Experienced chaplain and scholar Jessica Bratt Carle takes us inside ICUs and hospital rooms for a rare look into children's lives amid illness. What she learns sparks a rich debate with the bioethical ideal of patient autonomy, revealing how this default position jeopardizes not just children whose vulnerability, dependence, and agency must be respected but all of us adults who also share these traits. A wonderful window into childrens complex moral worlds and the invaluable role of theology in understanding them. -- Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Vanderbilt University What is missing in the care of children? Jessica Bratt Carles book puts on vivid display the full humanity of children, in all their social and spiritual complexity and moral richness. Her work is thoroughly researched, clinically informed, and carefully argued. Professional caregivers of all sorts, as well as parents, grandparents and policy advocates, will find in Carles writing a way forward in caring better for our children. This is a book to read and savor. -- Larry R. Churchill, Vanderbilt University This book provides a powerful and poignant corrective to the tendency of bioethics to be adult-centric, while also pushing back against secularized bioethics with inquiry that is rich with both deep experience and rigorous scholarship. Written by a clinical ethicist who also has worked for decades as a chaplain, Children, Theology, and Bioethics will move you, inspire you, and challenge you. Jessica Bratt Carle sketches out a moral vision of and for healthcare that recognizes the enduring presence of childhood in our lives, no matter our age, which provides a much-needed complexification. -- Nathan Carlin, McGovern Medical School
