1
Chair for Christian Studies and Research
University of Calicut
Value Education Programme (Post Graduate level)
Subjects
1. The Foundations of Human dignity
2. The vision of Good Samaritan in Fratelli Tutti
3. Counselling and Family Stability
4. Religions for Greener earth
5. Young People search for Personal identity
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Chapter 1
The Foundations of Human Dignity
Introduction
The cruel incident of rape and murder of the girl in Delhi has not yet faded away from
our memories. It was an incident that touched the consciousness of Indian People and
called for great protest all over the country. It is not a single case when we assess the
situation. In today’s culture we could realise that human life is the most neglected and
mistreated value on earth. There are rules for the protection of nature and wild animals
and the concerned people struggle hard to observe them strictly. It often appears that we
love wild animals more than human beings. The alcoholics, rapists, terrorists and
criminals, all aim at destroying human life which is a precious gift from God our creator.
The attitude towards human life is often merciless and brutal which underlines the old
saying, ‘homo homini Lupus’ (man is wolf to man).
The advancement in science and technology, especially in the field of
biotechnology and medical science, has increased this threatening situation. The ‘profit
gain’ attitude of the modern culture has influenced the human society to think seriously
about promoting and even legalising such acts like, experiments on human embryos,
homosexual marriage, mercy killing, surrogate motherhood etc. We are living and
promoting a ‘culture of death’ that human life is always under threat from the moment of
conception to the old age. “The crimes against human dignity have acquired the nature of
rights”1. The experiments on human embryos in order to create a society without
diseases, manipulation of embryos to treat harmful diseases, stem cell cultivation where
one develops particular organs to replace the diseased one, genetic screening, genome
1
This chapter is adapted from J. Christie Palliyodil, “The Foundations of Human Dignity: A Philosophical and
Theological Approach”, Eastern Journal of Dialogue and Culture (EJDC), 6.1 (2013) 63-78; JOHN PAUL II,
Encyclical letter, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life), AAS, Vol.87, 1995…, no. 11.
3
mapping, in vitro fertilization and the attempts to produce designer babies with super
human qualities etc challenge the moral worth of human beings and call forth serious
discussion on the dignity of human life.
The sources of Human Dignity
Dignity is an objective and intrinsic value, which is the inherent preciousness and
goodness of a being in which there is no preference for subjective likes or dislikes. 2 It is
most sublime and unique, incomparable with any other value, which endows a person
with an objective preciousness which raises him to the level of a being of
incommensurable worth.
The Catholic Church teaches that human beings possess a twofold dignity 3 while
living on the earth. Being simply as members of human species, the first kind of dignity
is intrinsic and conferred upon him as an endowment or gift. The very first book of the
Bible says; “In the beginning God created man in His own image and likeness…male and
female he created them.”4 Every human life is conceived as the image of God. This
intrinsic dignity proper to human beings is a gift of God and therefore every human
person from the moment of conception is a being of moral worth.
What does it mean when we say God has created human beings in His own image
and likeness? To put in other words, is human life superior to other living creatures on
earth? Or to put more simply, do the humans and animals on earth share the same life?
Or is there any difference between human beings and animals?
The answer is simple. It is sure that there is a difference between humans and
animals. Human beings are created superior to other creatures on earth and endowed with
special capacities such as intelligence, will, freedom and immortality which, the animals
do not possess. Every human individual has a soul which is the divine element in him;
2
SEIFERT, J., “The Right to Life and the Fourfold Root of Human Dignity”, In, The Nature and dignity of the
Human Person as the foundation of the Right to life: the challenges of the contemporary cultural context:
proceedings of the viii Assembly of the Pontifical Academy for life, VIAL CORREA de DIOS, J. & SGRECCIA, E.,
(eds.), Vatican City, 25 – 27 February 2002; Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Citta del Vaticano, 2003, p. 197.
3
AQUINAS, ST. THOMAS., Summa Theologiae, I, q. 93, a. 4 (Vol.1), Translated by the Fathers of the English
Dominican Province, New York: Benziger Brothers, 1947.
4
Genesis 1:27.
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immortal and the special capacities are considered as the faculties of the soul in his body.
While the body perishes after certain years of life, the soul supersedes and survives.
