Professional Ethics and the Recovery of Virtue

Journal of Moral Theology, 2013

HE HISTORY OF CATHOLIC MORAL THEOLOGY may be understood as a developing conversation between the church and wider society that can be read in one of two ways. On the one hand, we can emphasize the distinctiveness of the church, drawing forth the moral implications of the creed to highlight differences between "church" and "world." On the other hand, we can focus on the nature of life in the church community, which will not only bring us into contact with the turbulence of its history but also its noble and beautiful struggles for love and truth. Depending on which line of emphasis one selects, the terms "church" and "world" will mean something different as will the conversation between them. In the following paper, we focus on the latter way of reading this conversation, and in doing so, we attempt to bring Catholic moral theology into dialogue with the comparative study of religion. We are concerned primarily with how religion has been understood in the pastoral life of the church. 1 We focus in particular 1 As a community of study in the North American academy (which we assume to be the primary readership of this journal), Catholic moral theologians work in an ecumenical environment in conversation with others interested in Christian ethics and the wider field of religious ethics, which is itself affected by scholarship in the critical, comparative study of religion and the comparative philosophy of religions. These will not be our focus here, although we will have a few comments on possible intersections between Catholic moral theology and these fields at the conclusion of our essay. While each of the authors of this essay has written for the wider audience of religious ethics, both share the conviction that deep comparative thinking across religious and cultural traditions is both possible and necessary for contemporary Catholic moral theology. While David M. Lantigua emphasizes primarily the accessibility of contemporary narratives of cross-culturally recognized moral exemplars, in conversation with historical-contextual approaches to understanding the meaning of basic moral concepts, David A. Clairmont emphasizes the trans-temporal and cross-cultural appeal of moral and intellectual struggle within religious traditions, revealed in historical studies of the relationship between a community's moral concepts and moral practices.

Theological Studies, 2006

The author's survey of the writings of moral theologians over the past five years shows a deep concern about both the nature of moral theology and the role of moral theologians. A certain urgency animates much contemporary reflection calling the moralist to be challenged by the vocation to serve the Church and to explore better the ways Westerners can learn from other cultures. In this regard, virtue ethics continues to serve as a helpful medium for such intercultural dialogue. DEATH M ORAL THEOLOGIANS in France and the United States suffered the untimely loss of revered colleagues. On August 14, 2004, Xavier Thévenot died at the age of 65. His works spanning nearly four decades treated topics such as sexuality (among the young, the old, the celibate, the homosexual); morality and spirituality; an ethics of risk; and ethical discernment. 1 On August 3, 2005, William C. Spohn died at the age of 61. A frequent contributor to these pages, he set the agenda for discussions on Scripture and ethics, virtue ethics, spirituality and morality, and HIV/ AIDS. 2 The beloved Bill matched depth with style. JAMES F. KEENAN, S.J., received the S.T.L. and S.T.D. degrees from the Gregorian University and is now professor of theological ethics at Boston College. His primary research interests include fundamental moral theology and its history, Aquinas's moral theology, virtue ethics, and issues related to church leadership, HIV/AIDS, and genetics. His most recent monographs are Moral Wisdom: Lessons and Texts from the Catholic Tradition (2004) and The Works of Mercy: The Heart of Catholicism (2004) both from Rowman & Littlefield. A new book, Paul and Virtue Ethics, with Daniel Harrington, S.J., is forthcoming, also from Rowman & Littlefield. Father Keenan wishes to thank Seongjin James Ahn for his intrepid bibliographical assistance on this article.

Studies in Christian Ethics, 2019

Pedagogy in moral theology follows some of the particular concerns Catholic theologians have had since the Second Vatican Council as well as the aftermath of John Paul II’s encyclical on moral theology, Veritatis splendor. Most of the textbooks reviewed here teach virtue, Christian practice, and Thomas Aquinas’s theology, as largely positive responses to the Council and John Paul II. Catholic moral theology thus appears as a relatively stable field, though the authors use multiple approaches. There are, however, some moral theologians offering alternative perspectives on moral theology. One book reviewed here contends with Humanae vitae and resists both Thomas Aquinas’s authoritative voice and Veritatis splendor’s argument against proportionalist thought. The textbooks offer a range of pedagogical tools for varying student levels. Two of the overall gaps in the field, as indicated by these textbooks, might be more direct engagement with Scripture, and a proper locating of Catholic s...

