Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 10, 2024

Pope Francis calls for a ban on surrogacy

 The Catholic Church has long opposed in-vitro fertilization (IVF), one of the technological tools that allows surrogacy, on the grounds that IVF produces more embryos than are brought to term as babies, and so is comparable to abortion.*  But this week, during his annual "state of the world" foreign policy speech, Pope Francis made clear that he thinks surrogacy should additionally be banned because of the presence of "commercial contracts." 

Here's the story from the National Catholic Register:

Pope Francis Calls Surrogacy ‘Deplorable,’ Calls for Global Ban in Speech to Ambassadors

"Pope Francis called surrogacy “deplorable” and called for a global ban on the exploitative practice of “so-called surrogate motherhood” in a speech to all of the world’s ambassadors to the Vatican on Monday.

“The path to peace calls for respect for life, for every human life, starting with the life of the unborn child in the mother’s womb, which cannot be suppressed or turned into an object of trafficking,” Pope Francis said Jan. 8.

In this regard, I deem deplorable the practice of so-called surrogate motherhood, which represents a grave violation of the dignity of the woman and the child, based on the exploitation of situations of the mother’s material needs. A child is always a gift and never the basis of a commercial contract.”

"The Pope then called on the international community to prohibit the practice of surrogacy universally."

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The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reiterates the main point in this quote from its spokesperson:

Statement of USCCB on Holy Father’s Remarks on Surrogacy, January 8, 2024

“As Pope Francis stated, with surrogacy, an unborn child is turned into ‘an object of trafficking’ because it exploits the birth mother’s material needs and makes the child the product of a commercial contract. This is why the Catholic Church teaches that the practice of surrogacy is not morally permissible. Instead, we should pray for, and work towards, a world that upholds the profound dignity of every person, at every stage and in every circumstance of life.”

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And here's the story in the NYT:

Francis Urges Ban on Surrogacy, Calling It ‘Despicable’  The pope said that an unborn child must not be “turned into an object of trafficking,” expanding his condemnation of a practice already illegal in Italy and some other European countries.  By Jason Horowitz

"Pope Francis on Monday called surrogate motherhood a “despicable” practice that should be universally banned for its “commercialization” of pregnancy, including the practice among wars, terrorism and other threats to peace and humanity in an annual speech to ambassadors.

...

"Surrogacy is already illegal in Italy and compensated surrogacy is also illegal or restricted in much of Europe. The United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Portugal and several other nations allow surrogacy under certain conditions. Paid surrogacy is legal in some European nations, including Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.

"Surrogate mothers in the United States and Canada are often hired by Europeans, including same-sex couples, seeking to have children..."

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Earlier:

Wednesday, April 5, 2023  Surrogacy under siege in Italy



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Update: here's the Pope's full speech (in English) from the Vatican Press Office:

Wednesday, April 5, 2023

Surrogacy under siege in Italy

 Opposition to surrogacy in Italy has taken aim at the babies of same sex couples.

The NYT has the story:

Surrogacy Emerges as the Wedge Issue for Italy’s Hard Right. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has ordered municipalities to stop certifying foreign birth certificates for same-sex couples who used surrogacy, leaving some babies in a legal limbo.  By Jason Horowitz

"the government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni ordered municipalities to obey a court ruling made in December and stop certifying foreign birth certificates of children born to Italian same-sex couples through surrogacy, which is illegal in Italy.

"The decision has left Martino Libero and several other children suspended in a legal limbo, depriving them of automatic Italian citizenship and residency rights like access to the country’s free health care system and nursery school.

...

"Milan, a city that has long served as a cosmopolitan haven for same-sex couples in Italy, has for now complied with the Meloni government order and suspended issuing Italian birth certificates.

"Without official recognition, Libero Martino, 2 months old this month, will have to leave and re-enter the country every few months to remain legal. A court could eventually recognize one of the men as the biological father — they decline to say which one is the sperm donor — and then they could start a separate adoption process for the other.

...

"Ms. Meloni’s government has sought to shift the issue away from the status of the children to the practice of surrogacy, which, while legal in the United States and Canada, is illegal or restricted in much of Europe outside of Greece, Ukraine and a few other countries. In Italy, home of the Vatican, it is not only illegal, but it is also widely opposed, including among Catholic corners of the center-left opposition.

...

