Abstract
Despite strong religious influence in the development of medicine and medical ethics, religion has been relatively absent in the rise of preventive medicine and population health. Episodic, clinical medicine has a powerful hold on the religious imagination in health care. Nevertheless, Hebrew Scripture, elements of rabbinical teaching, and modern concepts of social justice all can be used to inspire action in health care that goes beyond clinical medicine. The Christian tradition can call upon the corporal works of mercy, virtue ethics, and Catholic social teaching, as well as the modern history Catholic sisters in the U.S. to do the same. By considering the moral imperative for public health, Jewish and Christian individuals and organizations reaffirm the notion that the human person is both sacred and social. This article suggests a need for religious traditions to consider their moral traditions anew with an eye toward prevention and population health.
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Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Alexander Jarosev for significant background research on this topic and would like to thank Peter Jacobson and Charley Willison for comments on previous drafts of this manuscript.
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Michael Rozier has received research grants from Catholic Health Association.
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This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.
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Rozier, M. Religion and Public Health: Moral Tradition as Both Problem and Solution. J Relig Health 56, 1052–1063 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-017-0357-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-017-0357-5