. And you know going above and beyond what would be expected, and that reflects a long line of this kind of care in Australia by our services so, Sacred Heart hospice up in Sydney, was the first ever dedicated end of life care service in Australia, started 130 years ago this year actually. And so as I was, you know, reflecting on my just having said no to doing, doing that work, I thought, well, you know what, actually what, what a beautiful invitation to be able to get our people together, and think about what does it mean to continue that 130 year history, and these beautiful things that I've seen as expressions of our ethical commitments, that participatory theological bioethics alive, today in the context of a legislation that we wouldn't be providing. And probably a whole set of assumptions that are reaction would be to kind of maybe stand in the corner and sulk, or I don't know, cause a lot of trouble or something like that, or just slam the door in the face of anyone who might want to talk about voluntary assisted dying, so, I ended up calling them back later that afternoon and saying, okay, look, I'll give it give this a go, and St Vincent’s was very supportive of me doing that.
And it was a huge project, but it, it followed that method of coming alongside, well, who are the key stakeholders here, who are the people who are going to have to enact whatever this response looks like, so that's obviously frontline clinicians and caregivers, who are the key thinkers we need in the room to help, help guide our thoughts. And we, we developed this mammoth piece of work, which was part of the task force, which people can still Google and you can see all the work produced, but it really, I think, delivered, and it wasn't, it was the work of the whole group. So whilst I was the Chair of this work, a lot of people contributed to it, but I think it delivered a really beautiful response of, exactly that, participatory theological bioethics, which really said, look, we're going to continue in our commitments to this beautiful care we've been offering for 130 years, the new legislation doesn't change that. But we want you to know that we've got a response that, should you our patient want to talk about the new legislation, or even access it from someone else who does provide it, we’re going to, in so far as you're seeking that out, we're not going to abandon our commitments to you because of that. And so I was really proud that we were able to bring together a work like that. But it relied on clear, you know, communication with everyone involved building trust with, with everyone, including people who work in a radically for the legislation, and I think some folks were quite surprised about that, that we took such a proactive stance in responding. So yeah, that that's kind of how that functioned.
And I mean to take it to the, the other area which is responding to the, the abuse crisis. I mean, what an awful, awful history in the Catholic Church, other organisations too of course, but my focus is on the Catholic church here, of really, I would say unorthodox behaviour. So, if the theological ethics tradition of the Church says that everybody has a sacred dignity that should be acknowledged, respected, and cared for in every moment, especially those most vulnerable, you couldn't get a set of behaviours and even systemic kind of entrenched evils that are so contrary to that. And so the work I'm doing with Jim Keenan from Boston in, in responding to that as an international group of folks who are really trying to think, not just about what, what kind of instrumental things do we need to put in place to see that it never happens again, but the next level down of other things that need to change about the way we think theologically that might have, might have contributed to these evils or might of, you know, really, when we have an ethical tradition, which should have gotten in the way at so many levels of these things happening in the first place, then being covered up, and then being allowed to continue. Why didn't that happen? What was it about the way in which we believe? So that's a theological question. So we're trying to wrestle with those things. But again, that involves listening deeply to people who are victims and survivors of sexual abuse, different elements within the church involved, and trying to draw on our ethical framework to think about, well, if we really are part of a tradition which stands on the side of those who are suffering and suffering grave injustice and liable to be hurt, then what does it mean, what kind of transformation is called out of that. So a very different project, but you can hear echoes of the same kind of methodology at play there.
Christopher Mayes: Fascinating.
Courtney Hempton: Yes, I guess, a bit of a, change of topic, but to bring our considerations to the present context of COVID-19, and Dan you work on theological approaches to pandemic ethics, and perhaps as a useful, I guess entry to that conversation is the context of a letter that was recently made public that was written to the Prime Minister of Australia. So three religious leaders, specifically the Sydney archbishops of the Catholic, Anglican, and Greek Orthodox churches, together, wrote to the Prime Minister of Australia expressing ethical concern regarding the development of a COVID-19 vaccination. And so the letter is in reference to a potential vaccine that's under development at Oxford University that utilises the HEC-293 cell line. And that's a cell line that was derived from human embryonic kidney cells that were sourced in the early 70s, and is commonly used in biology and biotech. But the letter to the PM raises the issue that, and quoting that any, “any COVID-19 vaccination cultured on a foetal cell line will raise serious issues of conscience for proportion of our population”. And so really the issues of conscience are regarding utilising the product of quote “an electively aborted human foetus”. So Dan, I guess we're just interested in your reaction to that letter and any reflections on some of the ethical issues that, that I guess emergee from a potential COVID-19 vaccination that, that might result from, from research utilising this foetal cell line.