"Prominent members of Ms. Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party have called surrogacy a crime “even worse than pedophilia,” in which gay couples, one of whom is usually the biological father, seek to “pass off” children as their own and mistake “children for Smurfs,” saying gay couples can uniquely afford surrogacy, even though it is overwhelmingly used more by heterosexual couples.

"The party is floating a proposal, made by Ms. Meloni when she was a member of Parliament, to make Italians’ seeking of surrogate births abroad — what she had called “procreative tourism” — illegal and “punishable with three months to two years of prison and a fine of 600,000 to a million euros.”

...

"In an interview shortly before her election, as her young daughter ran around her in a Sardinia courtyard, Ms. Meloni said she opposed gay marriage, not because she was homophobic — “I’ve got many, many homosexual friends” — but because she saw it as a step to same-sex adoption, which she opposed, and which the Roman Catholic Church successfully lobbied to exclude from a civil unions law passed in 2016.

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Earlier:

Monday, February 20, 2023

Thursday, January 26, 2023

Blasphemy in Pakistan

 How to strengthen a ban that already allows the death penalty for repugnant speech?  The NYT has the story:

Pakistan Strengthens Already Harsh Laws Against Blasphemy. Insulting Islam or its founder is already a capital offense, but now those who insult people connected to the Prophet Muhammad could get prison time. By Salman Masood

"Pakistan’s blasphemy laws, which can already mean death for those deemed to have insulted Islam or the Prophet Muhammad, can now also be used to punish anyone convicted of insulting people who were connected to him.

"The move this week by Parliament to further strengthen the nation’s strict blasphemy laws, which are often used to settle personal scores or persecute minorities, has raised concerns among rights activists about the prospect of an increase in such persecution, particularly of religious minorities, including Christians.

...

"Those convicted of insulting the Prophet Muhammad’s wives, companions or close relatives will now face 10 years in prison, a sentence that can be extended to life, along with a fine of 1 million rupees, roughly $4,500. It also makes the charge of blasphemy an offense for which bail is not possible.

...

"Taking a stand on the issue can also be dangerous, as the assassination of two senior politicians more than a decade ago made clear. In 2011, Salmaan Taseer, the governor of Punjab Province, was fatally shot by one of his own bodyguards. Mr. Taseer had been an outspoken opponent of the blasphemy laws and had campaigned for the release of Asia Bibi, a Christian convicted of insulting the Prophet Muhammad. Shahbaz Bhatti, a federal minister and a Christian who had also opposed the death sentence imposed on Ms. Bibi, was fatally shot the same year."

Friday, August 12, 2022

Are sociology and economics coming closer together? Philippe Steiner in Acta Oeconomica

 Professor Philippe Steiner, of the Groupe d’Etudes des Méthodes de l’Analyse Sociologique de la Sorbonne, thinks that these days sociology and economics may be coming closer to each other than they have for some time.

New economic sociology and economic theory by Philippe Steiner, Acta Oeconomica 72 (2022) S1, 23–40  DOI: 10.1556/032.2022.00017

"Abstract: The paper begins with a brief reminder of the origin of economic sociology. It then surveys research by economic sociologists from the 1980s to the present, with a focus on their relation to political economy, which ranges from close to arm's length. Finally, beyond any differences between economic theory and economic sociology, the paper considers how both approaches can be connected in the socio-historical and economic study of economic inequalities by Thomas Piketty, and the use of matching markets by Alvin Roth."

...

"In the final part the paper seeks to show that economists have developed approaches that permit a fruitful combination of sociology and political economy, even using some of the more technical aspects of modern economics.

...

"After the 1930s economic sociology lost its appeal for economists, as well as sociologists, and gave way to the “Parsonian peace” according to which economists deal with value, while sociologists deal with values (Stark 2009: 7).

...

"There was a revival of economic sociology during the 1970s on both sides of the Atlantic. In the United States, this began with Mark Granovetter’s work on the labor market (Granovetter 1974), and then with a new interpretation of the social embeddedness of the market (Granovetter 1985). This was something that Polanyi had stressed in his book, noting the catastrophic consequences that follow the management of humanity, nature and politics as if they were market goods (labor, land and money) regulated by “supply and demand” in their respective markets. In the same period, Viviana Zelizer (1979, 1985) brought the sociology of culture closer to the sociology of economic life. In Europe, Pierre Bourdieu proposed a new interpretation of the market for cultural goods (or symbolic goods), to explain the functioning of the art market (Bourdieu 1971).

