Abstract

There is a growing interest in bioethics education in Asiatoday. The UNESCO Asia-Pacific conference held in Seoul, adopted a Joint Plan of Action for RegionalNetworking in Bioethics Education – Towards Better BioethicsEducation, Paragraph 2 of which reads: “Societies will progressalong a more just, equitable and sustainable basis if theUcultural, ethical and spiritual valuesU of those societies arecentral determinants in shaping technology and science.”I would like to reflect on how India can respond to this call,considering two contexts. The first is the multicultural, multireligious,secular democracy that India is. The second relates tothe strictly secular nature of the present-day bioethicaldiscourse. In a secular world, what framework would bestenable the contribution of cultural, ethical and, especially,religious and spiritual values in bioethics education?This paper is situated in two moments – the first, anepistemological moment, defining the context, and theformative role of religion and spirituality in attitudes and valuesthat students bring to the table. The second, a pedagogicalmoment, which evaluates bioethics education today, anddescribes the role of religion and spirituality in formation of thecomponents of moral experience, viz. moral perception, moraljustification and moral motivation.A philosophical framework of capacity building in theprocess of “Deliberation” is proposed, which starts with themoral experience of the student and guides it towards theexpertise required of participants in the moral discourse. Theimportance of inter-cultural and inter-religious dialogue in thebioethics education process is discussed