How can a personalist perspective contribute to a better understanding of the experience of people living with dementia? What does it mean to offer hospitality to those in need of care? And why is it important to respect the conscience, and the right to conscientious objection, of healthcare practitioners? These are some of the questions we explore in this episode with Xavier Symons, a postdoctoral fellow at the Human Flourishing Program in the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University, and the author of Why Conscience Matters: A Defence of Conscientious Objection in Healthcare (Routledge).

We cover the following topics in this episode:

Xavier's current work at Harvard (02:12)

Xavier's earlier academic work (05:38)

Personal and family influences on Xavier's academic journey (11:25)

A personalist perspective on dementia care (15:00)

'Reciprocating care' (22:40)

Recovering the notion of hospitality in care work (26:35)

Hospitality and disponibilité (30:10)

Hospitality and spiritual care (35:00)

Why conscience matters in healthcare (37:30)

The virtuous practitioner (40:55)

Conscientious objection and end of life care (42:00)

Other personal and philosophical influences on Xavier's thinking (49:05)

Links

Xavier's website

The Human Flourishing Program at Harvard

Plunkett Centre for Ethics

Personalism

Catholic social teaching

Xavier's publications

Why Conscience Matters: A Defence of Conscientious Objection in Healthcare (2022)

'Love to the Very End: A Theology of Dementia' (2021)

'The Hostility of Illness and the Therapeutic Importance of Hospitality' (2023)

Other publications mentioned in the episode

Karol Wojtyla (John Paul II), Love and Responsibility

Eva Feder Kittay and Ellen K Feder, The Subject of Care: Feminist Perspectives on Dependency

Gerd S Sellevold et al., 'Quality care for persons experiencing dementia: the significance of relational ethics'

Brendan Sweetman (ed.) A Gabriel Marcel Reader

Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue

O. Carter Snead, What It Means to Be Human: The Case for the Body in Public Bioethics