"As regards the relation to economic theory, the new economic sociology unfolds along four axes: (i) Granovetter established a close and direct relationship between economic sociology and the neo-classical theory of job search, together with the theory of transaction costs; (ii) Zelizer distanced herself completely from economic theory, although her sociology of economic life deals with central economic phenomena such as insurance, money, and law; (iii) Neil Fligstein developed an economic sociology close to institutionalist political economy, focusing on key institutions of the market, notably those regulating competition; finally, (iv) Bourdieu employed an original conceptualization of fields in order to explain the functioning of the markets of symbolic goods (fashion, painting, literature), while at the same time developing a methodological criticism of economic theory.

...

"In the case of the creation of the life insurance market in the United States, Zelizer started from the following paradox: while changes in social structure – fewer landowners, less mutual aid between neighbors – made it increasingly rational to insure one’s life to avoid leaving one’s wife and children destitute in the event of premature death, the life insurance market remained sluggish during the 19th century compared to what it was in Great Britain and in France. How do we explain this apparent lack of self-interested behavior in American male breadwinners? Zelizer’s answer employed several cultural arguments, including one based on the relationship to religion. During this period there was a widespread idea that to insure oneself against premature death was to oppose the will of God, even to not trust his wisdom. This was the reason for the reluctance to accept this new market product, the life insurance contract. A strength of her argument is also that she is careful not to oppose social behavior and self-interested economic behavior head-on. In fact, two phenomena directly linked to religion intervene to modify this cultural relationship to life insurance. First, she points to the fact that the religious sects that sent pastors to frontier regions took out life insurance on them so that the sect would not have to take care of their families if they died – a financial interest played its part in religious institutions. Second, she notes a reversal in the religious discourse on life insurance. In the beginning of the 20th century not only preachers, but also the rhetoric of insurance salesmen emphasized that the good father is he who takes precautions against premature death, hence this good father must be insured. Both culture and the economy began to structure behaviors that promoted a developing insurance market.

...

"While economists continued to employ the hypothesis of rationality, this is no longer central to the discourse of economic sociologists; the idea that economists are remote from the historical and social dimension has also lost its intensity. Instead, other criticisms have emerged, especially associated with the idea of performativity. At present there is neither conflict, or mutual indifference. Indeed, in several fields there are signs of an explicit or implicit rapprochement. I would like to mention two in particular.

"First of all, given the capacity of modern computers to process large databases, economists can deploy econometric tools in ways that accurately account for historical and social facts, as Thomas Piketty (1998, 2013, 2019) does. Second, by pursuing the strategy of economic engineering proposed by Alvin Roth (2002), economists take up the practical work of constructing institutions of exchange, exemplified by design economics and matching markets economists, developing what sociological economists have called the economic performation of the economy by economics (Callon 1998; MacKenzie et al. 2007)"

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Earlier

Thursday, January 6, 2022

Wednesday, June 29, 2022

Medical aid in dying in Italy--a first

 The NYT has the story:

Man Paralyzed 12 Years Ago Becomes Italy’s First Assisted Suicide  By Elisabetta Povoledo

"Paralyzed 12 years ago in a traffic accident, “Mario” faced a series of legal, bureaucratic and financial hurdles in his pursuit of death

"On Thursday, “Mario,” identified for the first time by his real name, Federico Carboni, ended his life, becoming Italy’s first legal assisted suicide, in his home in the central Italian port town of Senigallia.

"Mr. Carboni, an unmarried truck driver, was surrounded by his family, friends, and people who had helped him to achieve his goal, including officials with the Luca Coscioni Association, a right-to-die advocacy group that assisted Mr. Carboni during the past 18 months and announced his death.

...

"An Italian court ruling has declared assisted suicide permissible in Italy under certain limited circumstances, but there is no legislation enshrining the practice, which for Mr. Carboni, led to delays.

...

"In a landmark ruling in 2019, Italy’s Constitutional Court said that assisted suicide could not be considered a crime as long as certain conditions were met.

...

"The Constitutional Court ruled that in some cases assisting someone could not be considered a crime as long as the person requesting aid met certain conditions: they had to have full mental capacity and suffer from an incurable disease that caused severe and intolerable physical or psychological distress. They also had to be kept alive by life-sustaining treatments.

...

"The Roman Catholic Church is firmly opposed to assisted suicide and euthanasia, which it has called “intrinsically evil” acts “in every situation or circumstance.” 

Sunday, June 27, 2021

Can same sex couples adopt and foster children in need? It's complicated...