Dan Fleming: Yeah. Thanks, Courtney and, and just true to my, my initial background which I mentioned earlier in biblical study, I think it's always worth going back to the source on these things. So the first thing I'd suggest is, it's really worthwhile going, listeners might like to look up Anthony Fisher's article on this which was published in the Catholic Weekly a few days after the kind of public storm of attention on, on that letter and these issues was brought up, because that I think clarifies very clearly what the ethical issues at play are. And, and I'll come back to that a few times.
But I wonder if it might be helpful just to start with a theological reflection on ecumenism in this context, too, because one of the significant things is that this is three religious leaders from three different Christian traditions writing together on something so, I might just say a couple of things about that, and then we can kind of jump into the content and the concerns of the letter itself. And as we were preparing for today, there are three different examples of this kind of, Christian traditions working together on a particular issue which I think are worth reflecting on, because it says something about the significance of the issues at play. The first one, we’re recording on the last day of winter down here, and goodness me what a difficult winter it's been for us all this horrible pandemic, and I noticed at the weekend that the, Christian churches within Melbourne and it might be more broadly Victoria, have banded together to encourage their flocks to be part of something this evening, where people will light a candle and put it at the front of their house in their driveway, the front window, whatever, and pray with hope for the new life and hopefully a different kind of future that spring will bring. And I thought, gosh, that's a beautiful thing. And as I light my candle this evening, I'll be thinking also about the hope of overcoming the divisions that so often separate different religious communities, including within the Christian tradition. So that's one example.
Second example which comes a little closer to our focus here which is in bioethics is, last year in Western Australia where they were debating their voluntary assisted dying legislation, an interfaith gathering was organised at the, I think it was the Catholic cathedral in Perth, where religious leaders. and again, their flocks came together and this was at a key point in the parliamentarians, eventually voting in the legislation, it hadn't been voted in yet. And they gathered together, not to make a particular political statement or a stance on the legislation, but rather to, in solidarity, pray in the hope that their elected political representatives would choose wisely over the days to come. So that's a very interesting example too.
And the final little one I'll give you is Pope Francis’ famous encyclical on the environment, 2013, Laudato si', On Care for Our Common Home, right at the beginning, makes a huge point and it takes a couple of paragraphs to do this, of lining up with Patriarch Bartholomew, who is the Ecumenical Patriarch and the kind of leader of the Eastern Orthodox Church. And so, Francis makes this big gesture of lining up his concerns for the environment with the patriarch of the Eastern Orthodox Church.
So all these things are significant because what they all say is that, whereas we, speaking on behalf of the religious leaders in this context, normally we’re part of communities which have different theological schools, different seminaries, we worship in different buildings, and throughout history there's sometimes even being outright violence between them, and there could be huge doctrinal differences. What they're in a sense, saying is that, as we gather together on this particular issue, we are of the same mind. And that's quite significant. And I think that means that when this happens, it's, it's worthy of close attention, because whenever a group of human communities are putting aside their differences and saying, this is so important that we want to draw attention to it, it's worth looking at, and looking at carefully, even if we're from a perspective that might fundamentally disagree with what they're raising. And so I think that's the context in which to kind of think about the letter and the resulting response over the past week or two, in terms of the COVID vaccination, as you've introduced it very clearly, Courtney. And. And so in that context, I think the three archbishops in Sydney have done something quite significant in saying, we're of the same mind on on this issue.
