PRINCIPLE OF THE

TOTALITY OF THE HUMAN

PERSON

To promote human dignity in community, every

person must develop, use, care for, and preserve
all of his or her natural physical and psychic
functions in such a way that:
A. Lower functions are never sacrificed except for the
better functioning of the whole person and even
then with an effort to compensate for this
sacrifice.
B. The basic capacities that define human
personhood are never sacrificed unless this is
necessary to preserve life.

To be a complete human being is not merely

having the higher level of functions but to
have all the basic human functions in
harmonious order
Human body functions contribute to higher
functions not merely by supplying what is
needed for physiological functioning; they
also supply part of the human experience that
is essential to human intelligence and
freedom

Conditions for Principle of

Totality
1.

2.

3.

That the organ, by its deterioration in function,

may cause damage to the whole organism or
at least pose a serious threat to it
That there is no other way than taking the
indicated action against it or obtaining the
desired good result
That the damage being avoided to the whole is
proportional to that which is caused by the
mutilation or incapacitation of the part

This principle does not apply to moral organisms

(family, society & humanity)- a person is still
independent- he is not a subordinate to any
group- He is the subject, principle and end of all
the social institutions
Authority cannot directly dispose the physical
and personal being of a person- removal of the
undesirable or weak parts of the society

It applies to the management of health and

integrity of the body
It throws light to the licitness or illicitness of all
kinds of medical interventions, surgical
procedures and transplants
A person can dispose of individual parts,
destroying them, if and to the extent that is
necessary for the good of his being as a
whole, to ensure its existence or to avoid and
to repair grave and lasting damage which
could not be avoided in any other way

Why is it permissible to sacrifice one of the

basic human capacities to preserve life?
Not to sacrifice one basic capacity from the
other
Not for the better functioning of all other
human capacities
But sacrificing one function so as to continue
functioning at all

MUTILATION

Destruction of member, organ or part of the body

(organic) or the suppression of a physical function
(functional) in such a way that the organism
becomes no longer basically whole
Types
-direct- willed in itself, as end or as means, intended
and caused
-indirect ( therapeutic)- caused by the exigencies of
the health or survival of the patient; at times willed
as means, at others tolerated as an unavoidable
side effect

TYPES

Direct mutilation- intrinsically wrong- offends

human dignity- individual does not have the
right to mutilate himself, much less does
society
Therapeutic mutilation- licit as an act of good
stewardship of the body necessary for the
survival of the patient or to free him of
proportional sufferings or infirmities

STERILIZATION

A medical or surgical intervention which

causes a patient, incapacity of generation
Therapeutic- inevitably required for the
survival and health of a person- sexual
organs- integrating parts which must yield to
the good of the whole; licit if:
- sickness is grave, certainly diagnosed and
definitive that it offsets the evils of sterilization
- it is necessary because it is the only
possible effective remedy
- exclusively curative- intention is important

Direct sterilization- the immediate effect is to render

procreation impossible
Types:
- eugenics- seeking to avoid the transmission of
hereditary defects
- hedonistic- evade the complications &
responsibilities of procreation without giving up the
sexual pleasure
- demographic- to control the birthrate
- preventive- render pregnancy impossible which
might aggravate sickness that already exist

Hemophilia is a dangerous genetic disease

transmitted through the mother. It is life-threatening, often
very painful, and requires expensive transfusion therapy. Dr.
G. government Pediatrician, proposes to gradually eliminate
it from the population by passing a law requiring all
hemophiliac women to have their Fallopian tubes ligated. He
argues that this is for the common good and that the
government has the responsibility to correct problems that
are not corrected at a lower level. Since the parents of girls
carrying this defective gene do not have their daughters
sterilized, the government must order it done. Furthermore, it
is for the good of the girls themselves to sacrifice their fertility
to avoid the burden of caring for a hemophiliac son.

Totality

ORGAN DONATION
A person may will to dispose of his body and to
destine it to ends that are useful, morally irreproachable
and even noble, among them the desire to aid the sick and
suffering. One may make a decision of this nature with
respect to his own body with full realization of the
reverence which is due it This decision should not be
condemned but positively justified.
Pope Pius XII, Allocation to Eye Specialist, May 14,
1957; The Human Body (Boston: St. Paul Press, 1960), p.
637.