 When religion and non-discrimination contest with each other in court, the decisions sometimes rely on the details of the case:

The WSJ has the story:

Supreme Court Exempts Catholic Foster-Care Agency From Nondiscrimination Law. Catholic Social Services is entitled to city contract despite Philadelphia ordinance requiring contractors to treat same-sex couples equally, court rules  By Jess Bravin

"The Supreme Court unanimously ruled Thursday that a Catholic social-service agency was entitled to a Philadelphia contract even if its religious views prevented it from compliance with local policies forbidding discrimination against same-sex couples.

"The court’s decision, by Chief Justice John Roberts, was a narrow one, stopping short of fundamentally extending the accommodations for religious exercise that Catholic Social Services—and several conservative justices in concurring opinions—argued the Constitution required.

"The city of Philadelphia contracts with private agencies to screen foster parents for children in need. While a broad nondiscrimination policy is written into its contracts, Chief Justice Roberts observed that the agreements also authorize the city’s human-services department to grant exceptions.

"Catholic Social Services, which for decades has received city contracts, was entitled to such an exception, the chief justice wrote, because the city can grant them for secular reasons. The city’s interest in equal treatment for same-sex couples—and in caring for children in need—wasn’t impaired, the court found, because some 20 other agencies with foster-service contracts are available to work with married LGBT foster parents."

Monday, November 4, 2019

Kidney donation in Israel

In Israel, as in the U.S., a lot of living kidney donations to strangers come from people associated with faith based organizations.  Tablet Magazine has the story:

TO SAVE A STRANGER’S LIFE
Kidney donations are on the rise among Orthodox Israelis
By Sara Toth Stub October 28, 2019

"Koplovich is among the growing number of religiously observant Israelis who are volunteering to donate kidneys to people they have never met, ultimately doubling the number of kidney transplants taking place in the country each year. Officials credit the increase in living donors to improved surgical techniques, increased social welfare benefits, and the work of a nonprofit organization called Matnat Chaim, which raises awareness about and facilitates live kidney donations, especially among Orthodox Israelis.
...
"Rabbinic authorities, whose often stringent definitions of brain death have led to Israel’s relatively low rate of organ transplants from deceased people, are now actively encouraging live donations of kidneys, the most in-demand organ, especially as the danger to the donor has been reduced, according to recent research by Koslowsky, and nephrologists Walter Wasser and Geoffrey Boner, published in the journal BMC Nephrology.
...
"Two Jewish organizations in the United States, Kidney Mitzvah and Renewal, also raise awareness about and facilitate live kidney donation/
...
"All kidney donations and transplant pairings made through Matnat Chaim are overseen by the government-appointed National Committee for Kidney Donations, which also makes sure there is no commercial component involved.

"But donors coming through Matnat Chaim can choose the characteristics of their recipient, and most Jewish donors choose to donate to a fellow Jew. Although bioethicists are generally divided over directing organs to certain types of people, Israeli health officials allow the practice, saying that it has helped increase the overall number of kidneys available.
...
"While Miran Epstein, a medical ethicist at Queen Mary University of London, acknowledges that every donated kidney ultimately helps everyone waiting for a kidney, he said an organization that allows donors to stipulate certain characteristics of potential recipients—including religious affiliation—in effect practices conditional organ donation, which Israel and many other countries don’t allow. When accepting matches made through Matnat Chaim, the government-run transplant system is undermining its own ethics guidelines and public trust, he said: “The ethnic-religious condition is effectively concealed behind the fiction of directed donation. There is no doubt that Matnat Chaim has shortened the waiting list, but the question is, at what price?”

"Meanwhile, Ashkenazi said that the country’s kidney exchange program—where relatives and friends of those in need of a kidney, but who don’t match, donate to a stranger, whose family or friends in turn donate to their relative—often brings together Jewish and Arab donors and recipients."

Friday, March 15, 2019

Ongoing controversies about same sex marriage

Relatively recent stories, about the Methodist world and the Arab world remind us that there remains considerable active repugnance to same sex marriage.

From the Washington Post:

Reeling from contentious LGBT vote, some Methodists pledge to fight while others mull leaving

"Dumbarton United Methodist Church is the oldest United Methodist congregation in Washington, D.C., dating almost 200 years before the United Methodist denomination was created — even before the United States was created.