But then the next question is, well, what is the issue at play? And I think that, given the, the significance of a statement like that clarifying the issues t play is, is enormously important because, unfortunately, and, I mean, this probably could have been foreseen, and I don't know if it was, but unfortunately what happened in the releasing of that statement is, as per usual in our kind of media and public perception cycle, all sorts of different things were taken from it and assumptions were made about what they were trying to argue, which I don't think necessarily lined up with the position that we're putting, putting forward, and really I think really what they were trying to do in that letter is say, just like in any other space, we should be thinking carefully about the supply lines which lead up to giving us a particular good, and in this case it's a vaccination, and we should ask questions about whether we're comfortable about the discrete actions along those, those supply lines. And if we're not, we should, we should think in conscience about whether we would use whatever is produced at the end of the day. And I think in a case of a vaccination like, like this, there's a very strong need for it. So, goodness, I hope, like the rest of the population that we get a vaccine for COVID, for all of the reasons which are obvious, to protect those who are most vulnerable in society, to protect our community, to enable us to be more free in movement and so on, and to live without fear of contracting it, so that's that's a given. And then the supply line question is well, what kind of a supply line do we expect, or what, what things are we, would we want from a supply line to make sure that we feel, feel comfortable in. I had, exactly the same question came to mind for me, and this isn't cheapening this discussion, but as I bought chocolate on the weekend. And as we all know, the, the fair trade movement has drawn our attention to real evils in the supply chain, which kind of really undermine the good of chocolate, and so many of us are now uncomfortable about buying a product that has slavery in it supply chain and we right rightly advocate for something different. So I think, in a formal sense that's what these three religious leaders are trying to do.
Now. Courtney, as you mentioned, this is, so this relates to the potential, and it seems probable, elective termination of a foetus back in the 1970s. So this is a long time in history that this happened. Some people are not going to have a moral question about that in the first place. So the vaccine is not going to be a problem for them, or this question about the vaccine is not going to be a problem for them. Some people might be uncomfortable about that practice, but see such a distance between that time and now that they, they feel very comfortable taking the vaccine. And some are just a going to be deeply uncomfortable about this. Now Fisher himself has said that he would take the vaccine, if it's the only one available, and he would not see any, he would not have a moral objection to others doing so, and that we might come back to this in a minute, that that comes back to a particular Catholic ethical principle called cooperation which we can unpack in detail if it's of interest. And I would, I'd hold the same view. As for someone who might be even more kind of rigorous about this, one can see why they would want to distance themselves from that. And then that raises the thorny questions about, well, what do we do in a situation like that, when there's this huge public health demand, and somebody has a conscientious objection.
What I've found helpful in the ethics education work I've done around these kind of things is expanding the focus a little just to think about questions like this in, in principle, so, you know for some of us, the question of this particular vaccine might be a no brainer, and would just say, oh, well, look, we're not morally uncomfortable about that, but it's helpful to think about, well, are there things in a supply chain that we might be uncomfortable about, and where would we draw the lines on those things? So for instance, if, if the vaccine required ongoing terminations, which this Oxford vaccine doesn't, and it's really important to clarify that. I think that's where the missteps were, by the way, in the communication of this letter is not clarifying what it's actually about. Would we be uncomfortable with that, if there was slavery in the supply chain, would we be uncomfortable about that, if people were injected in the research trials without their consent, which is a huge ethical problem, now, this hasn't happened in the Oxford one, by the way, just so I'm being particularly clear, but it's worthwhile thinking about these things because then perhaps we can have some empathy with someone who might be concerned about a different set of moral issues and we can understand a little bit more, how they're experiencing it.
But looping right back to the, the start the fact that this was an ecumenical statement gives it a particular kind of salience. And I do think that that means the communication of it, and about it has to be particularly, particularly sensitive to all of these issues, so that we're really clear about what the concern being raised is, and also really clear about what we're not trying to say. Because I think, understandably, and I think probably predictably, this got taken up in a different way, when it reached the public square. And I think there's a responsibility in our context when we predict that that might be the case to mitigate against it, as far as possible.
Christopher Mayes: Um, yeah, I mean, I think that's very true in terms of the communication. I mean, I think the whole COVID experience so far has been one where we've seen, whether it's in public health communication, or I mean this is also a form of public health communication, but the importance and the need for careful communication. Um, you know, I think there's plenty of blame to go around on all fronts for, for some of the aspects of the way this was communicated, and some, yes certainly some media reporting, and I know there was a, an initial headline, I think that said you know ‘archbishops call for a boycott’, which was obviously misleading, but I think there was also not so much in the letter, but some other commentary that was confused around whether this was requiring ongoing abortions, to create the foetal cell lines.
