Books by Nicholas Tonti-Filippini

The contemporary culture includes technicism, evidenced by the takeover of healthy women's bodies by technology, including the pill, emergency contraception, abortion, reproductive technology, invasive prenatal testing and the mantra of choice that inevitably devalues women and their bodies and tends to perceive motherhood as a restriction on freedom. How should a young man behave when he finds his partner is pregnant? What does the new National Curriculum on sex education say to him? In this book the author explores both the technological options and the unique love that exists between a man and a woman. Questions such as pornography, homophobia, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, masturbation and sexual abuse by clergy are dealt with frankly by someone who has lived through the cultural developments and who holds that human love imitates divine love so that neither seeks to dominate nor to possess the other. Love is the opposite of mere use. In an authentic relationship, the gift each makes is unilateral, not a bargain or exchange, even though so much of what married couples do is governed by an underlying sense of balance or fairness. Love precedes justice, but is never unjust. Gender difference enriches marriage with unpredictability, joy and humour, but also creates the opportunity to be a complementary gift to the other in which the union is so much more than the individuals who choose to create it. As a Philosopher and a respected Bioethicist, the author explains the contemporary excitement over the Theology of the Body, new claims about Scripture, and the challenges of contemporary culture and science for women and men who wish to love responsibly and well.

We will all die, but few of us discuss it with those who are important to us. Many will also be confronted by disability, illness, grief and loss. How we respond to suffering says much about empathy, love and who we are. There is no doubt many people have much to endure, but illness and disability are not all doom and gloom, just different, and calling on us, perhaps, to surrender to dependence on others, and place trust in God, and trust in our love for each other. In this volume the author reflects on being pleasantly surprised with doors that have been opened through illness, that he did not know existed. There was also the discovery of resilience and a deepening and strengthening of love. The book reflects on issues that arise in illness, such as the right to know and refusal of treatment, issues at the end of life, euthanasia, artificial feeding, pain management, representation and advanced directives. It also includes discussion of the care of those with mental illness, and finally the issue of health resource allocation. While considering the range of views on these issues, this book is also very frank about the author's experiences of illness, pain and threats to life.

Policy in Bioethics develops when people can reach agreement. We make progress when we listen to each other. About Bioethics, as the first of a series, explains the different secular and theological approaches to Bioethics, seeking to identify strengths as well as weaknesses because it is the strengths that produce good policy. In each case the assumptions and structure of the moral reasoning adopted are explored including a reflection on the role of religion in a secular society and a constructive approach to teaching Bioethics. The other books in the series include Care of the Sick and Dying, Donating Human Organs and Tissue, Man and Woman He Made Them, Motherhood and Technology, and Protecting the Human Person. The latter is to cover a range of issues such as Experimentation on Human Beings, Capital Punishment, Torture, Identity and Catholic Facilities and Cooperation with Evil. Associate Prof Nicholas Tonti Filippini BA (Hons), MA(Monash), PhD (Melb), FHERDSA, KCSG is Associate Dean and Head of Bioethics at the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family in Melbourne. The Institute is associated with the John Paul II Institute in Rome and the Lateran University. It is registered as a higher education provider in Australia to provide graduate courses in Bioethics, Theology of Marriage and Family, and Religious Education. Professor Tonti Filippini is a philosopher who has specialised in bioethics for the past 30 years including having been Australia's first hospital ethicist and Director of Bioethics at St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne, 1982-1990. He is well known internationally and has published widely in Bioethics.