"On Wednesday, when the church’s minister, the Rev. Mary Kay Totty, traveled back to Washington from a groundbreaking meeting in St. Louis, where the denomination decided to uphold its opposition to same-sex marriage and LGBT clergy, she said she thought that centuries-old history might be at a breaking point.

“To think of not being Methodist,” she said, then stopped, unable to complete the sentence. Dumbarton voted to affirm gay worshipers more than 30 years ago, and the church has performed 20 same-sex marriages since 2010, breaking the rules of the denomination every time. Now such actions will be met with much harsher penalties."
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(The NY Times reports that there were some voting irregularities:
Improper Voting Discovered at Methodist Vote on Gay Clergy)

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And from the Guardian:

Luxembourg PM takes Arab leaders to task on gay rights at summit
Xavier Bettel says his same-sex marriage would condemn him to death in some countries

"Luxembourg’s prime minister, Xavier Bettel, has confronted Arab leaders over the repression of gay rights, telling them his same-sex marriage would condemn him to death in some of their countries.
...
"Bettel, the first EU leader to be married to a same-sex partner, had planned to make the intervention before arriving at the summit in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, which was the first gathering between the EU and Arab League.

"Homosexuality is punishable by death under sharia law in Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Yemen. Other countries in the region prohibit same-sex acts, including Algeria, Morocco, Oman, Tunisia, Syria, Kuwait and some of the United Arab Emirates.
...
"Bettel’s point is underscored by the treatment of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community in Egypt, the country that hosted the summit.

"Homosexuality is not illegal in Egypt, but LGBT people are frequently detained on euphemistic charges such as “debauchery”. After the Egyptian president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, came to power in a coup in 2013, he “appeared to embrace persecution of gays and trans people as a political strategy” according to a report by Human Rights Watch.
...
"The European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, defended the bloc’s decision to hold the summit. “If I only talked to flawless democrats, then I would end my week already by Tuesday,” he said."

Thursday, April 5, 2018

Cursing sex traffickers in Nigeria

In some religious traditions, curses are performative, i.e. performing a curse is thought to have consequences for those cursed.  In Nigeria, a traditional leader is applying this to public policy.

The NY Times has the story:
A Voodoo Curse on Human Traffickers

"On March 9, Oba Ewuare II, the traditional ruler of the kingdom of Benin, in southern Nigeria, put a voodoo curse on anyone who abets illegal migration within his domain. At the same time, he revoked the curses that leave victims of trafficking afraid that their relatives will die if they go to the police or fail to pay off their debt.

"Before being smuggled into Europe, women and girls in the area, which falls in present-day Edo State, are made to sign a contract with the traffickers who finance their journey, promising to pay them thousands of dollars. The agreement is sealed with a voodoo, or juju, ritual, conducted by a spiritual priest, known here as a native doctor.
...
"Edo is not one of Nigeria’s poorest states. But in the early 1980s women there started traveling to Italy to trade in gold and beads, and “saw a thriving market in prostitution,” said Kokunre Agbontaen-Eghafona, a professor at the University of Benin and a researcher for the International Organization for Migration. She believes this “founders factor” is the main reason Edo has become such a center of human trafficking."

Friday, February 9, 2018

Altruistic kidney donation in Israel: Matnat Chaim (gift of life)

Matnat Chaim (gift of life) is an Israeli organization, led by a rabbi, that promotes living kidney donation.  It's been quite successful, but has also been the source of some controversy and suspicion.

Here's an academic article about them:

Altruism and Religion: A New Paradigm for Organ Donation
by Aviad RabinowichEmail authorAlan Jotkowitz, Journal of Religion and Health, February 2018, Volume 57, Issue 1, pp 360–365

Abstract: "Activity of NGO’s supporting living donor kidney donations can affect the shortage of kidneys. Matnat Chaim is a Jewish orthodox organization active in Israel since 2009. This is a voluntary organization with aims to shorten and eliminate the waiting list for kidneys. Since the beginning of its activity, it has said to play a key role in 379 kidney transplantations. In 2015, out of 174 live donor kidney transplantations that took place in Israel, Matnat Chaim had a key role in 88 of them (50.6%). We found some ethical issues concerning the organization's activity. The donor can restrict his or her donation to specific characteristics of recipient which can result in organs transplanted in a homogeneous group of the population. Another issue is the question of whether nudging people to kidney donation takes place and whether it is valid to do so. We found that Matnat Chaim does a great deal for promotion and intermediation of kidney donations in Israel. This form of promotion can be implemented by other organizations and countries."

