Some 20 years ago, a locally based organization all but introduced the concept of “practical bioethics.” At the time, however, few paid attention. Incorporated in 1984, the Midwest Center for Bioethics began life as little more than an idea in search of the inevitable funding.

The center’s first official staff member, in her first “real job,” remembers the early center as a cluster of little grey cubicles in a little grey office overlooking Mount Moriah Cemetery. Twenty years later, now CEO and Executive Director, Myra Christopher presides over what may be the most prominent center for practical bioethics in America. Last year, in fact, the organization changed its name to the Center for Practical Bioethics to reflect a client base that had become national and even international in scope.

Christopher was not eager to change. After 20 years, she had grown fond of the “Midwest” part of the title. The problem, however, was that almost every time the center was called upon to address a national issue on a national level, the word “Midwest” made people question the center’s rationale for involvement. “By changing one word,” Christopher says, “we did away with the limitations but remained true to our mission.”

Now with a staff of 20 housed securely on the 29th floor of the Town Pavilion in Downtown Kansas City, and with a small Boston office as well, the Center has the kind of presence a national organi-zation demands.

Although Christopher and her staff no longer have to explain “Midwest,” they do have to explain the “practical” part of their name. Indeed, to some, the linking of “practical” and “ethics” seems more than a bit oxymoronic. Through its work over the last two decades, however, the center has helped make the concept of practical bioethics make sense.

If there were ever a year in which the need for a practical bioethics showed itself, it has been this past one. Between the Terri Schiavo case in Florida and the debate in Missouri over cloning and stem cell research, as well as other national issues like medical marijuana in California and the Oregon “right to die” law, Christopher felt as if the Center were “at the eye of a perfect storm.”

Complicating matters for the Center was that it was one of the very few parties involved in these culture-war issues that was not a classic cultural warrior. Christopher sees the role of the Center not as a political activist, a lobbyist or even a referee, but more as a “convener,” one whose job it is to bring diverse interests to the table and help them share information.

“You are never going to find consensus in a pluralistic society,” Christopher says, “but people of intelligence and good will can provide the structure for resolution.”

That much said, Christopher and the Center board take certain positions on issues. They do believe, for instance, that families should agree on advanced directives to clarify their position on end-of-life issues to the point of appointing a durable power of attorney for healthcare. This was a clarification famously lacking in the Terri Schiavo case. They also believe that pain ought to be managed. As to abortion, an issue on which they are often asked to take sides, they largely have chosen not to.

If there is one issue that has shown the difficulty of remaining above the fray it is that of stem cell research. When the issue grew heated in Missouri after Lee’s Summit-area State Senator Matt Bartle introduced a bill to ban embryonic stem cell research/human cloning, the Center for Practical Bioethics Board went public to say that such legislation was premature, at least until there was more public education on early stem cell research.

The Center’s position, although seemingly impartial, has led supporters of the legislation to question the Center’s autonomy. Bill Neaves, who serves as President and CEO of the Stowers Institure for Medical Research and has led the fight against stem cell legislation, is a financial supporter of the Center and has recently written for its publication, Practical Bioethics, on the subject of stem cell research. His wife, Priscilla, is a member of the Center’s Board.

Jim and Virginia Stowers are sustaining members of the Center, having donated more than $5,000. Stowers’ company, American Century, has given more than $15,000.

Critics, however, may be overlooking the truly impressive sweep of the Center’s fundraising appeals. To be sure, the list of donors does include many in the bioscience establishment, but it also includes the biggest names in Kansas City philanthropy including the Hall Family Foundation, the Francis Family Foundation, the William T. Kemper Foundation, and the H & R Block Foundation among scores of others.

The Center for Practical Bioethics will need all the help it can get to deal with what Christopher believes will be the nation’s most pressing bioethic concern ever. She and her staff have identified 2020 as the year this concern has the potential to turn into crisis (2020 is the year that the oldest of the baby boomers begin to reach the end of their normal life spans).

At that point, America will exper-ience dying and death in ways that society never before has experienced. Christopher, in fact, compares the phenomenon to the way the AIDS crisis struck San Francisco in the early days of the epidemic.

Christopher is gearing up the Center to play a significant role in sorting through 2020 concerns. “Life science issues,” she says, “are limited only by the imagination.”