Course Introduction: Sketching a Moral Methodology PDF

Course Introduction: Sketching a Moral Methodology Introduction This lesson introduces the student to fundamental moral theology and traces one particular moral methodology and the sources which Catholic moral theology traditionally draws upon. Understanding the moral method and sources Catholic m...

Course Introduction: Sketching a Moral Methodology Introduction This lesson introduces the student to fundamental moral theology and traces one particular moral methodology and the sources which Catholic moral theology traditionally draws upon. Understanding the moral method and sources Catholic moral theology uses is a first step into doing Catholic moral theology and discernment; thus, the book starts with this in order to allow the students to understand the Catholic approach to decision making and ethics. Fundamental Moral Theology When confronting one’s faith commitment, a question that is always asked is this: what particular demands are asked of me in my commitment to this or that way of life? It is not simply enough to say that one believes a particular set of doctrines, or that one subscribes to a specific set of beliefs; it is also about identifying what the implications of these beliefs and doctrines are on the everyday practical life. Especially in a world where people are always confronted with a barrage of choices to make and paths to take, it is important to be conscious of how our beliefs and faith commitments affect how we make decisions in life, and how they should affect how we make decisions in life. This is what Catholic fundamental moral theology is concerned with. Fundamental moral theology is a branch of theology that is concerned with ethics, or how one is to act if one takes seriously the Catholic faith commitment; this includes the social teaching of the Church, sexual ethics, medical or bioethics, environmental ethics, and so on. This would also be concerned with how we discern and make decisions in big choices such as what career to take, to small choices such as where to shop for things like food or clothes. While it might seem that moral theology might only be concerned with avoiding evil or sin, we will see later on that it is concerned with many decisions and choices, as a primary assumption is that many of the choices we make in our day to day life do have moral dimensions and implications. Method There are many different moral methodologies that have been proposed over the two thousand years that Christian theology has had to develop in response to the question of decision-making that takes seriously the Catholic faith commitment. Catholics will have a particular method that is favored, which emphasizes particular sources over others. This will, of course be different from other religions, and even within the Christian faith tradition, though there are many things in common among the various Christian Churches, different Christian groups will favor different sources and methods. Thus, this book will focus in particular with Catholic methodology. Specifically, the method that will be outlined is that of James Bretzke, a Catholic moral theologian whose work draws from various theologians in the Christian tradition. It seeks to be both comprehensive and discernible to the average person, without compromising or watering down the rich and nuanced Catholic Tradition. In this method, Bretzke emphasizes that “a key aspect of lived morality is not just ‘doing’ the rights things and avoiding the wrong things, but more fundamentally living in right relationships—first with God and then with the rest of God’s children, and finally with the whole of God’s creation.” He also emphasizes that the goal of moral decision making is that of shalom; people often associate the term shalom with peace, but this Hebrew word has a richer and deeper meaning, which encompasses well-being and wholeness, rather than simply a lack of conflict or war. As such, moral decision making is concerned with how people are growing and developing and should move a person and the community towards shalom, which we will see in the chapter on Scripture. Bretzke outlines what he calls the subjective axis and objective axis in making moral decisions. Specifically, he identifies four sectors that continue to interact with each other as major considerations in Catholic moral decision making; these four sectors are also interpreted through our own personal worldview. These four sectors would be: Scripture, Tradition, human experience, and rational reflection on human experience. It is in the intersection of these two axes that one’s conscience lies. Conscience will be further expounded on in chapter three, but first, let us go through the four sectors that make up the axes of Bretzke’s moral methodology. The Four Sectors In Catholic moral theology, there are various sources that one draws on in making a decision. Such sources have a normative claim on the individual or community making the decision as part of the individual or community’s faith commitment. One source should not be emphasized to the detriment of another; rather, all of these sources have something important to contribute to moral decision-making that one risks losing if one source dominates all the rest. This method also seeks to go beyond an absolutely physicalist or absolutely relativist approach. An absolutely physicalist approach focuses on abstract and universalizable theories. This approach tends to focus on what it understands to be “objective,” ahistorical and unchanging: there is a given