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They earlier were the subject of some investigations, but I haven't heard that anything further has come of this. Here's an article from The Times of Israel in September 2017
Head of transplant organization arrested over ‘organs for donations’ scheme
Charity suspected of bumping potential recipients to top of waiting list in exchange for funding, paying illegal compensation to donors

"Police on Monday arrested the head of a charity that facilitates voluntary organ donations in Israel, and three of its employees, on suspicion that it illegally traded organs for donations.
"The suspicions include managing the waiting list so as to bump potential recipients to the top in exchange for donations to the organization, and paying compensation to potential organ donors, police said.
...
"A police spokesperson explained that the investigation was “particularly complex and sensitive” and officers have made an effort not to interrupt the continuing work of the organization “in order to allow its life saving services to continue regardless of the ongoing probe.”"

Sunday, March 26, 2017

Blasphemy as a repugnant transaction in Pakistan

The Guardian has the latest:
Pakistan asks Facebook and Twitter to help identify blasphemers
Companies approached in effort to locate Pakistanis at home or abroad so they can be prosecuted or potentially extradited

"Under the country’s strict blasphemy laws, anyone found to have insulted Islam or the prophet Muhammad can be sentenced to death.
The interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, said an official in Pakistan’s Washington embassy had approached the two social media companies in an effort to identify Pakistanis, either within the country or abroad, who recently shared material deemed offensive to Islam.
He said Pakistani authorities had identified 11 people for questioning over alleged blasphemy and would seek the extradition of anyone living abroad.
Facebook said it reviews all government requests carefully, “with the goal of protecting the privacy and rights of our users”."

Friday, November 20, 2015

Matchmaking among the Haredi

Ynet has a story: 
Ultra-orthodox matchmaking: everything it's best not to know

"Among the traditional Haredi public – not the modern stream, which has changed in recent years – pairing one's children is the exclusive responsibility of parents. No yeshiva boy is supposed to choose a girl himself. When parents think the time is right, the phase known as "starting to listen" begins – that is, taking suggestions and statements from matchmakers. For the Hasidim it happens around the age of 18, sometimes even younger. For Lithuanians and Sephardim, it's around the age of 20.

"During this stage parents approach matchmakers, tell them about their son or daughter and specify what they are seeking for their child. Finally, much like in the job market, they give the names of their relatives, neighbors and teachers who can provide those interested with "recommendations," or simply additional details.

"When the two sides feel that the stats are good, a meeting between the couple will be arranged. In most Haredi communities the couple will meet a maximum of three times before they become engaged. In the more devout Hasidic communities, the strict rules permit only one meeting, lasting about 20 minutes. The rationale: they will probably develop feelings, and feelings are bad for business.
...
"Haya, a neighbor of mine, got hitched to a match 38 years ago and is still married. To the same man. Eight out of her 15 children got married in the same way. "We aren't looking for love," she tells me. "We don't marry because I love you or you love me. We have a common goal – to build a home in Israel – and we work together in order to achieve that aim."

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

A plea for kidney sales in the Atlantic, from an Orthodox rabbi

Writing in the Atlantic, kidney donor Shmuly Yanklowitz argues that it would be easier for more people to do as he did if kidney donors could be paid.

Give a Kidney, Get a Check
Some people in poorer countries are compelled to sell their organs on the black market. Why not build a regulated system that compensates them fairly and ensures their safety? 

Yanklowitz is an Orthodox rabbi: here's a bit of his bio:

Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz is the Founder and President of Uri L’Tzedek. In 2012 and 2013, Newsweek rated Rav Shmuly one of the top 50 rabbis in America. Rav Shmuly is the author of 7 books on Jewish Ethics. He studied at the University of Texas as an undergraduate and Harvard University for a Masters in Leadership and Psychology, and he completed a second Masters degree in Jewish Philosophy at Yeshiva University. He completed his doctorate at Columbia University in Moral Development and Epistemology, and has taught as an instructor of moral philosophy at Barnard College and at the UCLA Law School. Shmuly was ordained as a Rabbi by Yeshivat Chovevei Torah (the YCT Rabbinical School) as a Wexner Graduate Fellow prior to which he studied Talmud and Jewish law at Yeshivat Hamivtar in Efrat, Israel for two years.

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Scalping tickets to see the Pope

The NY Times has the story: After Lottery in New York to See Pope Francis, Some Winners Scalp Tickets Online

"Tickets to the Central Park procession have been offered on eBay from $200 to $400.