The second kind of dignity is an achievement by our own effort. With the
intelligence and free will we have the capacity to determine our own lives by our free
choices. By making free choices in conformity with the divine Truth, a person achieves
this dignity. II Vatican council testifies to this fact: “the highest norm of human life is the
divine law – eternal, objective and universal – whereby God orders, directs, and governs
the entire universe and all the ways of the human community according to a plan
conceived in wisdom and love.”5
Human Being and Human Person
Human dignity is rooted in the nature of person. Dignity enables a being to be
considered as a person and is inseparable from personhood. There is a clear difference
between human being and a human person. Human being is an anthropological term
which has a place in the scientific system of biology and species, defined as a member of
human species, biologically, not developmentally. On the other hand, the term Person is
concerned with the moral or philosophical realm, the sphere of learning such as,
philosophy, theology, history, literature, psychology and law. A human person indicates
all that which is specific to man, that which differentiates him from other beings and is
the foundation of his dignity and rights, and which exists in a concrete individual. 6 Other
living creatures on earth are not referred to as persons.
A person is unique and unrepeatable subject of rational nature in whom the
dignity is inherent. Alexander of Hales expresses this relationship in the following words,
“the person is a substance which is distinguished through a property related to dignity.” 7
When dignity is referred to the person it also refers to his physiological, psychological
and spiritual nature, because this together constitutes the human person.
5
CONCILIUM VATICANUM II, Dignitatis Humanae, No. 3.
6
LUCAS, L. R., “The Anthropological status of the human embryo”, In, Identity and Statute of Human Embryo;
proceedings of the iii Assembly of the Pontifical Academy for life, VIAL CORREA de DIOS, J.& SGRECCIA, E.,
(eds), Vatican City, 14 – 16 February 1997; Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Citta del Vaticano, 1998, p.194.
7
SEIFERT, J., “The Right to Life and the Fourfold Root of Human Dignity”, In, The Nature and Dignity of the
Human Person…, p. 198.
5
Some of the significant aspects of the person are. 1. Inwardness of person, which
is the power of the person to act through himself, out of himself, or in other words to
perform acts that are radically his own. 8 2. Person has belongingness to himself, i.e., a
person is a being of his own, or a person is a being that exists of his own. But he does not
exist through himself, but belongs to God, thus there is a paradoxical unity of selfhood
and dependence, of autonomy and theonomy. Hence his dignity is respected in this
aspect. 3. The aspect of corporeality, this man is man because he possesses human nature,
is thus a human being and a human person.9
Aristotle, in his search for the distinguishing character of the human beings, settled
upon “rationality” as the trait that distinguishes human beings from other creatures. 10 The
Aristotelian idea was accepted by St. Thomas Aquinas, weaving it into his natural law
theory and Catholic Theology and it remained central in the Thomistic tradition of
thinking. Aristotle’s definition of personhood has since been accepted, almost
uncritically, by both western philosophers and the Church
Self-awareness is the capacity of a person to think of himself and of his
surroundings and to be aware of his activities. Man is aware of himself through his
conscious activities. The conscious act reveals him as the subject of both corporeal and
non-corporeal activities, e.g., walking and thinking. Man can be aware of both at the
same time. This property of self-consciousness enables him to make judgments of
conscience. The capacity to make free choices and moral judgments enables him to be a
moral being. This self-awareness gives him the sense of a unique superior being worthy
of dignity and rights.
This essentially leads to the following definition for a human person, “ A human
individual is a member of the species Homosapiens, who on account of a unique
psychosomatic constitution, is capable of experiencing self-consciousness, rational and
8
COSBY, J. F., “Man as Person”: a Personalist approach to the Spiritual Nature of Man., In, BOYLE, J. F., (ed.)
Creative Love: the ethics of Human reproduction, London: Christendom press, 1986, p. 91.
9
GUARDINI, R., Welt und Person, Würzburg, 1962, p. 128.
10
BOSS, J. A, The Birth Lottery: Prenatal diagnosis and selective Abortion, Chicago: Loyola University Press,
1993, p. 102.
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free acts in addition to performing nutritive and physiological functions and other bodily
activities.”11
The essential nature of the person is related to his capacities for free acts, thinking,
moral conscience, religious acts etc. Therefore, this dignity is referred having an
ontological character. So, it is a religious dignity related to an objective reality – related
to God. Hence the Jewish, Islamic and Christian religious traditions consider that the
person is created in the image and likeness of God.