1989

Introduction Bibliography The influence of Auricular Confession The legacy of Augustine Nature and supernature 'Teaching with authority' Subjectivity The language of law The impact of Humanae Vitae A pattern in renewal? Index

Copyright © 2013-15 Francisco J. Romero Carrasquillo. All rights reserved. Pre-Publication draft of article by the same title, forthcoming in Goris H., Hendriks L., Schoot H.J.M. (eds.), "Faith, Hope and Love Thomas Aquinas on Living by the Theological Virtues," Series: Thomas Instituut Utrecht 16 (Leuven: Peeters, 2015). EXTENDED ABSTRACT: Today the ternary number of the theological virtues may seem to us to be beyond dispute, as it is solidly grounded in the Pauline corpus and in the Catholic theological tradition. Perhaps surprisingly, however, in the Middle Ages the issue was not so self-evident and it was disputed whether there were more than three theological virtues, and especially whether the virtue of religion, which was known to the pagan philosophers and which inclines man to give to God the worship that is due to Him, is to be counted as a theological virtue. William of Auxerre and St. Bonaventure categorized religion as being in some way a theological virtue. St. Thomas Aquinas, on the other hand, following his master St. Albert the Great, settled the question so-to- speak, at least for the Thomistic tradition, by categorizing the virtue of religion as a virtue that is annexed to justice, and thus locating it solidly within the realm of the natural moral virtues, and as distinct from any theological virtue (ST II-II.81). In his questions on religion Aquinas gives us very fine precisions regarding the nature of the theological virtues, especially when he explains why religion is not a theological virtue— and curiously most of these precisions cannot be found explicitly within his treatises on the theological virtues (cf. ST II-II.1-46). Concretely, here he presents two very helpful principles that shed an enormous amount of light on our understanding of his teaching on the theological virtues—and elucidating these two points is the principal aim of the present paper. The first principle (1) in question is Aquinas’ very technical way of distinguishing the theological virtues from the virtue of religion, which he ultimately draws from his doctrine on the object and end of human acts (cf. ST I-II.18): the virtue of religion has a creature (religious cultus) as its object and God as its end, whereas the theological virtues have God as both their object and their end. As a corollary, the virtue of religion and the theological virtues have in common the fact that they essentially have God as their end, and in this respect the four stand apart from all other virtues. The second principle (2) is the fact that any virtue is capable of ‘commanding’ the acts of other virtues towards its own ends. How this principle is related to the first can be seen from the examples Aquinas uses: both the virtue of religion and the theological virtues are ‘commanding’ virtues. First, the principal acts of the virtue of religion, such as prayer and sacrifice, are directly ‘elicited’ by the virtue of religion, but there are also other secondary or indirect religious acts, such as chastity and martyrdom, which, though directly elicited by other moral virtues (e.g., temperance and fortitude) are ‘commanded’ by the virtue of religion in such a way that religion orders them to a higher, religious end. Thus, the acts of essentially non- religious virtues can all be transformed into indirectly religious acts by being ‘commanded’ to a religious end. Similarly—and this is the main idea that the paper attempts to unpack—the acts of essentially non-theological virtues can all be transformed into indirectly theological acts by being ‘commanded’ by the theological virtues. In this way, the theological virtues can govern the whole system of natural virtues, bringing a supernatural dimension to all of human life. Thus someone interested in studying Aquinas’ doctrine on the theological virtues can gain a better understanding of the theological virtues by going beyond the treatises on the theological virtues and studying why Aquinas thinks that the virtue of religion is a moral virtue and not a theological one. In particular, the doctrinal principles on the distinction of moral and theological virtues and on the commanded and elicited acts of a virtue, both found within the discussion on religion in Aquinas’ Summa, are the basis of a highly technical and philosophically sound account of how the theological virtues, and especially charity, can be as it were the ‘form’ of the other virtues.

Concilium, 2011

Seminary of All Saints, Uhiele-Ekpoma at Twenty-Five: History and Perspectives, 2020

The inquiries concerning the ontological status of man and its implications for human formation for the nobility inherent in human nature become evident have been deliberated and scrutinized by diverse philosophers that defined human nature. It is palpable that Plato accentuated that man is a fallen soul imprisoned in a body and needs liberation. Aristotle called him a rational animal while Severius Boethius and Thomas Aquinas admitted that man is a rational subsistent being. Moreover, Max Scheler and Karol Wojtyla sustained that the human soul makes him an incarnate spirit. A systematic and comprehensive examination of philosophical anthropology of the aforementioned philosophers unambiguously affirmed that human nature is ontologically composed of body and soul, emotion and reason, material and spiritual entities in such a way that man is neither an animal nor spirit but a rational animal. This unique status serves as a foundation of human formation that can facilitate the attainment of human personality suitable for the candidates of the Catholic priesthood in 21 st century. This paper explores how Aristotelian-Aquinas' understanding of human nature and virtue ethics can help human formative processes for the seminarians that will later become the intermediaries between God and his people in the field of evangelization, bringing Christ to all and bringing all to Christ.