The mayor’s office vowed on Friday to crack down on online scalpers, and officials said that eBay and Craigslist had been quick to remove the ads at the city’s request.

“The city, along with the United States Secret Service, are monitoring ticket sales sites to remove tickets that are for sale,” said Monica Klein, a spokeswoman for Mayor Bill de Blasio.
...
"Roman Catholic Church officials have been predictably unhappy that some are seeking to capitalize off the chance to glimpse the pope.

“Papal tickets are never intended to be sold,” said the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in a statement, adding that it had asked eBay and Craigslist to remove the ads. “Scalping of tickets to papal events is shameful and reprehensible.”

Friday, August 21, 2015

Organ donation in Qatar

Here's a story from Al Jazeera:
Finding organ donors among Qatar's Muslim community
The Qatari government offers a series of incentives to those who donate their organs.

"In late 2012, the head of HMC's Organ Transplant Committee, Dr. Yousuf al-Masalamani, told the local Al Arab newspaper that expatriates made up 99 percent of people on Qatar's donor registry.

A report by Doha News last year said that of 20,000 new donor registrants that summer, less than 1,000 were Arab, including Qatari nationals.

Yosri said that superstitions and misunderstandings about religious opinions on the matter were behind low sign-up rates among those of Arab origin or Muslim faith.

"Some people believe that by signing up to give their organs after death, they are tempting fate and they will die … That's silly, obviously nobody is going to die before their time," Yosri told Al Jazeera, adding many were unaware of religious edicts encouraging the practise.

"I give most Muslims, who are unsure, a leaflet containing a fatwa by Yusuf al-Qaradawi, and the next day they've made their mind up and they're telling me they want to donate," Yosri said, referring to a religious decree by the Qatar-based Egyptian religious scholar, widely followed in Muslim-majority countries.
...
"Beyond religious arguments, the Qatari government offers a series of incentives for those who donate their organs. Living donors, who give parts of their liver or a kidney, benefit from comprehensive medical insurance for life, discounted plane tickets and compensation for loss of income during medical procedures.

"Families of deceased donors are given social care and support, as well as financial help to cover the cost of transferring the body to their home country.

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Expanding non-directed kidney donation: the Renewal model

An article in the Forward talks about attempts to expand the successful organ donation program of Renewal beyond the Jewish community:
Can an Orthodox Charity Help Save Lives in This Man's Church?

"Although 90% of Renewal’s donors are ultra-Orthodox, about half their recipients are people like Sarna, who come from the broader Jewish community.

"The average wait time for a kidney through Renewal is six to nine months.

"Because many ultra-Orthodox rabbis believe that organ donation from dead bodies is against Jewish law, Renewal focuses solely on live donors. That puts Renewal’s donors in an extremely rare group of several hundred Americans who, each year, donate their kidney altruistically to a stranger.
...
"Researchers are studying Renewal’s model to see whether it can be replicated in other race- and faith-based communities. Meanwhile, one African-American transplant surgeon is setting up a group modeled on Renewal in a prominent Harlem church.

"Anthony Watkins, an assistant professor of surgery at Weill Cornell Medical College, has witnessed Renewal’s work firsthand, ever since he began his transplant fellowship six years ago. “I’ve always thought that what Renewal does is spectacular and fantastic and [that] maybe this could be duplicated in other communities,” he said.

"Watkins thinks that by using Renewal’s model — appealing to African Americans to help fellow African Americans — he can persuade people to donate in greater numbers. “I think once you establish a good rapport and knowledge and education… you can get altruistic donors to step forward,” Watkins said. But how many people are willing to donate a live organ to a stranger?
...
"Renewal facilitates an average of about 50 kidney transplants a year. About three-quarters of those transplants are ultra-Orthodox donors giving to a Jewish stranger.

"Ultra-Orthodox Jews account for just 0.2% of America’s population. Yet last year, by the Forward’s estimates, they accounted for up to 17% of the people who donated a kidney to strangers.

"Rees realized that if Renewal’s model of communally focused organ donation could be extrapolated to the general population, it could create tens of thousands of additional kidney donors. The waiting list could be reduced to zero. “That’s what Renewal has achieved,” Rees said, “and that is nothing short of amazing.”

"Rees contacted Duke University to see if researchers there could investigate whether Renewal’s model could be replicated in Christian communities.