This view can be seen in the philosophical traditions too. The Romans considered
the person as sacred: ‘homo homini res sacra est’.12 Immanuel Kant spoke of dignity as a
value for which no equivalent can be offered. It does not allow some negotiations nor any
offences against it. For Kant, dignity is of irreplaceable value, for which a price cannot be
attributed, and hence this dignity does not allow us to use a human being as a means to an
end.13
Person and Personality
There is a fundamental difference between person and personality. “Personality has
predominantly a psychological sense and indicates the collection of qualities and defects,
innate or acquired that characterize an individual. The person, instead, is the subject of
those endowments”14. The person is the ontological substratum of human nature, whereas
personality refers to accidental qualities. Personhood does not change, nor is it alterable
nor in the process of becoming. It either is or not. On the contrary the personality is
subjected to transformations, in the development due to education and environmental
influence. Thus, there takes place an improvement or change of personality.
Romano Guardini writes in a famous passage:
11
FORD, M. N., When did I begin? Conception of the Human Individual in History, Philosophy and Science,
Cambridge University Press, 1988, p.76.
12
Man is for man sacred, a sacred thing; In, CICERO, De Legibus, I, vii, 22, Cf. SEIFERT, J., “The Right to Life
and the Fourfold Root of Human Dignity”, In, The Nature and Dignity of the Human Person…, p. 199).
13
KANT, I., Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, Vorlaender, K., Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1922, p.436.
14
LUCAS, L. R., “The Anthropological Status of the Human Embryo”, In, Identity and Statute of Human Embryo,
p. 201.
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Being a person is not a datum of psychological nature but existential. Fundamentally it depends
neither on age, nor on psychological condition, nor on gifts of nature with which the subject is
endowed. The personality might not yet be developed, as in the baby, but nevertheless from the
beginning it commands moral respect. It is even possible that the personality in general does not
emerge in acts, in that physical or psychological support are lacking, as in the case of the
mentally ill. Finally, the personality can also remain hidden as in the embryo, although it is
present in him from the beginning and has its rights. It is the personality that gives men their
dignity, distinguishing them from things and making them subjects. 15
The Relationship between Human Nature and Person
Some writers argue that the early human embryo is not yet a person because it doesn’t
have a right kind of nature as that of the later embryo, foetus or infant. . Aristotle uses the
term ‘nature’ (Physis), as the essence of beings, which is the principle of operation. Every
being has a nature which determines its place among beings, and which specifies its
typical mode of acting. ‘Nature’ is something intrinsic to the subject, not a factor which
conditions it from outside. It refers to the ontological constitution of the being and its
mode of acting. Therefore, man has a human nature and this nature is rational in which
both his biological corporeity and his spiritual soul are essentially present in substantial
unity.
These personal abilities surely must depend on the kind of being they are. That is,
it depends on the nature of the being. The concept of a person is not primarily a
biological concept, but human beings are persons because of their human nature. And
human nature is determined at the time of conception. A person may lack one or several
of the attributes typical to personhood, yet he can be called as a person, for what decides
whether a being is a person is his nature.
The subject of any moral action is the person. One cannot say a human being is a
person simply because he possesses a human nature. Rather one must say, it is the human
nature in this man here, that is, the person. Human nature is not created to subsist, since it
cannot exist in reality except in its indivisible unity, that is in a subject. Therefore, one
cannot say that the nature is born, but that this person of human nature is born. Not a
human nature but a man is born, precisely this man from these parents. In summary we
GUARDINI, R., I diritti del nascituro, In, “Studi Cattolici”, May – June, 1974, as quoted in Lucas, L. R., “The
15
Anthropological Status of the Human Embryo”, In, Identity and Statute of Human Embryo…, p.201.
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can say that, the essence common to all men constitutes human nature, and that the
concrete human nature in this man here constitutes the person, a concrete and singular
individual.16
It is clear that all beings of human origin, all members of the species homo
sapiens, have the same kind of nature, that is the human nature and the capacity to
develop the abilities inherent in this nature. We must say that the development from
zygote to foetus, even in the case of twins, is continuous and so must be informed
throughout by one and the same teleologically orientated developmental power which at
the biological level is genetically determined and which directs the organism’s
development as a functional unity from zygote into foetus, into a baby, a child and
eventually into an adult.
