The Varieties of Religious Experience in Clinical Ethics

In order to answer the procedural question of “how to solicit the perspectives of key stakeholders when making decisions with broad implications” in healthcare, we must first grapple with the substantive question of whether to adjudicate the normative moral guidance offered by those key stakeholders. This panel will seek to answer this substantive question by exploring the role of theologians, religious ethicists, and chaplains in clinical ethics. The panelists are each dually trained in religious studies and clinical ethics, but they will answer the following questions in different ways to critically assess the place (if there is one) of a theological anthropology in clinical ethics: Is it possible to suspend theological commitments in clinical ethics? Can a clinical ethicist express her theologically informed views about the moral and ethical basis of the practice of medicine without imposing her own religious views on patients and staff? Can she show respect for others, as demanded by liberal democracy and a religiously diverse environment, and still approach her clinical work with a theologically informed moral anthropology? Procedurally speaking, can (or should) training in comparative religions displace training in a normative theology, specifically for those who approach clinical ethics through their roles as chaplains? Ultimately, these questions all deal with the place of theological reflection in the public square but aim to focus our attentions on the specific nature of moral and religious conflict in the healthcare space and the multiple demands put on clinical ethicists with training in theology, religious ethics, or chaplaincy.