nature, essence, and moral order to the world, and thus the job of people is to find it, understand it, and follow it. Reality is thus understood to be static. On the other hand, an absolutely relativist view would simply allow for whatever each person wants in, without any basis. This method that Bretzke outlines tends towards what is called a personalist approach, which, while not denying some form of objective moral order, nevertheless acknowledges the need to “look for the moral meaning of the human person in his or her matrix of relations, with his or her talents, concrete circumstances, personal history, and so on.” There is a tension and dialogue between the objective and subjective dimensions of the human person and reality, as will be seen in the next chapters. The Subjective Axis: The Human Person’s Experience and Reflection on Experience Human Experience Human experience, though difficult to define, acknowledges the individual’s self- awareness and subjectivity, and a person’s relationship with themselves, other people, and other communities as important considerations or even starting points for theologizing. Traditionally, human experience has gotten little attention in moral theology. It has only been recently with the philosophical turn to the subject, as well as the coming of postmodern and contextual theology, that human experience has been given more consideration in theologizing. The unsaid assumption that western theology was the only correct theology and was universalizable led to the conclusion that the only thing needed was to teach other cultures this form of theology without any form of enculturation or consideration of what other people had experienced; this led to misunderstandings and even erroneous teachings of Catholicism, and thus people falling away from Christianity in general—such is an example of possibly disastrous results when human experience is not considered when theologizing. This is not to say that we ought to privilege human experience above all else; however, as seen in the earlier example that was particularly blind to the colonial and cultural experiences of other people, theology that does not consider human experience can lead to erroneous decisions and theology. Today, particularly with Pope Francis’ papacy, the Catholic Church privileges a hermeneutic or way of interpreting or understanding the world that is based on a particular human experience: that of the poor. Jesus Christ sought out the poor and the marginalized—the widow, the orphan, the stranger in the Old Testament, and the tax collectors, prostitutes, and sinners in the New Testament—and sought to include them back into the community and allow them to once again participate in society; thus, the Catholic Church does the same. It is through the poor and marginalized that the Catholic Church believes that we will meet Jesus, for as Jesus says “truly, I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” Rational Reflection and Reason on Human Experience Part of human experience, and what it means to be a human being, is one’s capacity to reason, and experiences are constantly interpreted by the person or community experiencing it. One processes one’s human experiences and reflects on them, articulating what the said experiences mean in light of one’s background theories, retroductive warrants, communities of discourse, and in dialogue with Scripture and Tradition. In this sector, one reflects on what is thus counted as “normatively human” in order to arrive at more concrete criteria or definitions of what is human flourishing and the common good means. This is obviously difficult, and various people can have various definitions of what the good is, and who the good is for; nevertheless, this is what a person in this sector attempts to do, in collaboration with many other people, and with much humility and respect for each other. As mentioned earlier, there is a balance among the different sources, with a hermeneutic of suspicion that is willing to critique any ideologies that may creep into the Tradition. Thus, in taking into account human experience in moral methodology, certain factors need to be considered in articulated in order to have a more holistic analysis and understanding of human experience and what counts as “normatively human” in relationship to the other sources. First, the background theories or presuppositions that a person brings should be articulated. Each person is not a blank slate: each person comes with his or her own background theories that shape and inform how he or she approaches and perceives any data, experience, or phenomenon. There can be a tendency to be unaware of what assumptions a person has, and therefore not question whether these assumptions hold true or not. Hence, it is important to reflect on one’s background theories: how does one understand the self, community, and the vision or goals of the said community and self? How does one understand Scripture and Tradition, and how does one think they fit into the person’s approach to life and work? For example, much of St. Augustine’s theological work, which has now changed much of western Catholic theology, was heavily predicated on neo-platonic philosophy, while St. Thomas Aquinas’s work borrowed much from Aristotle’s work. Conversely, a background theory that assumes an inequality of races, for example, can be expressed in how salvation is understood: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s work, which integrates evolution and Christianity and opened a new way for dialogue between faith