Human Dignity and Right to Life
In his article, “Right to life and the fourfold root of human dignity”, J. Seifert
notes that the following situations cause a threat to human dignity and the right to life.
1. The first attack against human dignity is based in denying a distinction between
man and animal due to the theory of evolutionism.
2. This is further rooted in atheism hence denying the character of human being as a
person in the image and likeness of God, and any metaphysical and religious
foundation of human dignity.
3. The reduction of the being of the person only to his performance as a person,
which is absent in embryos and in many other human beings.
4. The reduction of persons to their conscious activities only: the introduction of a
distinction between human being and a human person.17
16
LUCAS, L. R., “The Anthropological status of the human embryo”, In, Identity and Statute of Human Embryo…,
p.194.
17 36
The author observes that the distinction between the biologically defined human being and human persons is
closely related with actualism as a denial of a personal subject or soul. (See the quoted footnote from the author:
SPAEMANN, R., Personen. Versuche über den Unterschied zwischen etwas und Jemand, Stuttgart, Klett – Cotta,
1996; See also, SEIFERT, J., Is Brain Death actually death?, In, “The Monist”, 1993, Vol.76, Pp. 175 –202. The
attitude behind this concept is to attribute personhood only to awakened human beings capable of acting as persons,
as a result, personhood is denied to infants and to the patients in irreversible coma or in PVS, or as well as to the
brain dead.
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5. Denial of human nature and the law pertains to his nature, inherent in all human
beings, and accepting only positive law as a source of human rights.
6. A general scepticism and relativism which denies any values independent of any
subjective opinions.
Human dignity and right to life are closely related, but are two different things.
Dignity is inherent and unique, possessed by every individual, whereas right to life is
relative. It is related to other person, and depends upon various circumstances. Human
dignity is understood in relation to the objective reality that is related to God. Dignity
belongs to a person at every stage and form of life. Right to life presupposes, besides,
dignity, the contingencies to claim such a right and a possible threat to life, whereas these
conditions are not essential elements of inherent human dignity.
The offence against the right to life is not only an act against the Fifth
Commandment “You shall not kill” Second Vatican council brings forward the offences
against life in the following words:
All offences against life itself, such as murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia and wilful self-
destruction; all violations of the integrity of human person, such as mutilation, physical and
mental torture, undue psychological pressures; all offences against human dignity, such as
subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution, the selling
of woman and children, degrading working conditions where men are treated as mere tools for
profit rather than free and responsible persons, all these and their like are criminal; they poison
civilization; and they debase their perpetrators more than their victims and militate against the
honour of the creator.18
The legalisation of abortion is the first direct attack against the dignity and status
of the unborn child. As Pope John Paul II has noted, paradoxically the crimes against
human dignity acquired the nature of rights 19 by this movement. By the legalisation it has
acquired a generally acceptable character in the society. The first legislation on abortion
was done in Russia in 1920, which was followed by the East European nations under
Communism in 1950. This was the result of a totalitarian socio-political approach with
economic motives. In Europe the legislation arrived late with the English abortion act of
18
II. VATICAN COUNCIL, Gaudium et spes, no.27.
19
JOHN PAUL II, Encyclical letter, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life)…. no. 11.
10
1967. In 1971, abortion was legalised in India; in 1973 in America, Germany and
Denmark; in 1974 in Sweden; in 1975 in France; 1978 in Italy, Luxemburg and in
Greece; 1984 in Portugal; 1985 in Spain; 1990 in Belgium etc.20
It is quite interesting to observe the motives behind the legislation movements
against the right to life. In Russia and other communist countries with totalitarian
political system, the motive behind the legislation of abortion was to enhance to bring the
woman in the working world outside the domestic walls in order to benefit the social
economy.
In America the legislation was done in a democratic atmosphere, guided by the
motive of personal freedom of the woman.21 In India and China abortion was facilitated
by socio cultural and religious reasons.22
Though there are different motivations behind the legalisation of abortion,
basically they are guided by strict legal positivism based on the denial of natural law and
the consequent separation of freedom from the truth. It is observed, that two utopian
ideologies, which also became political systems, guided the world in the last century:
“the totalitarian utopia of justice without freedom on the one hand and on the other the
libertarian utopia of freedom without truth.”23
The encyclical letter written by Pope John Paul II, “Evangelium Vitae - The Gospel of
Life”, examines the consequences of laws, which legitimise the laws against the right to
life. For example, the laws are passed by the state authorities against the direct killing of
human beings either by abortion or by euthanasia. The following consequences are
presented.
