Theology: Christian / Theological Ethics: Human Sexuality

An exciting introduction to the theory and practice of Christian ethics in the contemporary world.

Peter Singer is often described as the world's most influential philosopher. He is also one of its most controversial. The author of important books such as Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, Rethinking Life and Death, and The Life You Can Save, he helped launch the animal rights and effective altruism movements and contributed to the development of bioethics. Now, in Ethics in the Real World, Singer shows that he is also a master at dissecting important current events in a few hundred words. In this book of brief essays, he applies his controversial ways of thinking to issues like climate change, extreme poverty, animals, abortion, euthanasia, human genetic selection, sports doping, the sale of kidneys, the ethics of high-priced art, and ways of increasing happiness. Singer asks whether chimpanzees are people, smoking should be outlawed, or consensual sex between adult siblings should be decriminalized, and he reiterates his case against the idea that all human life is sacred, applying his arguments to some recent cases in the news. In addition, he explores, in an easily accessible form, some of the deepest philosophical questions, such as whether anything really matters and what is the value of the pale blue dot that is our planet. The collection also includes some more personal reflections, like Singer's thoughts on one of his favorite activities, surfing, and an unusual suggestion for starting a family conversation over a holiday feast. Provocative and original, these essays will challenge--and possibly change--your beliefs about a wide range of real-world ethical questions.

God, Sex, Science, Gender: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Christian Ethics is a timely, wide-ranging attempt to rescue dialogues on human sexuality, sexual diversity, and gender from insular exchanges based primarily on biblical scholarship and denominational ideology. Too often, dialogues on sexuality and gender devolve into the repetition of party lines and defensive postures, without considering the interdisciplinary body of scholarly research on this complex subject. This volume expands beyond the usual parameters, opening the discussion to scholars in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences to foster the development of Christian sexual ethics for contemporary times. Essays by prominent and emerging scholars in the fields of anthropology, sociology, psychology, philosophy, literary studies, theology, and ethics reveal how faith and reason can illuminate our understanding of human sexual and gender diversity. Focusing on the intersection of theology and science and incorporating feminist theory, God, Science, Sex, Gender is a much-needed call for Christian ethicists to map the origins and full range of human sexual experience and gender identity. Essays delve into why human sexuality and gender can be so controversial in Christian contexts, investigate the complexity of sexuality in humans and other species, and reveal the implications of diversity for Christian moral theology. Contributors are Joel Brown, James Calcagno, Francis J. Catania, Pamela L. Caughie, Robin Colburn, Robert Di Vito, Terry Grande, Frank Fennell, Anne E. Figert, Patricia Beattie Jung, Fred Kniss, John McCarthy, Jon Nilson, Stephen J. Pope, Susan A. Ross, Joan Roughgarden, and Aana Marie Vigen.

This comprehensive textbook offers an unparalleled introduction to the study of Christian Ethics, mapping and exploring all the major ethical approaches, and offering thoughtful insights into the complex moral challenges facing people today.  Redefines the field of Christian ethics along three strands: universal (ethics for anyone), subversive (ethics for the excluded), and ecclesial (ethics for the church) Encompasses Christian ethics in its entirety, offering students a substantial overview by re-mapping the field and exploring the differences in various ethical approaches Provides a successful balance between description, analysis, and critique  Reveals how ecclesial ethics is respectful of, and indeed, often profoundly indebted to, other approaches to ethics Structured so that it can be used alongside a companion volume, Christian Ethics: An Introductory Reader, which further illustrates and amplifies the diversity of material and arguments explored here

This long-awaited book by one of American Catholicism's foremost ethicists proposes a framework for sexual ethics whereby justice is the criterion for all loving, including love that is related to sexual activity and relationships. It begins by addressing the large questions of embodiment, gender, and sexuality. Following this is a normative chapter that delineates the justice framework for sexual ethics. Though the particular focus is Christian sexual ethics, the framework is broad enough to have relevance for multiple traditions of sexual ethics. The remaining chapters focus on specific issues in sexual ethics, including same-sex relationships, marriage and family, divorce and second marriage, celibacy, and sex and its negativities.