and science, also assumes an inequality of races, which is troubling and can be problematic. These examples simply want to show that the background theories one has will be expressed in one’s theology or perspective, which will in turn affect one’s ethics. Second, retroductive warrants serve as an important “acid test” to one’s theology. Simply put, retroductive warrants are the theoretical and practical fruitfulness of one’s theology or decision-making. Are the consequences of one’s theology and decision actually life-giving, moving the person and community towards shalom, and in line with the gospel values? If yes, then it is fruitful. To be clear, Catholic moral theology is not purely consequentialist; however, if one can foresee that one’s decision or theology will lead to oppression, death, or violence, then it ought be a point of consideration. One’s theology and decisions do not happen in vacuum—they affect other people, no matter how small or private our decisions are; therefore, these consequences on ourselves and others should be considered. Third, the Catholic Church is understood to be a community of discourse, which emphasizes that it is made up of various people who are theologizing and making decisions. In the interaction among the different people who will have different perspectives, background theories, and theologies, three questions need to be raised as part of this community: first, who is the authority? Second, who is the audience—to whom is one speaking to or theologizing to? Lastly, who is the adjudicator in cases of conflicts and disagreements in perspectives, theologies, and decisions? The next two chapters in particular will talk about these questions and concerns on human experience, the underlying assumptions and principles that guide the understanding of human experience in Catholic moral theology, and will discuss how the subjective axis interacts with the objective axis in what Catholic moral theology had traditionally identified as one’s conscience. From here, we can now discuss the objective axis that interacts with human experience and forms a basis for guiding one’s understanding of reality and ethics. The objective axis is what is unique to Christianity, and The Objective Axis: Scripture and Tradition Scripture Scripture, understood as the Word of God, understandably holds a major place in moral theology. Recall that in understanding Scripture, it is important to clarify the way one reads it, and to read it using a correct method, which is neither fundamentalist nor completely subjective. “On the one hand, exegetical practice stresses a scientific objectivity and neutrality that aim to be free from subjective presuppositions. On the other hand, contemporary hermeneutical theory underscores the significance that one’s pre-understanding and application have for interpretation.” It is good then to keep in mind that Scripture has its own “language” that may not be the same as the way we use language today, and that three “worlds” exist when one reads Scripture: the world of the author who put into writing, through inspiration from the Holy Spirit, the Word of God into Scripture, the world of the biblical text itself, with its characters, stories, and genres, and the world of the reader, coming in with his or her hermeneutics presuppositions, and even biases. The intersection of these three worlds helps us have a deeper dialogue to illumine God’s Word in Scripture. As St. Augustine emphasizes, it is important that one allows the Holy Spirit help one draw closer to God and to do the good. Tradition In the Catholic Tradition, Tradition is broadly understood as both the doctrine that is handed down in the Church, as well as the process of handing down this doctrine, reinforcing, amplying, or applying Scripture to the concrete context of people. Sandra Schneiders gives a holistic understanding of Tradition that does not narrow it down to simply words or doctrine: Tradition, as the foundational gift, out of which the Church’s experience unfolds throughout history, is the Holy Spirit, who is the presence of the risen Jesus making the Church the Body of Christ. Tradition, as content, is the sum total of appropriated and transmitted Christian experience, out of which Christians select the material for a renewed syntheses of the faith. Tradition also refers also to the mode by which that content is made available to successive generations of believers, the way in which the traditioning of the faith is carried on through history. Since Scripture and the Catholic narratives are not self-interpreting, there is a need to continue to reflect on and interpret what they truly mean. Tradition is not a “dead faith of the living” as Jaroslav Pelikan says, but rather it is a living faith, a faith that “develops and changes in a way that constantly reconstructs what it considers to be paradigmatic” based on Scripture, doctrine, and the needs and human experience of the people. For example, slavery used to be allowed and even defended using Scriptural passages, citing that slavery was allowed in Scripture, particularly in the Leviticus law and Pauline texts; Catholics and Catholic orders owned slaves, and it was only in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries that slavery was explicitly condemned in Catholicism and Christianity. What counts as Tradition then would include not just magisterial or official documents from the Vatican, but also various works of theologians and doctors of the Church, and the “historical collective experience of the entire Christian community, our