With their new book Welcome, Lois Shepherd and Margaret Mohrmann provide an original and important contribution to the field of ethics, and indeed, to human relationships generally. Rather than a theory with examples, they describe welcoming with rich illustrations that make this experience come alive, even in difficult interactions. Altogether, a masterful work of exceptional value.

Larry R. Churchill, Stahlman Professor of Medical Ethics Emeritus, Vanderbilt University

In Welcome, Shepherd and Mohrmann show convincingly how welcoming is a necessary-and difficult-obligation. It is not an emotional disposition but a call to engagement and action, both for individuals and for institutions. Welcome can show us ways for bioethics to recapture health and health policy, through the challenging work of openness in these difficult times.

Nancy M. P. King, JD, Emeritus Professor, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Co-author of Bioethics Reenvisioned: A Path toward Health Justice

For centuries philosophers have been working through the fundamental question of what it is to be an ethical person. In this insightful and practical book, Shepherd and Mohrmann provide an answer that is at once deceptively simple and straightforward, and profoundly deep and complex. They argue that the starting point for ethics is attentive and intentional presence and openness to all others in all encounters. While they rely on ethical language familiar to all (responsibility, action, obligation, love, empathy, virtue), their insistence on the posture of welcome as the foundation of ethics is innovative. As is their demonstration of philosophical argument as non-linear, narrative, inclusive, and expansive. This primer on what it is to be a welcoming person is not just another abstract philosophical treatise; it will transform the way you organize your thoughts and actions about responsibility, love, and communal obligations.

Aline Kalbian, Professor of Religion, Florida State University

Welcome: Patterns of the Moral Life weaves together moral philosophy, phenomenology, literature, and seasoned professional experience to make a powerful case for an “ethics of welcoming.” Lois Shepherd and Margaret Mohrmann have produced an original and elegant work that will engage, challenge, and guide a wide reading audience. This is a book of practical wisdom of the highest order.

Richard B. Miller, Laura Spelman Rockefeller Emeritus Professor of Religion, Politics, and Ethics, University of Chicago