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The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics

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The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics Books The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics Edited by Anna Abram Printed Edition of the Special Issue Published in Religions www.mdpi.com/journal/religions MDPI The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics Books Special Issue Editor Anna Abram MDPI • Basel • Beijing • Wuhan • Barcelona • Belgrade MDPI Special Issue Editor Anna Abram University of London UK Editorial Office MDPI AG St. Alban-Anlage 66 Basel, Switzerland This edition is a reprint of the Special Issue published online in the open access journal Religions (ISSN 2077-1444) from 2017–2018 (available at: http://www.mdpi.com/journal/religions/special_issues/ethics). For citation purposes, cite each article independently as indicated on the article page online and as indicated below: Books Lastname, F.M.; Lastname, F.M. Article title. Journal Name. Year. Article number, page range. First Edition 2018 ISBN 978-3-03842-771-1 (Pbk) ISBN 978-3-03842-772-8 (PDF) Articles in this volume are Open Access and distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY), which allows users to download, copy and build upon published articles even for commercial purposes, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. The book taken as a whole is © 2018 MDPI, Basel, Switzerland, distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). MDPI Table of Contents About the Special Issue Editor ......................................v Preface to ”The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics” ........................vii Anna Abram Introduction to the Special Issue of Religions—The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics doi: 10.3390/rel9010019 ........................................ 1 Joseph A. Selling Reframing Catholic Theological Ethics: Summary and Application doi: 10.3390/rel8100203 ........................................ 5 Lisa Sowle Cahill Reframing Catholic Ethics: Is the Person an Integral and Adequate Starting Point? doi: 10.3390/rel8100215 ........................................ 14 Mathew Illathuparampil Goal-Oriented Ethics: Framing the Goal-Setting Concretely doi: 10.3390/rel8100228 ........................................ 21 Mary Catherine OReilly-Gindhart Pope Francis and Joseph Selling: A New Approach to Mercy in Catholic Sexual Ethics Books doi: 10.3390/rel8120264 ........................................ 28 Nicholas Austin Normative Virtue Theory in Theological Ethics doi: 10.3390/rel8100211 ........................................ 37 Nenad Polgar Reframing Catholic Theological Ethics from a Scotistic Perspective doi: 10.3390/rel8100200 ........................................ 46 Jacqueline Stewart Hermeneutic and Teleology in Ethics across Denominations—Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth doi: 10.3390/rel8100207 ........................................ 56 Peter Sedgwick Anglican Moral Theology and Ecumenical Dialogue doi: 10.3390/rel8090199 ........................................ 63 Marian Machinek My Conscience is Clear (1 Cor 4:4). The Potential Relevance of Pauls Understanding of Conscience for Todays Fundamental Moral Theology doi: 10.3390/rel8100201 ........................................ 71 Edward Vacek Theocentric Love Ethics doi: 10.3390/rel8100224 ........................................ 78 iii MDPI Books MDPI About the Special Issue Editor Anna Abram was born in Poland where she studied theology and ethics. For 25 years she was at Heythrop College, University of London, where she completed her doctorate on the topic of moral development, taught ethics and worked as Head of Pastoral and Social Studies Department. She is Principal of the Margaret Beaufort Institute of Theology in Cambridge, UK. Most recently she co-edited a book (together with Peter Gallagher SJ and Michael Kirwan SJ) ‘Philosophy, Theology and the Jesuit Tradition: The Eye of Love (T&T Clark/Bloomsbury, 2017) and was a guest editor of the Special Issue of ‘Religions’(2017) entitled ‘The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics’. She co-edits (together with Janusz Salamon) a book series 'Bloomsbury Studies in Global Ethics’. Books v MDPI Books MDPI Preface to “The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics” This special issue of Religions considers the question of the future of Catholic Theological Ethics. It recognises the moral wisdom of the past and searches for new ways of making Catholic theological ethics pertinent. The papers presented here cover several major themes that, traditionally, Catholic theological ethics have considered but, according to the authors of the papers, need revisiting. Each contribution engages with the publication Reframing