author: Anna Laputko
Urgency of the research. In the Roman Catholic Church anthropological concept is based on the perception of the sacredness and inviolability of human life. Life is a gift of God, God is its source. The spiritual and bodily integrity of a person who is free and responsible has as its main goal the direction to God. Personality is the basis of Christian personalism, the main criterion of moral evaluations and actions, the object and purpose of human activity. Dignity and the good of the integrated person are the main principle of the Christian anthropological concept and the fundamental criterion of Christian bioethics.
Target setting. The Catholic Church has a clear position on bioethical issues, based on the recognition of the value and dignity of human life and respect for human rights. The bioethical approach of utilitarianism focuses on the public good, to which the individual must submit. The paradigm of utilitarianism solves the problem not in favor of being a person, because it recognizes the primacy of quality of life: moral rules are little taken into account, the emphasis is on maximum benefit, in particular for society as a whole, not for the individual.
Actual scientific researches and issues analysis. The main basic documents on the anthropological concept in the context of bioethics are: the encyclical "Humanae vitae", the "Charter for Health Care Workers", the encyclical "Evangelium vitae". Since these documents require a fairly broad analysis and require a large amount of work, in our article we will focus primarily on the first two of them. To support our conclusions, we will analyze the report of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, which provides in-depth generalizations about the anthropological concept of man in the Roman Catholic Church. The methodological example for our article will be the works of Ukrainian scientists Tetyana Havryliuk, Ivan Ostashchuk and Yuri Chornomorets.
The research objective. The aim of the of the article is to analyze the anthropological concept of man as a integrated personality in the Catholic tradition of bioethics. In accordance with the set aim, separate tasks should be revealed: to analyze some basic documents of the Holy See on the problems of bioethics and to highlight the main features of the Christian concept of anthropology in their application to the evaluation of bioethics.
The statement of basic materials. In modern bioethical research and the practice of their implementation, two opposite directions can be traced: ethical absolutism in Christian philosophy and ethical relativism in utilitarianism and pragmatism. Christian bioethics is based on the anthropological concept of man as integrated personality and social being. The thesis of the dignity of the human person is contained in the biblical concept of the creation of man in the image and likeness of God. The Christian anthropological concept is based on the perception of the individual as an inseparable unity of the physical and the spiritual. Christian moral norms should be seen in the context of the phenomenon of the gift.
Conclusions. The Christian position is based on the transmission and interpretation of the biblical idea of the human person on the basis of God's plan. Man is the only creature called to live for himself; created in the image and likeness of God; the main purpose of its life is to go to God and to call to God's beatitude. Man is an inseparable and unique unity of the physical and the spiritual. It is impossible to give exclusive preference only to the biological or only the mental nature of man as an integrally the sources of moral responsibility; the matter of human growth is based on a combination of sensory and spiritual life. Man, by his actions on the basis of conscience, accepts or does not accept the good that God has promised him.
Keywords: anthropological concept, integrated personality, value, dignity, bioethics, Catholicism.
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