The movement to medicate grief is an insult to the human condition.

Caregivers and health care professionals can and often do greatly assist those who are suffering and dying. Even with careful pain management and comfort measures, however, the dying process can still be agonizing and difficult.

This article is excerpted from a homily given by the Archbishop of Vancouver, B. C. during the White Mass for health-care providers in January 2011.

I once asked a young physician whether he had received any training in medical ethics during medical school.

In modern times, dying is more and more often portrayed as a cold, clinical reality to be kept at arm's length, relegated to the closed doors of a hospital, almost hermetically sealed from the rest of our lives. When it comes to the event itself, we diligently work to avoid confronting it, addressing it, or acknowledging it.

In October, Barack Obama signed a new law that prohibits the U.S. government from referring to the mentally retarded in any of its laws and regulations.

I once heard a remarkable story from a woman named Cecilia sitting next to me on a long flight.

Some medical conditions can be made worse by becoming pregnant.

In a May, 2010 article entitled "How We Created the First Synthetic Cell," Dr. J. Craig Venter waxes broadly about how his research team succeeded in constructing a bacterial cell out of its component parts.

When I do presentations on in vitro fertilization, audience members sometimes ask whether test tube babies experience psychological problems as they grow up.