Catholic Theological Ethics (Oxford University Press, 2016) by Joseph Selling, Emeritus Professor of Moral Theology, Catholic University Leuven. The collection explores such themes as conscience, virtue, natural law, authority, ecumenism, the human person and the theology of theological ethics. The writers represent a variety of approaches, geographical locations (Western and Eastern Europe, USA, and India) and while most of them are Roman Catholic, there is an imbedded ecumenism as well as interreligious and inter-cultural slant in several papers. I hope that this collection will ignite a lively debate about the future of Catholic Theological Ethics and you, the reader, will make it radiate further. Anna Abram Special Issue Editor Books vii MDPI Books MDPI religions Editorial Introduction to the Special Issue of Religions—“The Future of Catholic Theological Ethics” Anna Abram The Margaret Beaufort Institute of Theology, 12 Grange Road, Cambridge CB3 9DU, UK; [email protected] Received: 7 December 2017; Accepted: 19 December 2017; Published: 10 January 2018 If the past is said to be a foreign country, then the future must be even less native. This is something many Catholic theological ethicists feel when they look back into the history of moral theological reflection and attempt to relate it to practical issues of today. What should be the starting point for discussing the future of Catholic Theological Ethics? It is not easy to address this question at the time of unprecedented change in which political upheavals, migration of people, inequalities, climate change, views on gender, sexuality, human relationality (including the relationality of the human to the non-human species) are amongst many issues that require careful attention and new understanding. This is in no way to imply that what went on before in Catholic ethics is no longer relevant. Arguably, the moral wisdom of the tradition is an important resource. However, new approaches, both theoretical and practical, are needed. The ten contributors to this special issue of Religions search for new ways of making Catholic theological ethics pertinent. For each of them the Books starting point of discussion is the groundbreaking publication Reframing Catholic Theological Ethics (Oxford University Press, 2016) by Joseph Selling, Emeritus Professor of Moral Theology, Catholic University Leuven. The papers presented here cover several major themes that, traditionally, Catholic theological ethics have considered but, according to the authors of the papers, need revisiting. Amongst these themes are: conscience, virtue, natural law, authority, ecumenism, the human person and the theology of theological ethics. The writers represent a variety of approaches, geographical locations (Western and Eastern Europe, USA, and India) and while most of them are Roman Catholic, there is an imbedded ecumenism in several discussions and there is a direct and indirect interreligious and inter-cultural slant in some of the papers. Joseph Selling opens the issue with a summary of the approach he developed in the above-mentioned publication. In his ‘Reframing Catholic Theological Ethics: Summary and Application’ (Selling 2017) he argues that while traditional Catholic moral theology has much to offer regarding responsible, ethical living and decision-making, the method of theological ethics used over the centuries doesn’t serve us well today. The aim of theological ethics in the past was to train priests for hearing confessions and helping them to judge whether acts confessed were sinful or not. Selling traces the history of the discourse and notes that while the goal of the acting person was also important in judging the acts, it was only in order to find whether the guilt of the penitent was possible to mitigate. Selling makes a case for inclusion in the method a proper attention to the goals of ethical living. He proposes a review of ethical terminology, especially the meaning of good, bad and evil. He builds his method of moral evaluation and decision-making on the work of Thomas Aquinas and the documents of the Second Vatican Council which urged the adaptation of a norm broadly called as ‘Human Person Integrally and Adequately Considered’. He offers a new reading of ‘circumstances’, ’ends’ and ‘intentions’ as well as virtues. He lists twenty ‘principles’ which for him are part and parcel of the Catholic ethical tradition: ‘the need for a working anthropology, an emphasis on attitude before behavior, a sense of commitment to life projects, protecting the common good, maintaining a sense of community, validation of corporeality, striving toward detachment, fostering love of enemies protecting our environment, promoting equal human dignity, maintaining an eschatological sense, construction of a shared ethics, belief in basic Religions 2018, 9, 19 1
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