Consistent Life Ethic
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Image:Cle.gif The Consistent Life Ethic is an ethical, religious, and political philosophy with the basic premise that "all human life is sacred", and that this calls for "a coherent social policy which seeks to protect the rights of the weakest and most vulnerable in our society, the unborn, the infirm, the refugee, the homeless, and the poor." Advocates of the Consistent Life Ethic are consequently opposed to abortion, capital punishment, "economic injustice", assisted suicide and euthanasia, and unjust war; some who hold the Consistent Life Ethic oppose all war.
In the United States, one of the pioneering organizations which developed the "consistent" approach was the Prolifers for Survival, founded by Juli Loesch Wiley. Today the ethic is promoted by an umbrella organization called Consistent Life which includes about 400 anti-war, pro-life, nonviolence, Christian, Buddhist, and other organizations. The current movement's formal organization began in 1987, with the creation of the Seamless Garment Network. In November of 2002, the Seamless Garment Network changed its name to Consistent Life. Most of its support initially came from religiously conservative, politically liberal Catholics, including the late Archbishop of Chicago, Joseph Cardinal Bernardin. The Democrats for Life organization, founded in 1999, subscribes to the ethic.
The movement is difficult to define in terms of the American political spectrum, since those who subscribe to the ethic are often at odds with both the Republican Party over capital punishment, war, and economic issues, as well as the Democratic Party over abortion, embryo-destructive research, and euthanasia.
Notable exponents include novelist Wendell Berry, the current Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso (the head of state of the Government in exile of Tibet and spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism), political writer and self-described atheist Nat Hentoff, and Roman Catholic actor Martin Sheen.
Symbol
The Consistent Life Ethic symbol with three interweaving rings was created for the Consistent Life net ring [1]. It represents the interrelatedness of all issues related to life, as held by proponents of the ethic.