In 2019, as part of its Proactive Ethics Integration program, ethics leadership at Ascension St. Vincent partnered with Marian University Department of Graphic Arts to design and produce, under the St. Vincent College of Health Professions Press, an academic journal entitled Ethos: A Journal of Catholic Health Culture.

Ethos starts with a simple premise: To change culture (e.g., within an organization), one must make culture (e.g., artifacts that create new possibilities and conversations as well as new limitations or impossibilities). Thus, the vision behind Ethos is a culture of participative, non-academic, non-expert, ethical reflection and engagement, focused more on moral growth, character development and freedom for excellence than merely the analysis of obligations and duties in clinical scenarios.

Ethos aims to foster this distinctive ethical culture within Catholic health care by presenting ethical issues and concepts in a Christian-humanistic manner, engaging the moral imagination of readers. This approach is accomplished in several distinct ways. First, through the expertise and ingenuity of the Marian University graphic arts program, the journal incorporates extensive use of aesthetic appeal and graphic design, including art and photography from featured artists who work at Ascension St. Vincent (e.g., physicians, nurses). Interactive components include a QR code to engage readers in an audio element of a related article and an ethics crossword puzzle. Second, submissions range beyond classical ethical analyses of controversial subjects and cases to include personal reflections, ethical reflections on art and music, ethics poetry, and first-person experiences and stories of character growth living out the Proactive Ethics Integration model. Third, while all submissions are peer- reviewed, contributors range from professionally trained ethicists to radiation technicians, nurses, physicians, ethics interns and others. Fourth, Ethos emphasizes the contributions of those participating in the Proactive Ethics Integration model, especially the Ethics Integration Committees that serve as the primary resource for local ethics services. Fifth, Ethos enhances its readers' ability to participate in the Proactive Ethics Integration program initiatives, such as monthly Ethics Case Calls, Ethos Book Club, Clinical Ethics Intensives, and the Ascension St. Vincent Ethics intranet resource site. This is especially true in the electronic version of the journal, which incorporates links to all such resources. In brief, Ethos represents an effort to advance an authentic and vibrantly Catholic culture in the health ministry; it creates a forum that demystifies ethical thought to restore it to its appropriate purpose of helping people in a practical and artful way to flourish as individuals under the common good.

ELLIOTT LOUIS BEDFORD, PH.D.
Director of Ethics Integration
Ascension St. Vincent
Indianapolis
elliott.bedf[email protected]