In addition, transplanting organs from one living

person to another is also ethically acceptable
provided that the following criteria are met:

1. There is serious need on the part of the recipient

that cannot be fulfilled in any other way.

2. The functional integrity of the donor as a human
person will not be impaired, even though
anatomical integrity may suffer.
3. The risk taken by the donor as an act of charity is
proportionate to the good resulting for the
recipient.
4. The donors consent is free and informed.
5. The recipients for the scarce organs are selected
justly.

ORGAN DONATION
Live donor- Informed
consent
- benefits & risks
- Unforeseen adverse
events
Cadaver donors
- brain death
- Proper care at death

Recipient- continued drug

therapy
- dependence on
technology
- Shortened life span
Who receives organs?
- those who will benefit
- Those who will comply
w/ treatment
- Allocation must be just

Principle of Double Effect

To form a good conscience when an act is foreseen to
have both ethically beneficial and physically harmful
effects, the following conditions should be met:
The directly intended object of the act must not be
intrinsically contradictory to ones fundamental
commitment to God and neighbor (including oneself)
- the act must not be evil in itself
The intention of the agent must be to achieve the
beneficial effects and as far as possible to avoid the
harmful effect (that is, must only indirectly intend the
harm).
- the intention is the good effect and the evil is not
directly intended

Principle of Double Effect

The beneficial effects must follow from the action at

least as immediately as do the harmful effects.
- Both effects must proceed equally directly from the
act or the immediate effect of the act must be good
while the evil effects is remote
The foreseen beneficial effects must be equal to or
greater than the foreseen harmful effects.
- A proportionately grave reason must be present in
order to justify the toleration of the indirect evil effect

CASE

Mrs. J. Jimenez, 35 year old, has been diagnosed

to have a breast cancer. She is pregnant for 24 weeks.
It is her first baby and she was very ecstatic that after
10 years of marriage, she finally got her wish. Her OBGyn prescribed Chemotherapy to neutralize the
cancerous cells. Her OB-Gyn advised her that such
procedure could affect the viability of her baby. She
became depressed. She advised further that it would
be better to terminate her pregnancy so that she can
be better managed medically.
A) Is the termination of pregnancy ethical as
prescribed by the Doctor?
B) Should Mrs. Jimenez agree to the procedure?

Principle of Legitimate
Cooperation
To achieve a well-formed conscience, one should
always judge it unethical to cooperate formally with
an immoral act (that is, directly to intend the evil
act itself), but one may sometimes judge it to be an
ethical duty to cooperate materially with an immoral
act (that is, only indirectly intend its harmful
consequences) when only in this way can a greater
harm be prevented, provided that:

the cooperation is not immediate and

the degree of cooperation and the danger of scandal are
taken into account.

Types of Cooperation

Formal cooperation- when one concurs with the

sinful act of another and gives internal consent to it.
- encourages, counsels, advises
Material cooperation- one somehow externally
participates in anothers sinful deed, without giving
internal consent to it
- immediate
- mediate

Mediate Cooperation
Ethical if the following conditions are met:
1.
The more remotely related the material and
mediate cooperative act is to the evil act, the
easier it is to justify
2.
The good achieved by the material and mediate
cooperation must outweigh the degree of evil and
also the contribution of the cooperator to the evil.
3.
The evil effects of the scandal ( the bad example)
set by the mediate material cooperation should be
weighed.

Personalized Sexuality

One of the basic traits of a person and must

be developed in ways consistent with
enhancing human dignity

The Meaning of Sexuality

It is used to denote the capacity of persons to

love other persons and be united with them in
friendship and community
Actions that are genital and seek orgasmic
satisfaction

The Five Major Values of

Sexuality
1. Sexual activity is a search for sensual
pleasure and satisfaction, releasing physical
and psychic tensions.
2. Sexual activity is a search for th completion
of the human person through an intimate and
personal union of love, expressed in and
through the mutual gift of the lovers s bodies.
3. Sexual activity is a social necessity for the
procreation of children and their education in
a stable family

The Five Major Values of

Sexuality
4. Sexuality opens us up, married or single, to
all the human relationships of friendship,
sympathy, cooperation, compassion, and
reconciliation
5. Sexual activity is a sacramental mystery,
somehow revealing the cosmic order and our
human destiny

Principle of Personalized
Sexuality
The gift of sexuality must be used in keeping with
its intrinsic, indivisible, specifically human
teleology. It must be a loving, bodily pleasurable
expression of the complementary, permanent
self-giving of a man and a woman to each other
which is open to fruition in the perpetuation and
expansion of this personal communion through
the family they responsibly beget and educate.

