Annual Educational Conference

79th Annual Educational Conference - Seattle, Washington October 28-30, 2010

The Christian imperative to care for the sick is based on our desire to continue the healing ministry of Christ the Divine Physician. Our desire to work in his vineyard and the commandment to love are powerful incentives to use science and technology for the practical benefit of others. However, too many physicians have allowed the practice of medicine to be separated from the exercise of faith, hope and charity, and the science of medicine to be divorced from the profound harmony of faith and reason as understood by the Church. Even among Catholics, many seem apologetic and reticent about being a Catholic physician, isolating their practice of medicine from the Church’s profound teaching of the truth about man.

In the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council noted that, while the conviction grows that man can and should increasingly consolidate his control over creation, “many look forward to a genuine and total emancipation of humanity wrought solely by human effort; they are convinced that the future rule of man over the earth will satisfy every desire of his heart … confer a total meaning on it by their own ingenuity alone.” This has led to a dis-integration of man from God; a dys-integration of man and medicine. Exacerbating this disintegration has been the loss of conviction in absolute truths to inform our understanding, and in absolute prohibitions that proscribe particular kinds of behavior. The result is that choices in medicine increasingly are based only on a mere calculation of the consequences, and the dignity of human life is under lethal assault at the beginning and end of the lifespan.

This conference will show why physicians need to be inspired and guided by an authentic Christian anthropology in the science and practice of medicine, and the benefits that ensue when they are. This anthropology includes the truth about man constituted in creation, and the truth about man’s redemption revealed in the Word of God. Only on this foundation can the commandment to love and imitate Christ the Divine Physician be faithfully practiced in the vocation of medicine.

A series of world-class speakers will address the most important aspects of theology, philosophy, spirituality and science required to delineate and implement this faith-inspired understanding of the human person.