Dialogues on events
that shape our world
between science and bio-utopia
Conference on regenerative medicine
In collaboration with Association Medicine and the Person
Speakers:
Edmund D. PELLEGRINO
Chairman of the President’s Council on Bioethics
Daniel CALLAHAN
Director International Programs, The Hastings Center
Daniel P. SULMASY
Director of the Bioethics Institute NY Medical College
Saturday, January 28, 2006, at 9:30 am
Auditorium St. Vincent’s Hospital
170 West 12th Street, New York
Exploring our heritage
Testing our tradition
THE WORLD
Discovering the world
of arts: performances
and presentations
THE CROSSROADS
Face to face with...
OPENING REMARKS
On behalf of Crossroads New York Cultural Center I would like
to thank Mr. Sansone and Saint Vincent Catholic Medical
Centers for their tremendous help in organizing the conference.
Let me also take advantage of this occasion to thank the
association "Medicine and the Person" for generously
supporting this conference. Medicine and the Person, founded
in Milan in 1999, is a free association of health care
professionals and focuses on the central role of the person in
health care. You can take a moment during the break or at the
end of the conference to walk through the interesting exhibit
prepared by Medicine and the Person just outside the
auditorium. Finally, we would like to mention Servitas and his
chairman, Mr. Griffo, for their special effort in promoting the
conference.
Today's conference is part of Crossroads’s "Human Affairs"
series of event, aimed at increasing the public's awareness
about important issues that shape today's world. Our goal in
promoting events like this is first of all to disseminate
information, and help an audience as broad as possible to form
an educated judgment. Some of the greatest challenges faced
by our society in the next few years will revolve around
biotechnology and regenerative medicine. On one hand,
dramatic scientific advances will offer the possibility to relieve
the sufferings of people affected by many previously incurable
diseases. On the other hand, the same techniques will open
the door to new forms of manipulation of human life, in a social
environment which appears less and less capable of
recognizing and respecting the intrinsic value and dignity of the
human person. Given this background, it is vital that all of us
learn to distinguish genuine medical and scientific progress
from over hyped promises. Unfortunately, this is task at which
often the mass media fail us. It is easy to fall in one of two
extremes, either an uncritical acceptance of everything that
claims to carry the banner of "science," or an equally uncritical
fear of biomedical research as the route to a brave new world
where our very personhood is under threat. Today, we hope to
follow the St. Paul's advice: "Test everything, retain what is
good" (1 Thess. 5:21). This suggestion sums up the ideal of
Crossroads much more than any pre-determined agenda. It
was also one of the favorite formulas of the late Msgr. Luigi
Giussani, founder of Communion and Liberation, the
international movement in the Roman Catholic Church in whose
life Crossroads finds its inspiration for its cultural work.