"Last year, two Duke professors, David Toole and Kim Krawiec, put together an interdisciplinary team of faculty and students, including lawyers, physicians, sociologists and theologians, to examine new methods of increasing living kidney donation.
...
"Renewal leads donors and recipients through every stage of the transplant process. It is particularly important for kidney donors, who receive very little financial support from insurance companies and the state. Renewal covers lost wages, transportation and any necessary hotel costs. It also offers domestic support such as house cleaning, laundry services and catering. Reiner said that the average cost of a transplant, including the group’s administrative overhead, is about $20,000.
...
"The United Network for Organ Sharing, which tracks donations nationally, counts a kidney donation as “altruistic” only if the donor does not specify to whom the kidney is given. Last year it tracked 180 such altruistic donations.

"Because Renewal’s donors choose the recipient of their kidney — even though they have no personal relationship with them — UNOS categorizes them in a larger pool of 1,273 living donors who directed their kidney to a “non-relative.”

"Based on this method, Renewal’s donors account for about 2% or 3% of living donations to non-family members.

"But Duke University’s Toole says that it is unfair to compare Renewal’s donors to most other donors in this larger pool because most of those donors know the recipient of their kidney. Renewal’s donors give to strangers. “What makes the model so interesting,” Toole said, is that “it’s some in-between space” between directed donations and altruistic donations."
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See my earlier post on Renewal here.

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

Organ donation in Turkey

The religious debate about organ donation in Turkey may have reached a turning point. Here's a story from the Daily Sabah:

Imams to lead organ donation efforts in Turkey

"Yesterday, Turkey's Presidency of Religious Affairs (DİB) launched a new campaign for imams to raise awareness about organ donation, while DİB head Mehmet Görmez urged imams to donate their organs first before advising the congregation to do so.

"DİB, the top religious authority in the country, quashed a religious debate on whether donating organs is permissible in Islam by introducing a new campaign to raise public awareness about organ donation.

"Görmez and Minister of Health Mehmet Müezzinoğlu attended a meeting in order to inform religious figures on the matter in the Turkish capital Ankara.

"Görmez called upon imams, muftis and other members of the religious authority "to practice what they preached" and donate their own organs. "Sometimes, clerics fail to act in line with advice they dispense to their congregation. On this issue, we should lead the people. I call on my colleagues to tell their congregation in the sermons that they have donated their organs," Görmez said. "This will make people attending mosques heed your advice," he added.

"It is the greatest alms one can deliver from the heart," he said. Görmez said he found it odd that organ donation has been the subject of contention for decades among clerics. "Life, value of a human being's life are at the center of all religions," Görmez said. He quoted a verse from the Quran that says that killing someone is equal to killing humanity and giving life to another is equal to giving life to humanity."

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Fushimi Inari-taisha: a shrine to business and a pioneer in advertising

The Inari shrine in Kyoto is devoted to a patron of business. Unlike many other shrines and temples we visited in Japan it does not support itself by charging admission to visitors. Rather, many of its "thousand gates" are endowed by an advertiser.  There are still gates available.

Below are some of the ads on gates, and a price list for adding your ad, to gates of different sizes.


Sunday, November 16, 2014

Repugnant transactions: the right to say "God" in Malay

Thomas Fuller has the story in the NY Times: The Right to Say ‘God’ Divides a Diverse Nation

This is one of those stories whose URL is more informative than the headline:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/04/world/asia/in-malaysia-allah-is-reserved-for-muslims-only.html

"According to a series of government orders and rulings by Malaysia’s Islamic councils, the word for God in the Malay language — “Allah” — is reserved for Muslims. Malay-language Bibles are banned everywhere except inside churches. State regulations ban a list of words, including Allah, in any non-Muslim context."

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Project Renewal: Kidney donation in faith-based communities

It appears that many American non-directed kidney donors (perhaps a third, judging from informal evidence from the programs with which I deal) come from faith-based communities. (I understand that policemen and firemen are also well represented among nondirected donors.) Non-directed donors are particularly important because they can initiate chains of donations among patient-donor pairs waiting for kidney exchange.

A Jewish organization that has contributed many non-directed donors is Renewal, founded by Mendy Reiner.


Here's an article about Renewal, by Rabbi Boruch Wolf, which focuses on the big effect of these living donors from the religious Jewish community, and contrasts it with the reluctance of members of that community to sign deceased-donor registration cards, because of concerns among other things about what is involved in deciding that someone is deceased.
Do Chareidim Contribute Their ‘Fair Share’ of Organs?