It isn’t often that a high school in the United States is ahead of the curve when it comes to promulgating Church teaching. But John Paul the Great Catholic High School, the Arlington Diocese’s newest high school, recently found itself in that position with the publication of the Vatican’s latest instruction on bioethics.

The document, “Dignitatis Personae” (“The Dignity of a Person”), published in December, is confirmation that the development and implementation of a bioethics curriculum at the high school level is on the right track.

In “Dignitatis Personae,” the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, with the expressed approval of Pope Benedict XVI, responds to new bioethical questions that have been a focus of concern in society. What makes the document so affirming of the work of John Paul the Great, however, is the way the Church responds to these new questions, as well as the content of her response.

“Dignitatis Personae” is divided into three sections. The first part discusses the foundational principles needed to understand the Church’s answers to bioethical questions. In its second and third parts, the document then applies those principles as it deals with various bioethical issues.

The bioethics curriculum being taught at John Paul the Great is similar in structure to “Dignitatis Personae.” Before looking into any of the bioethical issues in detail, students are first acquainted with the foundational, philosophical principles they will need to truly understand the “why” of the answers.

The goal is for students to not only understand what the Church teaches on the various bioethical issues, but also to comprehend why she teaches as she does. The hope is that this deeper knowledge will enable John Paul the Great students to see its reasonableness as well as to articulate for others a rational explanation of the truth.

“Dignitatis Personae” lays out two foundational principles that concern the dignity of every human person. The first is that every human person has the inviolable right to life from the very first moment of his existence until natural death. The second demands that every person come into existence only through the sexual act of his mother and father who are united in marriage. Once these principles are established, the document goes on to apply them to particular issues.

This same content is found in John Paul the Great’s bioethics curriculum. The foundational course, entitled "The Human Person," is divided into two parts: The first presents a philosophical understanding of the human person according to St. Thomas Aquinas, and the second looks at Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body.

It is in the second half of the semester that students learn the beauty and meaning of the sexual act and the purpose of marriage. They come to realize that what we do with our bodies, especially sexually, is of tremendous importance, for our bodies express our persons and affect other persons.

“As one of the first students to complete the ‘Human Person’ course at JP the Great, I find that it has taught me to better understand the moral and ethical issues facing our generation,” said sophomore Cathryn Krakie of Woodbridge. “I believe that my knowledge of these issues will help me understand why the Catholic Church teaches what it does and why I choose to follow it.”

As the first semester comes to an end, the school leadership and students find it has already done exactly what “Dignitatis Personae” does in its first section. “Dignitatis Personae” presents no new information in its first section that John Paul the Great students have not already considered to some extent. Perhaps this is why one unidentified student exclaimed in class when she heard about “Dignitatis Personae,” "We are ahead of the Church!"

More accurately, John Paul the Great high school is right with the Church in trying to address some crucial needs of our times.

Nashville Dominican Sister Terese Auer, the author of John Paul the Great’s bioethics curriculum, has provided condensed bioethics seminars for parents of students, so that mom and dad may learn along with their children.

There continues to be interest from Catholic schools in other dioceses about starting a bioethics program, and John Paul the Great has promised to provide assistance and materials once their own four-year curriculum has been perfected.

Find out more

John Paul the Great Catholic High School will offer condensed bioethics seminars for the general public beginning in February.

For information go to jpthegreat.org or call 703/445-0300.

COURTESY PHOTO

Nashville Dominican Sr. Terese Auer teaches a new bioethics course at John Paul the Great Catholic High School in Dumfries, a course that mirrors a recent Vatican document.