20
HERRANZ, J., “The Dignity of the Human Person and the Law”, In, The Nature and dignity of the Human
Person…, p. 26.
21
BOSS, J. A., The Birth Lottery…, p. 11.
22
MACKLIN, R., The ethics of sex selection, in, “Journal of Medical Ethics India”, Cfr.
[Link].
23
HERRANZ, J., “The Dignity of the Human Person and the Law”, In, The Nature and dignity of the Human
Person…, p. 27; The author observes that the totalitarian ideology of, justice without freedom is declining and left
its bad impact upon the spiritual and social realm of life. The second utopian ideology; freedom without truth is
unfortunately still in a growing face, found its legislative instrument in legal positivism which explicitly or implicitly
denies the postulates of natural law; it expresses the idea that, there is no objective truth, but truth is only relative
and conventional.
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1. These laws are in complete opposition to the inviolable right to life proper to every
individual
2. Thus, they deny the equality of everyone before the law
3. These laws are contrary to the fundamental principles of absolute respect for life
and of the protection of every innocent life
4. Such laws open the door to ways of acting, which are destructive of trust in
relations between people
5. Therefore, such laws are not only opposed to the good of the individual but also to
the common good. Because it allows the killing of the persons who exist to serve
the society for the common good.24
Therefore, Evangelium Vitae says that “a civil law authorizing abortion or
euthanasia ceases by that very fact to be a true, morally binding civil law.” 25
The development of science, especially the developments in the field of
biotechnology, has brought forth new challenges beyond abortion, such as assisted
reproductive techniques, early experimentation on human embryos etc. Therefore, the
debate on the dignity and value of human life has become much more profound and
compels us to consider other areas of related studies such as genetics, embryology, law,
philosophy, theological anthropology, pastoral theology etc for a more qualified and
profound intervention in the subject.26
There is an obligation to respect human life in its every form, due to the dignity
and nature owned by the human person. “Human life is not a value equal to other values
such as education, wealth or power, but is a fundamental value, whose protection and
preservation is a condition of any other values, including also these ones which are
attributed to the human person in particular.”27
24
Evangelium Vitae,No. 72
25
Evangelium Vitae, No. 72
26
CARRASCO DE PAULA, I., “The Respect due to Human Embryo: A Historical and Doctrinal Perspective”, In,
The Identity and Statute of the Human Embryo…, p. 58.
27
A, SZOSTEK., Dignity and nature…..p. 48. Regarding the dignity and value of human life from the beginning of
life and to the later stage, see Evangelium Vitae, no.58 – 67.
12
To live is to exist. Therefore St. Thomas Aquinas warns us against treating life as
a category of action, because life is an abstract rendering of the existence of living
beings.28 Therefore, one who is denied of life either in the early stages or in the later
stage, is denied of his or her right to existence, along with other possibilities of self-
fulfilment.
The inclination to protect and to preserve life is derived from natural law. For, life
is the essence, and to live and to protect life is the first principle of human existence.
Evangelium Vitae presents right to life as the fundamental right, a right belonging to
every individual regardless of his or her state of life and source of all other rights. 29
Conclusion
The attacks on human persons and the principal arguments on the licitness or
illicitness of biomedical interventions on human life lead explicitly to the question of
personal status of the human Individual. Man is considered as a moral agent due to his
capacity of reflective self-awareness. This intellectual ability enables man to be aware of
himself as a person. The same awareness enables him to be considered as an agent of
moral worth, a being endowed with dignity and rights. This is applicable not only in
cognitive acts, but in the non-cognitive acts that express love, sorrow, hatred, joy,
sympathy, anger or greed. The capacity for reflective self-awareness is unique to human
being. It differentiates man from other beings including animals. Man is more than
someone who has the capacity to engage in rational self-conscious acts as the animals do.
Hence the need to think about the presence of a human soul. Therefore, human life in any
form, either in its totality or in the differentially able state deserve respect in every sense
and is to be treated, as not something but as someone who is a person bearing the image
and likeness of God.
28
[Link] AQUINAS, Summa Theologiae,… I, q. 18, a. 2
29
Cfr. Evangelium Vitae, ....No. 72