But something that has interested me and I mean this is part of the my, and our work on the history of bioethics, is thinking about the way these different Christian traditions have come together, and you know, you're suggesting, and you know, I think that's certainly one way of looking at it the, the deep significance of this issue has forced them to come together, but there's, I would say, since the 1970s, and thinking about that at the time when that foetus was aborted in around 1972, Australian Christian churches were still very much in the sort of shadows of sectarian divides that were shaping their relationships, particularly between Anglicans and Catholics. So in some of the press releases or issues statements that the Anglicans would put out about abortion in the 1970s that I was recently revisiting, they would always be very clear to distinguish themselves from the Roman Catholic position which they would say, was a lot more rigid and, and they would, you know, the Anglican position would be saying that there's is still taking the Bible seriously but allows for a more flexible interpretation around these forms of reproductive ethics. But it seems that since the 70s, there has been, what I would call perhaps a pragmatic ecumenicism, particularly around these bioethical issues, and accelerating in recent years with I think Peter Jensen, and George Pell coming together to oppose embryonic stem cell research, and then last year, Glenn Davies and Anthony Fisher sharing a podium together to deliver a series of lectures, which I think was a first for Anglican and Catholic archbishops, in Sydney coming together, and so historically there are some interesting movements around these, but not just now, but I think, you know, I'd say since the 1970s, there has been this joining forces on a range of bioethical and social issues and that, obviously there's a one dimension is the importance of the issue itself. But it does seem that there's a dimension of, whether you'd call it secular, secularisation, or diminishment of power and influence, I don't know, that they're just seems to be, particularly, I'd say on the Anglican part, a more reliance on and around Catholic theological thought around these issues. So even in in some of the materials that I was looking at in the 70s and 80s, there would often be a difference from Anglicans to Catholic moral theologians, which I found quite interesting, whereas if there would not be a difference to Catholic theologians on, say for instance atonement, or sanctification, but when it comes to moral theology, there seems to be, at least as I say, since the 70s and 80s a much more ecumenical movement.
Dan Fleming: And that's, that's really, really interesting, Chris. And I suppose the only, the only thing, I think your, your use of the word pragmatism very interesting there, because whereas those three examples I gave at the beginning there's, there's very clear kind of rigorous thoughtfulness going into when we, when, when these moments are chosen and why, I think what you're pointing to is, not, not that same degree of thoughtfulness, you're, you're pointing towards that kind of okay it's suits, at the moment, politically to do this. And on that point, the only thing I would, would want to add is, wouldn't it, it would be wonderful to see more, given the significance of these kinds of things, more of the same in the context of the many issues, which one would expect that these different denominations within Christianity are committed to.
So just as another example, the Archdiocese of Sydney has a very strong anti-slavery in supply chains project running at the moment. And wouldn't it be wonderful if another gesture and a kind of well planned, thought out, prudential, courageous gesture of raising a common voice in the public square would be if other denominations, and perhaps even other religious traditions join up to say, look, we're so concerned about the infringement on dignity of these precious people, many who belong to our flock in different parts of the world, that we together are challenging the whole community to think more deeply and more rigorously about this, and to change our behaviour, that to me would be beautiful and refreshing, and might help to undercut some of the cynicism that that exists in this space.
Now, I think there is good work that happens in those areas, and actually think it would be really worthwhile perhaps there's a future PhD student listening in on this podcast, a really worthwhile project for someone who's in this area, because I know a common critique that these church leaders get is that they speak loudly about some issues and not others, and a common retort that they and those who advise them give is, well we speak on lots of issues, but we're not really heard, nd I think that that really is an empirical question about when is this deployed as you say, Chris, on what basis and on what issues, And then it becomes a question of our, are we consistent enough in raising our voices and articulating our concerns in the public square on the issues that we should be concerned about, or are we selective in that, I think that that would be a very worthwhile study.
Christopher Mayes: Yeah, and I agree, and I think the empirical dimensions really important both in studies such as that, and across the board in many bioethical debates, and that's something else that just, and it certainly wasn't the only thing in this letter, but in some of the background to this issue, And some of the other sort of correspondence, this idea of. who are the archbishops speaking for, you know, are they sort of witnessing to the Prime Minister and trying to create some conscious awareness. But there's also this sense, so, this you know rhetorical use of ‘many of you’ or ‘some will feel’ that, and again, historically it would seem that there's a big divide between, say archbishop's and bishopss statements about what the church has positioned, this is Anglican and Catholic, on say things like no fault divorce, or contraception, IVF, RU486, same sex marriage, and so on where the people in the pews don't necessarily either hold the same belief, or the same practice, as what's been spoken from the pulpit, to continue that church-based metaphor.