On Marriage and Conjugal

Love
Fundamentals of Marriage
Mans cooperation in the creative power of
God. Hence, man becomes Gods co-creator.
Vehicle in he transmission of life and
preservation of human race.
Instrument in the establishment of the human
family and its education.

Conjugal Act

Highest expression of union between man

and woman.
Originates from a supreme origin, God, Who
is Love.
Not an effect of chance or product of
evolution of unconscious forces.
For baptized persons, represents the union of
Christ and of the Church.

Characteristics of Conjugal Love

Human

it belongs to both Senses and Spirit (not only to

instinct and sentiment but also as an act of free
will intended to endure and grow)

Total

it is a very special form of personal friendship

(husband and wife generously share everything,
without undue reservations or selfish calculations)

Characteristics of Conjugal Love

Faithful and Exclusive

a lasting relationship until death

bond between the man and woman

Fruitful

destined to continue raising up new lives as it is possible

ordained to begetting and educating children in a stable
society
children are the supreme gift of God to the family and to
the world.

Responsible Parenthood/ Family

Planning

A way of thinking and living that is adopted

voluntarily upon the basis of knowledge,
responsible attitudes and decisions by
individuals and couples in order to promote
the health and welfare of the family group

Meaning and Origin of Life

A human organism, a member of the human

species, comes into existence when a human
ovum is fertilized by a human spermatozoa

Natural Family Planning

Defined as the way of life by which properly

instructed couples can achieve or avoid
pregnancy by appropriate sexual behavior
during the fertile and the fertile phases of the
menstrual cycle without using drugs,
chemicals, or mechanical devices

Natural Family Planning

Such methods place responsibility on both partners,

not merely on the woman, as do most methods of
family limitation
Many women who use NFP report an enhanced
sense of personal dignity resulting from an
awareness of their own body and its natural rhythms
Abstinence from intercourse can help a couple to
have confidence in the strength of their love and
express it in other ways besides orgasm.
Periodic abstinence removes something of the
sexual routine and enhances the experience when it
is actually decided upon.

Natural Family Planning (NFP) is an ethical,

effective, and proven method of limiting the
size of families

Sterilization

A medical or surgical intervention which is

performed on the patient, either man or
woman to incapacitate him or her whether
organically or functionally, temporarily or
permanently

Therapeutic Sterilization
Direct Sterilization

Types of Sterilization

Euphonic
Ascetic
Punitive
Eugenic
Hedonistic
Demographic
Preventive

Methods of Sterilization

Tubal Sterilization
Vasectomy

Direct Sterilization, regardless of the

ostensible benefits and justification is, and
will always be, a grave violation of the natural
law

Contraception

Performance of sexual intercourse with the

deliberate intention of rendering infertile an
act that could be fertile
Voluntary prevention of conception by the
positive use of artificial means, which hinders
the generative cells from uniting during the
sexual act

Methods of Contraception

Folk Methods
Mechanical Methods
Chemical Methods
Hormonal Methods
Abortifacients

The Morality of
Contraception

Any conjugal act must be open to the

transmission of life
Contraception the separation of the unitive
and procreative aspects of the marital act by
human means- is intrinsically evil

The Morality of
Contraception

When couples, by means of contraception,

separate these two meanings that God the
Creator inscribed in beings of man and
woman in the dynamism of the sexual
communion, they act as arbiters of the divine
plan and they manipulate and degrade
sexuality and themselves by manipulating,
the value of total self-giving.
(Pope John Paul II)

Artificial Reproduction
Any process by which a human sperm fertilizes
a human ovum in a manner that takes place not
as the result of sexual intercourse
Methods:
>In vitro fertilization (IVF)
>Artificial Insemination by Husband (AIH)/
Artificial insemination by Donor (AID)
> Surrogate Motherhood

Human procreation must take place in

marriage. The procreation of a new person ,
whereby the man and the woman collaborate
with the power of the Creator, must be the
fruit and the sign of the mutual self-giving,
love, and fidelity of the spouses.
Using the sperm or ovum of a third party is
not acceptable, because it constitutes a
violation of the reciprocal commitment of the
spouses. Moreover, this form of generation
violates the right of the child to a filial
relationship to its parents.

