He is Senior Research Professor of Theology at Valparaiso University, and served on the President's Council on Bioethics from its founding in 2002 until its dissolution in 2009.
[2] Meilaender has been called “one of Lutheranism’s brightest lights in the field of bioethics”[3] and “one of the most important Christian ethicists of his generation.”[1] In 2015, Princeton University's James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions cosponsored a conference with the Berkeley Institute to celebrate Meilaender's work, describing him as "one of the leading ethicists of our time" and highlighting his contributions to the study of bioethics, human dignity, justice, and the place of religion in the public sphere.
[4] Papers from the conference were collected and published in Studies in Christian Ethics's May 2017 issue, which was dedicated to discussing Meilaender's thought.
Asked why he thought the book had such “staying power as a text,” Meilaender suggested its narrow focus on “questions that have been of central importance in bioethics and that almost everyone sooner or later has to think about” might be one reason.
[11] Subjects addressed in the book include assisted reproduction, abortion, prenatal screening, gene editing, suicide and euthanasia, and organ donation, among others.