You know, just for instance I was looking at some old stats around when IVF was first being proposed in the early 80s, that there was a Morgan poll showing that 73% of the Australian population without religious affiliation approved, 67% of Catholics approved, and then the Anglicans 79%, so they approved even more than the general population, even though church leaders at the time were raising a lot of ethical questions. Which I guess, this empirical dimension goes to that earlier point you were making as well around beliefs in action, and the connection between the two, in a moral formation, but I guess there's also the political and ecclesiological point about, relationship between what the archbishops or bishops are saying, and their statements to parishioner belief and action.
Dan Fleming: Hmm. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. It's an old chestnut as you both, and all the listeners would know in church circles. It is, what is the bishop speaking about, and does that match the convictions of the faithful. And I look, I think, one additional thing to add in here, and this came from a dear friend of mine who I was speaking with last week as, as the kind of wash came out and we saw the clip clearer, and I mean, I was looking is your understand more closely at the Catholic commentary around this. But as it, you know, as it was really clarified in, in writing. So Fisher’s article in the Catholic Weekly, or he didn't interview with Andrew West on the ABC as well, and through a number of other sources, there was clarity that came afterwards, that no we're not saying were anti-vaccination, number one, no we're not saying that we are encouraging everyone to boycott this if it's the only one available, number two. And number three, there is a good moral reason for doing this, even if we feel discomfort, and we should make that discomfort known, but that's not the same as saying don't take the vaccination. So that there was a lot of clarity, though a dear friend of mine who is part of an immigrant community, and I think she's first or second generation, she worried about her parents and her parents’ parents, who might not be able to access that latter clarification. So might only receive that first headline, might only receive the thinned-out discourse around this, and could well be very pious, and I mean this in a generous way, not, not an accusatory way, yeah, but, but very simple in a sense in their faith, and may well then decide on that basis, well, there's no way I'm going near it because my Archbishop said that I shouldn't. Now, we have to be, and, and religious leaders have to be very thoughtful about those folks too who are sitting in their pews and for whom they care, that comes to a question of moral pedagogy.
But so to do those who are reporting on what religious leaders are saying, because they also have a responsibility, as they do in every arena to report accurately and, and Chris, I know this has been part of the kinds of questions you've had around all this, and Courtney you as well, around well well is, is, is there something anti-religious that just happens when it's a Catholic leader, a Catholic leader who says something which might not necessarily happen to someone else. I think that's worth digging into a little bit too because if, if it's the case that whenever a Catholic leader is reported on, the reporting is itself uncharitable, and we one can well understand why, the Catholic Church has not done well in upholding itself as a moral authority. So it can be very honest about that. But if the reporting itself is uncharitable, inaccurate, and sometimes even mischievous, what does that have, its telos, still as the community good, given that what we know about how some folks might interpret this, so that, I think the, the responsibilities here are, are far beyond the content of what was in that letter, in the clarification statements afterwards, which is kind of relatively straightforward to get one's head around, if one has a working knowledge of the ethics. But the bigger question of perception and assumption and pedagogy, I think is a really serious one in a case like this. And going back to what you're saying before Chris around, how difficult it's been to communicate in COVID, and well it doesn't take much for a fire to start, so what does that mean for how we report, and how we speak out when we speak out.
Christopher Mayes: Hmmm, yeah, there are lots of ethical questions to consider about who and when and how we should speak in these heightened times.
Dan Fleming: And just a final point that I'll, I'll flick you both an article which might be of interest too, is on this vaccination question. There's a long tradition within Catholic ethics of thinking about questions of complicity, and that belongs to a category called cooperation with moral evil, and it doesn't matter if we're thinking about robbing a bank or a supply line with modern slavery in it, or whatever it is we're thinking about. The question of complicity with something that, in conscience we see is wrong has a long path, and so is the question of what we call appropriation of evils or wrongdoings that happened in the past, and there's a lot of thinking emerging now around that. I wrote something about this in the context of the big lockout laws debate around alcohol consumption in Sydney especially recently, and I'll flick that to you both, because it has the, it has the frameworks that we use to think about these kind of things. And there's nothing in a sense, particularly Catholic about them, in the narrow sense of belonging to the religious tradition of Catholicism, but there is something deeply reasonable and deeply helpful about them, which looping all the way back around to where we started our conversation today, helps to explain why the Catholic Archbishop of Sydney can raise a moral concern about a supply line, but also say that if this was the only option I would be encouraging people to take it, and I would probably take it myself, even if there's, there's discomfort there.
