The emerging role of ethics: a sponsorship view. Implementation of ethics throughout Catholic health care promotes values-based actions.

HP he story of Catholic health care is one of innovation and adaptation, and one .Jfc^in which ethics has had a featured place. In response to changes in the church, in religious life and in health care, Catholic health systems grew dramatically during the 1970s and 1980s in the United States. Building on a long tradition of care, independent Catholic hospitals and nursing homes increasingly came together to form stronger and more integrated systems. In order to ensure vital community presence and service, sponsoring religious congregations recognized the importance of maintaining an intentional ministerial focus during these changing times. Catholic hospitals came to form systems, and sponsors built formal methods for nurturing the unique dimensions to religiously motivated health care. Leaders created structures to ensure mission integration, pastoral care, care for poor and underserved persons, and dynamic community outreach. In line with these important dimensions of Catholic identity, founders of new systems also put ethics structures and processes into place. The emerging role of ethics in Catholic health care provides one important frame for understanding the sponsors' commitment to ministerial identity, organizational values and charitable mission. This article outlines themes in the recent history of ethics in Catholic health care, and some specific experiences of ethics practice at Bon Secours Health System.