Andrew Lustig

Despite a limited number of Scriptural texts describing human beings as made in the “image” and “likeness” of God, such language has been widely invoked in both classical and current theology and ethics. In this essay, I first discuss the variety of ways that theological voices have developed this theme. I then consider the possible implications of different understandings of image/likeness for Christian living and normative practice, because different interpretations offer useful examples of how fundamental theological themes play out in the moral life, both methodologically and substantively. Finally, I analyze the links often drawn between image/likeness language and appeals to “human dignity,” a term widely invoked in both religious and secular debates. In addressing that linkage, I consider whether faith-based claims about human dignity based on image/likeness language function independently, that is, without further specification in terms of other, perhaps more determinative, principles and norms. I also consider whether such religious understandings of the image/likeness theme, as the basis for dignity-claims, provide additions to, or correctives of, secular accounts of dignity.

The rights of health care professionals to refuse to participate in procedures such as abortion and sterilization that they judge to be wrong on moral or religious grounds have been protected by federal legislation and regulations for several decades. Recently, rights of conscience have been invoked in the pharmaceutical context, where the applicability of such claims has generated significant controversy. This article responds to those controversies in three steps. First, it critiques the major arguments that would deny rights of conscience to dissenting pharmacists. Second, it explores traditional discussions of the subjective and objective aspects of duties of conscience. Third, it employs the conceptual and practical links between subjective and objective aspects of conscience to develop a four-fold typology of case categories for interpreting the relative weight of claims of conscience against other values

Distinctions between therapy and enhancement are difficult to draw with precision, especially in marginal cases. Nevertheless, most recent Christian discussions of enhancement technologies accept the general plausibility of distinctions drawn between therapeutic interventions and enhancement technologies by appealing to general understandings of nature and human nature as available benchmarks. On that basis, a range of religious assessments of enhancement technologies can be identified. Those judgments incorporate different interpretations of nature as a source of moral insight, different understandings of human responsibility in light of God's purposes, and different assessments of the effects of sin and finitude on human freedom