This paper seeks to make a highly original contribution to the debate on whether in Aquinas’ natural law ethics requires belief in God. The author gleans from the texts of Aquinas an argument for why living a full life of natural virtue requires that one practice the virtue of religion, a natural moral virtue that inclines us to perform religious actions. The author concludes that lack of belief in God is detrimental for the moral life, even at the natural level, for: (1) the virtue of religion is not only a legitimate natural virtue without which a person’s moral life is incomplete, but is actually classified by Aquinas as the highest of the moral virtues, and thus to lack this virtue is no small moral defect; and (2) most significantly, this virtue ‘commands’ the other moral virtues, ordering them to their ultimate natural end, and thus without this virtue the moral life falls into disorder even at the natural level.

Kościół-Pluralizm-Europa.Praca zbiorowa pod redakcją Marcina Hintza, 2005

A look at abortion & homosexuality through the lens of the Church Fathers. Written from a conservative Lutheran standpoint.

Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 2006

This essay proposes a method and aim for the future of religious ethics. Rather than surveying the usual debates about the field, the essay situates the various kinds of work in religious ethics both in the contemporary global context and with respect to the modern western conception of what defines a "discipline" and the aspiration to a system of the sciences. In response to the breakdown of the modern project, various claims about rationality and also moral inquiry have arisen. Isolating the insights and yet also problems in these alternative models of inquiry, the essay proposes, as a method for religious ethics, a multidimensional and reflexive hermeneutic that reflects on and with religious sources. Further, the essay advocates as the aim or purpose of religious ethics the humane reconstruction of traditions around their deepest convictions and reflexive interactions with others. Calling this enterprise a form of "religious humanism," the essay seeks to show not only the adequacy of such a conception of religious ethics but also its pertinence to critical, comparative, and constructive thinking.

The article offers an overview of the Compendio de teología moral by Arregui-Zalba, a very significant work of moral theology (particularly in the Spanish speaking world) in the years preceding Vatican II. The overview presents the structure of the book, some of the main characteristics of its way of doing moral theology and a few examples of particular topics. The article helps us understand the directions of pre-conciliar moral theology. 50 years after Vatican II, the aim of the article is to help to understand the significance and the effects of the Council in the renewal of moral theology, particularly the significance and timeliness of the call of Optatam Totius, 16 to give special care to the perfection of moral theology, which "nourished more on the teaching of the Bible, should shed light on the loftiness of the calling of the faithful in Christ and the obligation that is theirs of bearing fruit in charity for the life of the world."

Journal of Religious Ethics, 2009

The London suicide bombings of July 7, 2005 were partly the revolt of moral earnestness against a liberal society that, enchanted by the fantasy of rationalist anthropology, surrenders its passionate members to a degrading consumerism. The "humane" liberalism variously espoused by Jürgen Habermas, John Rawls, and Jeffrey Stout offers a dignifying alternative; but it is fragile, and each of its proponents looks for allies among certain kinds of religious believer. Stanley Hauerwas, however, counsels Christians against cooperation. On the one hand, he is right to resist, insofar as liberalism illiberally excludes theology from public discourse. On the other hand, not all humane liberalism does this: Stout's, for example, is genuinely polyglot, requiring not a common secularist language but a common ethic of communicating. Such a liberal ethic and its attendant anthropology merit the support of Christians: there may be more to be said about the Kingdom of God than respect, tolerance, and fairness, but there will not be less. The Christian has good theological reasons to expect some concord with other inhabitants of secular space. Ethical distinctiveness is no measure of theological integrity; and neither theology (pace Barth) nor biblical narrative (pace Richard Hays) should be expected to do all of the ethical running. If Christians are to be thorough in their moral theology and intelligible in their public statements, then they must borrow non-theological material, formulate abstract concepts, and engage in casuistical analysis. Nevertheless, if an anxious insistence on distinctiveness is a mistake, concern for theological integrity is not. When the moral theologian borrows ethical material from elsewhere, he should integrate it into a theological vision structured by the Christian salvation-historical narrative, which will sometimes modify the meaning of what is incorporated. So in affirming humane, polyglot liberalism, the moral theologian will at the same time make salutary qualifications. One of these is the assertion of the need of liberal institutions to own and promote their moral and 1 This essay originally appeared as the author's inaugural lecture in the Regius Chair of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford on April 22, 2008. The author would like to acknowledge the generous support of the McDonald Agape Foundation in its preparation.

This dissertation examines Thomas Aquinas' treatment of religion as a moral virtue.