Christopher Mayes: Yeah, definitely. And I think, so we can maybe move on a little bit that, and pick up on some of this, what I always like to see how the history informs some of this, current debates, but in an earlier episode Undisciplinary with Robert Young, if you haven't listened to that one yet, friends, it's back there in the archives, but he talks about the way a lot of early bioethics was done by people with a religious faith and beliefs, primarily Catholics, and in the US, and to a lesser degree, but still there in Australia, a lot of the founding figures in bioethical debates had either come through, or some association with theological institutions. Yet today, it would seem that there is suspicion, if not of fear of some of these religious influences in bioethics and healthcare, and maybe you know it's not even just a fear, it's a sense that the influence of these beliefs and ethics on healthcare practice and in healthcare practice will result in harms to patients.
Dan Fleming: Hmm. Thanks, Chris. Yeah, so I remember when I was chairing the Catholic Health Australia response to voluntary assisted dying task force, that we used to make a joke at the beginning of every presentation. I was traveling around quite a lot, this time, and I used to say there's no better way to guarantee silence on the bus or the train or a plane or whatever a method of transport I was using, than to tell the person I'm sitting next to that I'm chairing this Catholic response to the assisted dying legislation, because I can guarantee silence from them after that. And I kind of said it, I would say it kind of tongue in cheek, but it struck a chord and it struck a chord, because it points to exactly what you're talking about here, that there is something about the words Catholic ethics, which are a turnoff to some folks and, and and I actually think that this is this is part of the reaction to the letters of the three archbishops that one can almost feel out there, and and even yet out there and close by, the kind of collective eyeroll when a headline says Catholic bishops say, or something like that, or even Christian leaders say. And so I do think that there is a, yeah, there's a general suspicion of it. And look, I think there's a lot there are a lot of reasons for that. One is a general impatience with religion in our current kind of secularist Australia. One is a lack of a sense that this ethical framework brings anything of interest to the table or anything new or anything worthwhile considering, and that might be related to the lack of patience with religion in general, or it might also just be that we're not seeing the fruits of this, we're not seeing why we would need to listen to this, this voice as well. And another is that, that the churches in particular have undermined their moral authority as, as we spoke about earlier, with particular reference to child sexual abuse, but not only in in that context. So I think there's a lot going on in in that space. That said, I wouldn't want to be too conspiratorial about it in the sense that there's some kind of collusion out there to prevent the Catholic voice on issues from being raised, and as I mentioned earlier, in the context of our response to the legislation Victoria, I found a real generosity in people of other, other viewpoints in engaging with them, because of the way in which that engagement happened. And so I think it's relevant to consider that.
Christopher Mayes: Hmmmm. Unfortunately I think we’re going to have to leave it there. I mean, its been a very interesting conversation, and there are a lot more things that could be said about, and developed that what we’ve talked about, as well as different avenues to explore, so we may have to get you on again sometime to talk about some of these things. But thanks again for talking with us today, Dan.
Dan Fleming: Great. Well, the real joy to be with you both and look forward to hearing it when it's all done.
Christopher Mayes: Alright, fantastic.
Courtney Hempton: Thank you so much, really, truly appreciate it.
Christopher Mayes: If you’d like to send us a comment, question, or suggestion, our email is undisciplinarypod@gmail.com – we’ve had a couple of questions so far, so we may at some point do some kind of mail bag episode, so it would be good to hear your feedback or comments.
Courtney Hempton: You and tweet us at Undisciplinary underscore [@Undisciplinary_], you can find more information about the podcast at our website, including a transcript and links to some of the things we’ve spoken about, the website address is undisciplinary.org, and you can continue listening to Undisciplinary, wherever it is you are currently listening to us, but you can also subscribe, rate, and review the podcast.
Christopher Mayes: Thanks a lot.
Courtney Hempton: Thanks.
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Christopher Mayes: … thorough lots of looping around backwards, but we always got back on, or not backwards, looping around up back to the beginning, but we always eventually got there, ah, to, um. I, don't even know what I'm saying.