© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy Inc. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com Religion at Work in Bioethics and Biopolicy: Christian Bioethicists, Secular Language, Suspicious Orthodoxy RUSSELL BLACKFORD University of Newcastle, Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia UDO SCHÜKLENK 1, * Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada *Address correspondence to: Udo Schüklenk, PhD, Ontario Research Chair in Bioethics and Public Policy, Queen’s University, Department of Philosophy, Watson Hall 309, Bader Lane, Kingston, ON K7L 3N6, Canada. E-mail: udo.schuklenk@pm.me The proper role, if any, for religion-based arguments is a live and sometimes heated issue within the field of bioethics. The issue at- tracts heat primarily because bioethical analyses influence the out- comes of controversial court cases and help shape legislation in sensitive biopolicy areas. A problem for religious bioethicists who seek to influence biopolicy is that there is now widespread aca- demic and public acceptance, at least within liberal democracies, that the state should not base its policies on any particular religion’s metaphysical claims or esoteric moral system. In response, bioethi- cists motivated by religious concerns have adopted two identifi- able strategies. Sometimes they rely on slippery-slope arguments that, sometimes at least, have empirically testable premises. A more questionable response is the manipulation and misuse of secular- sounding moral language, such as references to “human dignity,” and the plights of groups of people labeled “vulnerable.” Keywords: human dignity, public reason, religion, religious bio- ethics, secularism, vulnerability, vulnerable groups I. INTRODUCTION Bioethics as a field of study began with contributions from scholars firmly situated in other academic disciplines, initially including history, philosophy, theology, jurisprudence, and medicine, with scholars from social science The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, 46: 169–187, 2021 doi:10.1093/jmp/jhaa037 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jmp/article/46/2/169/6208795 by guest on 07 April 2021