SACRU working group calls on health professionals to embrace vulnerability as a moral imperative
On 7 April, doctoral students from seven member universities of the Strategic Alliance of Catholic Research Universities (SACRU) joined leaders from Catholic and health institutions at a seminar on the Rome campus of the Australian Catholic University (ACU). Professor André Azevedo Alves, Director of the Research Centre of the Institute of Political Studies (CIEP-Católica) and doctoral student Joana Ramos, a research fellow at the same centre, were present from the Universidade Católica Portuguesa.
Led by Professor David Kirchhoffer, director of the ACU Queensland Centre for Bioethics and chair of the SACRU Working Group on Vulnerability and Health, the event coincided with the Jubilee of Patients and Health Professionals. According to Professor Kirchhoffer, the working group believes that health institutions and individual providers have ‘a moral imperative... to create spaces of trust where people can be vulnerable in safety, in order to allow them to flourish fully’. The event aimed to analyse the ethical and social dimensions of vulnerability and call on institutions to recognise fragility not as a weakness, but as an integral part of the human experience and authentic care. SACRU's Working Group on Vulnerability and Health seeks to actively involve young researchers in the importance of placing vulnerability at the centre of their work.
ACU Vice-Rector and SACRU President Professor Zlatko Skrbis said that SACRU has eight working groups, including the Vulnerability and Health working group, in which member universities collaborate to produce high-quality research results. ‘Research collaboration within SACRU has a global approach, allowing us to maximise our impact on the societies and communities we serve’, he said.
Among the guests of honour at the SACRU event on April 7 were Australia's Ambassador to the Holy See, the Right Honourable Keith Pitt, and the Pro-Chancellor of the ACU and Chair of the Board of Mercy Health Australia, Virginia Bourke.
Closing the session, theologian James F. Keenan, S.J., Vice Provost for Global Engagement at Boston College, offered a profound reflection on vulnerability as an ethical commitment:
‘Vulnerability is a robust concept in healthcare ethics. It identifies those who are in precarious situations, yes - but also those who respond. Nurses, doctors, carers: they must allow themselves to be vulnerable towards those they serve. It is this fundamental openness that gives vulnerability its power in our time.’
Professor Pier Sandro Cocconcelli, Secretary General of SACRU and Director of the Faculty of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Sciences at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, said that ‘this initiative is even more significant after the Jubilee of the Sick and the World of Health. SACRU is committed to continuing to promote spaces for dialogue and collaboration, so that the next generation of scientists can tackle the great ethical and social challenges of our time with rigour, passion and responsibility’.