The new HKLD e-Newsletter, issue 4-2024, has been published. We bring you a message from the HKLD President and Editor-in-Chief of the Newsletter, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sc. Rok Čivljak, MD, and you can read the entire Newsletter on the Society’s website HERE!

Dear readers, dear members of HKLD!

Another calendar year is behind us, but so are very intense activities for HKLD in the past year. In addition to the usual meetings and activities that we have reported on in previous issues of the Gazette, the past year was marked by numerous international activities in which members of our Society participated, of which in this issue we bring you a report from two conferences held in November 2024 in Belgium, in which a larger group of members of the HKLD Youth Section participated.

We invite you to definitely not miss reading the last pages of this issue in which we announce the plan and program of activities for the year 2025 in which we celebrate the Jubilee Year under the motto Peregrinantes in spem – Pilgrims of Hope, in which we will make a pilgrimage to Rome in April for a thematic celebration of the Jubilee dedicated to the sick and healthcare professionals. In September 2025, we will gather with colleagues from other European Catholic medical societies at the FEAMC Congress in Bari when we will elect the new leadership of FEAMC for the next four-year term.

Among the many professional and ethical challenges that healthcare professionals face, one of the most current is artificial intelligence, which is slowly entering medicine. The views of key stakeholders in the healthcare system on artificial intelligence and its impact on decision-making in medicine are presented in an article by Anamarija Malešević and Ante Čartolovni from the Laboratory for Ethics of Digital Technologies in Healthcare at the Catholic University of Croatia.

We have concluded this issue in the season of Advent, awaiting the arrival of the Child Jesus through whom we all await salvation. And part of our medical mission is to help others in preserving and saving life – from conception to natural death. With this goal in mind, HKLD has taken over the veneration of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the patron saint of unborn children, especially in our branches in Pula and Zagreb, which we bring you reports on in this issue of the Gazette. However, our fight to protect and preserve life continues through promoting the acceptance of natural death, which also includes the fight against methods of violent termination of life, which you can read more about in the articles by Danijela Rupčić and Ivan Ćelić. The presentation that Sr. Ivana Margarin gave to HKLD members during the spiritual retreat on the eve of the feast of St. Luke, the patron saint of HKLD, and which we bring in the form of an article in this issue of the Gazette, also reminded us of the missionary mission of medicine. Through their profession, a doctor reaches out to many people every day, often in the most difficult moments of their lives. Therefore, the medical profession is a perfect opportunity to revive the missionary vocation, by bearing witness to God’s love and mercy. However, to be authentic witnesses, we must ourselves have a deep experience of God.

May reading this issue of the Herald and the texts we bring you help you find answers to the many questions that our medical professions raise, but also strengthen your faith in unity through belonging to the HKLD, through which we can spread the Good News of salvation to those who have not yet heard of it.

Greetings in Christ!
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sc. Rok Čivljak, Dr. Med.