The generation of the new person should

occur only through an act of intercourse
performed between the husband and wife, in
an act that is per se suitable for the
generation of children, to which marriage is
ordered by nature.
The fertilization of the new human person
must not occur as the result of a technical
process that substitutes for the marital act
because it separates the procreative and
unitive aspects of marriage.

Methods of human generation that occur

outside the marital act are unethical because
they result in the destruction of fertilized ova,
and because they bring about the generation
outside the method in accord with the natural
law and the design of the Creator.

ABORTION

Includes spontaneous (miscarriage) and

deliberately procured (or induced) termination
of pregnancy with the resulting death of the
human being at any stage of its development.
>Direct
> Indirect

DIRECT ABORTION
-one that is induced with the immediate
purpose of destroying the human fetus at any
stage after conception

INDIRECT ABORTION
- is one in which the direct, moral object of
the action (immediate intrinsic purpose of the
procedure) is therapy for the mother, but in
which the death of the fetus is a side effect
that cannot be avoided
-eg: removal of a pathological tube
containing a fertilized ovum in an ectopic
pregnancy/ removal of a cancerous gravid
uterus
- Such indirect abortions are justified by the
Principle of Double Effect

1.

2.

3.

4.

The act in itself is directly aimed at treating

a pathology in the mother and hence ethical
The mother and the physician would save
the child if that were possible
The death of the child is not a means to
treat the mother, but only a side effect of the
procedure
The proportionate reason for the procedure
is to save the mothers life

Legal, Moral, and Ethical

Considerations

Article II, Section 12 of the 1986 Constitution

- The state recognizes the sanctity of life and
shall protect and strengthen the family as a
basic autonomous social institution

Legal, Moral, and Ethical

Considerations

The direct and voluntary killing of an innocent

human being is always gravely immoral, even
when it is performed as a means to a good
end.
Life is sacred from the very first moment of
conception
Abortion destroys life and violates the right to
life

World Health Chronicle of

1976

Summarizes the conditions or situations in

which the legislation of different countries
authorize the practice of abortion

When the mother is authorized to safeguard

her physical and mental health
When pregnancy is the consequence of rape
or incest, or when it occurs in minors
When the mother is exposed to other risks
When Downs syndrome or other
chromosomal abnormalities is diagnosed
through amniocentesis
When the parents are mentally deficient and
considered incapable of adequately rearing a
child

Shocking news circulated in

China

A town in Canton is now on trend taking baby herbal soup to

increase health and sexual performance/stamina. The cost in
China currency apprx $ 4000
A factory manager was interviewed and he testified that it is
effective because he is a frequent customer.
It is a delicacy whereby expensive herbs are added to boil the
baby with chicken meat for 8 hours boiling/steaming.
He pointed to his second wife next to him , who is 19 (he is 62),
and testified that they have sex everyday.
After waiting for a couple of weeks he took this reporter to the
restaurant when he was informed by restaurant Manager that
the spare rib soup (local code for baby soup) was now available
.
This time it was a couple who have 2 daughters and this 3rd
one was confirmed to be a daughter again.
.

So the couple aborted the baby which was 5 months

old. Those baby close to be born and die naturally
costs 2000 in China currency.
Those aborted ones cost a few hundreds in China
Currency. Those couples who did not want to sell
dead babies, placentas can be accepted also for
couple of hundreds.
The reporter making comment that is this the
problem that arise from Chinese being taking too
much attention in health or is the backfire effect
when China introduced one child in a family policy
(since majority prefers to have male babies and
those poorer families need ended up selling their
female babies.)

Direct abortion is intrinsically evil, and the

church- following the teaching of Jesus- has
affirmed this truth from the beginning

RAPE

Motivated by hostile impulses

A desire to assert aggressive powers by the
rapist and to humiliate the victim- more than
the desire for sexual pleasure
It is a violation of natural sexual activity,
which should be an act of mutual love

Care of Rape Victims

Offer psychological support and counseling

that the woman needs to overcome the
trauma of attack; often, this will require followup treatment
Provide medical care for injuries or abrasions
that might have occurred
Gather evidence to be used if the rapist is
apprehended
Provide treatment to prevent venereal
disease and pregnancy

Methods of preventing ovulation may be

utilized in Catholic hospitals, provided efforts
are made to ensure that the woman has not
already conceived as a result of rape