liturgical and sacramental life together, as well as the paradigmatic examples of Christian living given us by the... ‘saints.’” A large portion of what is handed down and used in fundamental moral theology is what is understood as natural law, a set of universal precepts that can be known through human reason, which will be further discussed in the next chapters. How does this tradition evolve over time? In the Catholic Church, there is a tension between the magisterium and the sensus fidelium. The Catholic Church, on the one hand, looks to its official teaching body, called the magisterium and made up of the pope and bishops, to adjudicate or make pronouncements on official Catholic teaching. These pronouncements may be “from above” in the form of ex cathedra statements from the pope, who exercises his papal infallibility explicitly at the moment, or through authoritative statements by bishops collectively. This helps ensure that Catholicism does not simply fall into the trap of relativism or purely subjective understanding of the faith; in short, in certain areas of doctrine, Catholics cannot simply pick and choose what it is that they want to believe in, if they wished to commit to the Catholic faith. On the other hand, the Catholic Church also believes in the sense of the faithful or sensus fidelium or the sense of the faith or sensus fidei. This sense is something that is exercised by the entire body of Catholic faithful, and is a form of intuition of what is the Truth. “The sensus fidei...is a sort of spiritual instinct that enables the believer to judge spontaneously whether a particular teaching or practice is or is not in conformity with the Gospel and with apostolic faith. It is intrinsically linked to the virtue of faith itself; it flows from, and is a property of, faith. It is compared to an instinct because it is not primarily the result of rational deliberation, but is rather a form of spontaneous and natural knowledge, a sort of perception (aisthesis). Some of the dogmas associated with Mary, such as the dogma on her bodily assumption of Mary for example, began not “from above” but “from below,” in the practices and beliefs of the practicing faithful and Marian devotees. These devotions and practices were then promulgated through official documents of the Catholic Church. These two ways of how Tradition develops are not meant to be taken as an “either-or,” rather it is a “both-and,” wherein the traditional teaching office of the Catholic Church meets the people where they are, and teaches and learns from the actual practices, ethics, and faith of the people. Later on, we will see how these two are taken together and at the same time dialogue in developing Church teaching. The Ultimate Norm: Jesus Christ One last thing to note in this section, as well as in this chapter. With the various sources that Catholic moral methodology draws on, how does one adjudicate when they conflict? Do we privilege one source over another? It is possible to get conflicting statements. Even in Scripture alone, there can be seemingly conflicting literal statements. So, it is helpful to always go back to what one calls the ultimate norm. In latin, this is the norma normans non normata, which means “the norm of norms which cannot be normed: in short, the ultimate norm or organizing principle upon which Catholic moral methodology turns. As Catholics, this would be the life and the person of Jesus Christ, the Word of God made flesh. This is important to note because moral decision making is not a linear process—it can be messy, conflicting, and full of confusion. There can also be times wherein we may have to choose between the lesser of evils, as a world that is marred by sin can often force people into situations where there may be no good choice. In all of these cases, having an ultimate norm helps clarify at least some of the confusion and doubt, and helps keep the person in line towards the goal of flourishing and the common good. It also helps a person keep the various sources and sectors in moral methodology from becoming fossilized ideologies that become “false gods” of the people. In sum, “if our ethics and moral theology are to be truly Christian then every other norm, judgement, and conclusion has to eb subordinated to our understanding of Jesus Christ and his gospel message.” Summary In this lesson we briefly tackled what fundamental moral theology is and its significance in Catholic theology and a person’s life. We also sketched one particular moral methodology and the sources such a method draws on. Understanding what method we use and what sources we draw upon is important if we are to make good decisions and be able to clarify and at times defend our decisions, and so the later chapter will further expound on the various sources and how they intersect in Catholic moral theology. In using the four sectors, Bretzke raises the following questions: first, what do we use from which sector, and why? Second, what do we ignore from which sector, and why? Third, what is rejected from which sector, and why? Fourth, what is reinterpreted from which sector, and why? Lastly, what do we, as Catholics and the body of faithful, judge to be decisive when sectors or sources conflict, and why? These questions are important to ponder on as a collective body, as well as individual Catholics, because as Tradition is deconstructed and reconstructed over time, it should ultimately be towards the goal of the common good, shalom, and right relationship with God and creation, in light of the ultimate norm, Jesus Christ.