Befriending the North Wind is about the moral lives of children and their agency in decisions about death. Our failure to be honest and open about the death of children hinders us from addressing their needs and confronting the sources of their suffering. This failure only adds to their suffering. Dying children often feel ignored, overlooked, and unable to exercise their agency to ameliorate their situation.
Befriending the North Wind presents a reconstruction of our understanding of human nature in light of the dimensions of human meaning that children reveal and the new horizons they open to us. It asserts that children can die a good death and that they can and should have a voice in their end-of-life care. This agency is grounded in their ability to make meaning, to act, to imitate, to use language creatively, to grasp a plurality of meanings, to reach judgments, to contribute to the meanings of others and to shape their understanding. Children are moral agents. We grown-ups need to humble ourselves and listen.
Product Details
ISBN-13: 9781506481838
Media Type: Paperback
Publisher: Fortress Press
Publication Date: 11-14-2023
Pages: 209
About the Author
Robyn Boeré is an associate professor at the Faculty of Theology at the University of Oslo. A scholar of moral theology, her research focuses on moral decision-making, medical ethics, and the meaning of the moral life. She was previously an associate lecturer at the University of St. Andrews and a postdoctoral research fellow at the Lonergan Research Institute at the University of Toronto. She lives in Oslo, Norway.
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