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I would like to join in the\ngreeting offered by Dean Dallal and welcome you, both for myself and on behalf\nof the Pontifical Academy for Life, to our Conference dealing with \u201cMuslim and\nChristian Perspectives on Palliative Care and the End of Life.\u201d This conference\nis part of the Academy\u2019s wider PAL-LIFE project that is dedicated<\/p>\n\n\n\n
to the increased acceptance\nand full implementation of palliative care around the world. I first of all\nthank Georgetown University in Washington DC, represented here by Doctor John\nBorelli, then Georgetown University in Qatar, represented by Dean Ahmad Dallal,\nand I thank Sultana Afdhal, Chief Executive Officer of the World Innovation\nSummit for Health (WISH) Community sponsored Qatar Foundation. Their\ncontributions to the scientific and organizational aspects of this event have\nbeen invaluable. It is an honor to collaborate with such prestigious and\nculturally committed institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Historically, the palliative\ncare movement was born at the middle of the last century to give specific\nmedical and social attention to incurable cancer patients and relieve the\ncomplex of symptoms that accompany the most advanced stages of the disease\nuntil death. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
From the beginning,\npalliative care includes not only the management of symptoms and care for the\nneeds of the patient, but also preparation for death, in the realization that\nit is not only inevitable for all, but that it must be dealt with in particular\nways when a disease is incurable and the progression to death is unstoppable.\nPalliative care also includes the patient’s family, or those others who are\nclosest, as beneficiaries of accompaniment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We are aware of the\nimportance that palliative care can assume, inside and outside medicine, in\ntimes like ours where we witness marginalization, discrimination, and the\nelimination of the weakest of human beings, such as those suffering from a\nserious, disabling or incurable disease. We want to oppose the \u201cthrow-away\nculture\u201d\u2014 and we know how pervasive it is in most of contemporary society – by\npromoting a \u201cpalliative care culture,\u201d that overcomes the attraction of\neuthanasia and assisted suicide, and that leads to the greatest possible\nacceptance of a culture of care that enables us to accompany the dying with\nlove until the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nTo accomplishing this, I think we must reflect as deeply as possible about the\ngreat anthropological questions and enormous ethical challenges we face in\ndealing with the end of earthly life. For this reason, our efforts in this\nConference will be directed to exploring what palliative care can offer to\nthose human needs that arise from the power of the human spirit. We will take\nconsider not only clinical experience, but also the contributions that science\nand the deathless truths that religions preach about mystery of humanity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today the palliative care\nscientific community recognizes the important role that religions play in\nadvancing this form of accompaniment of the sick or dying, given the ability of\nreligions to reach the peripheries of humanity, those who in every community\nare in some way most in need. While this is certainly true, religions are<\/p>\n\n\n\n
and do much more. Religions\nare not only able to facilitate a greater presence of palliative care where it\nis needed, but they are one of the true component forces of palliative care\nitself. Total attention to the person is made much more difficult by economic\nhegemonies that colonize contemporary cultures and societies. The result of\nthis situation can be only a culture, or rather anti-culture, of wastefulness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An understanding of human\nexistence and of reality that values religious experience allows us to see and\naffirm a good that surpasses and is not limited by economic calculus.\nRecognition of the integral openness of the person to transcendence makes it\npossible to state that in human life, even when it is fragile and seems to be\ndefeated by illness, there is inalienable value. Palliative care represents a\nvision of man that is preached and protected by the great religious traditions.\nIn terms of motivation and inspiration, this is the most profound and trenchant\ncontribution palliative care can receive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dependency\u2014a human condition\nthat is a focus of religions and palliative care\u2014is indeed human and should be\nappreciated, when freely chosen, as an inalienable human value. The ego finds\nits fulfillment in relationship, in the \u201cwe.\u201d The \u201cwe\u201d is no less innate in us\nthan the \u201cI.\u201d It is clear that our existence is marked by a permanent movement\nfrom the \u201cI\u201d to the \u201cwe.\u201d Humanism must necessarily be marked by solidarity.\nThe task of \u201ccaring for\u201d the other, and for creation, is very different from\nthe false, predatory and destructive attitude so often adopted by man\u2014not only\ntowards nature and the earth, but also against brothers, especially when they<\/p>\n\n\n\n are perceived as obstacles\nor no longer useful. The palliative care community bears witness to a new way\nof living that focuses on the person and his good, to which not only the\nindividual but the whole community tends. In this community the good of each\nperson is pursued as a good that benefits everyone. Palliative care is a human right,\nand various international programs are working to implement it; but the basic\nhuman right is to continue to be recognized and accepted as a member of\nsociety, as part of a community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Conference which we are\nabout to begin will open with the signing, by me and Sultana Afdhal, of a Joint\nDeclaration on the End of Life and Palliative Care, issued by WISH and the\nPontifical Academy for Life, two institutions of different faiths, but sharing\nthe task of study, scientific advancement and cultural development; two academic\ninstitutions that specifically in palliative care find a fruitful ground for\nencounter and cooperation in order to reach a new humanism for the benefit of\nall persons and all peoples. In this context I would like to express my\nappreciation for the scientific and cultural contribution that WISH has offered\nto the international community through its activities, not least for the work\nof the group on \u201cIslamic Ethics and Palliative Care\u201d led by Dr. Mohammed Ghaly,\nwho presented its results during the Summit celebrated here in Doha last\nNovember. This was a valuable starting point for our work. I hope that these\ntwo days can make an effective contribution to making palliative care\u2014which is\ncalled on every day to face great challenges in accompanying the dying\u2014more\nwell-known and fully accepted by public opinion, and can give rise to a\nfruitful new humanism for the benefit of all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I am sure that we can work together effectively and learn much from each other. I wish everyone a very profitable two days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nPalliative care today represents for all of us a concrete initiative within a\nclimate of vanishing love for humanity and a crisis of social ties that\nbeginning with a generic disengagement is now reaching a real social\ndisintegration that involves all social structures, beginning with the family. Societas\n<\/em>as a communion of persons, no matter what form it takes, is necessary for\nself-realization of the individual. While the individual is not the servant of\nsociety, society is not merely an instrument for the self-realization of the\nindividual. It is rather a condition that allows for the such realization. It\nis difficult to make what is human develop in a society where relationships are\nmummified. The ego, as it is more and more conceived of by postmodernity, becomes\nan force for dissolution, not for bonding; exclusion, not inclusion; fluidity,\nnot consolidation. It is therefore essential to foster not only\nproblem-solving, which can be superficial, but also the lasting dream of a new\nhumanism for all, and of universal brotherhood. Reinventing a new brotherhood\nis the anthropological and social challenge of our day and is the specific\ncharge that Pope Francis gave to the Pontifical Academy for Life on the\noccasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of its creation, which will be\ncelebrated on February eleventh. The text of the Holy Father\u2019s letter is in\nyour folders. Here too, religions have a very special word to say. <\/p>\n\n\n\n