Wesley J. Smith

Thousands of medical ethicists and bioethicists, as they are called, professionally guide the unthinkable on its passage through the debatable on its way to becoming the justifiable until it is finally established as the unexceptionable. Continue Reading »

Excluding the terminally ill from suicide prevention campaigns is discrimination and a form of abandonment. Dying isn’t the same as being dead; it is a stage, albeit a difficult stage, of living. Continue Reading »

Stubbornly adhering to the “no medicinal uses” fiction aggravates the anarchy of state medical-marijuana laws. Continue Reading »

With so much humanity-altering power being developed, where are the democratic debates about whether we should permit human beings to be designed, manufactured, and subjected to methods of quality control? Continue Reading »

Healthcare public policy is becoming a means of imposing a secularist, anti–sanctity-of-life ideology on all of society. Continue Reading »

This September, the Roman Catholic Church will canonize Mother Teresa, the great nun and humanitarian, in a vivid reminder that saintliness continues in our contemporary world. Less well known in the West—and unknown to me before I converted to Eastern Orthodoxy—are the many Orthodox saints who demonstrate the same truth. Continue Reading »

The fact that doctors are free to prescribe lethally for people with illnesses outside their areas of medical specialization demonstrates the folly of legalizing doctor-prescribed death. Continue Reading »

Words matter. The terminology we employ not only reflects our values but helps to define them. Language is particularly important in bioethical debates, in which dehumanizing verbiage can distance us from our fellow human beings.When embryonic stem-cell research was in the news, we were told . . . . Continue Reading »

Most people understand the word “death” to mean the end of biological life or, as Merriam-Webster defines it, “a permanent cessation of all vital functions.” But now an influential cadre of utilitarian bioethicists wants to redefine it to include a subjective and sociologically based . . . . Continue Reading »

I recently gave a speech to a group of conservative senior citizens in California, arguing against assisted suicide, which is due to become legal there in June. Assisted suicide is not an issue that allows for fence-sitting, so although I expected (and received) a friendly reception for the most . . . . Continue Reading »