At the heart of Christian ethics is the biblical commandment to love God and to love one's neighbor as oneself. But what is the meaning of love? Scholars have wrestled with this question since the recording of the Christian gospels, and in recent decades teachers and students of Christian ethics have engaged in vigorous debates about appropriate interpretations and implications of this critical norm. In Love and Christian Ethics, nearly two dozen leading experts analyze and assess the meaning of love from a wide range of perspectives. Chapters are organized into three areas: influential sources and exponents of Western Christian thought about the ethical significance of love, perennial theoretical questions attending that consideration, and the implications of Christian love for important social realities. Contributors bring a richness of thought and experience to deliver unprecedentedly broad and rigorous analysis of this central tenet of Christian ethics and faith. William Werpehowski provides an afterword on future trajectories for this research. Love and Christian Ethics is sure to become a benchmark resource in the field.

Ethical reflection about sexuality is increasingly controversial, complex, and conflicted. After centuries of conflicting messages from the tradition, Christians are understandably confused about how exactly the good news pertains to sexuality. Using a series of provocative questions, Marvin Ellison, a pioneer in contemporary Christian rethinking of sexuality and sexual ethics, attempts to increase readers' skills and confidence for engaging in ethical deliberation about sexuality. Redrawing the conventional, rule-based sexual morality, often rigidly and legalistically applied or broadly ignored, entails transcending fear and shame to redraw the sexual map, he argues. Ellison works to affirm a more relationally focused ethical framework, from which to deliberate about premarital and extramarital sex, marriage and divorce, homosexuality, contraception, abortion, spousal abuse, and sex-education. Students and all adults will welcome this book for enabling their personal clarity, approach to relationships, and mindful participation in respectful moral debate.

These days sexual sin is far less about sex and far more about the misuse of power and exploitation of vulnerability. It's time to redraw the ethical map. But how should a contemporary Christian ethic of sexuality be formulated? Marvin Ellison, a pioneer in contemporary Christian rethinking of sexuality and sexual ethics, uses a series of provocative questions to increase readers' skills and confidence for engaging in ethical deliberation about sexuality. Students and all adults will welcome this book for enabling their personal clarity, approach to relationships, and mindful participation in respectful moral debate.

This important philosophical reflection on love and sexuality from a broadly Christian perspective is aimed at philosophers, theologians, and educated Christian readers. Alexander R. Pruss focuses on foundational questions on the nature of romantic love and on controversial questions in sexual ethics on the basis of the fundamental idea that romantic love pursues union of two persons as one body. One Body begins with an account, inspired by St. Thomas Aquinas, of the general nature of love as constituted by components of goodwill, appreciation, and unitiveness. Different forms of love, such as parental, collegial, filial, friendly, fraternal, or romantic, Pruss argues, differ primarily not in terms of goodwill or appreciation but in terms of the kind of union that is sought. Pruss examines romantic love as distinguished from other kinds of love by a focus on a particular kind of union, a deep union as one body achieved through the joint biological striving of the sort involved in reproduction. Taking the account of the union that romantic love seeks as a foundation, the book considers the nature of marriage and applies its account to controversial ethical questions, such as the connection between love, sex, and commitment and the moral issues involving contraception, same-sex activity, and reproductive technology. With philosophical rigor and sophistication, Pruss provides carefully argued answers to controversial questions in Christian sexual ethics.

What happens when ethical interpretations meet life? Readings sample divergent views on moral issues. Readers can work through case studies.

Two principles capture the essence of the Catholic tradition on sexual ethics: that each and every marriage act must remain open to the transmission of life, and that any human genital act must occur within the framework of marriage. In the Catholic tradition, moral sexual activity is institutionalized within the confines of marriage and procreation, and sexual morality is marital morality. But theologians Todd Salzman and Michael Lawler contend that there is a disconnect between many of the Church's absolute sexual norms and other theological and intellectual developments explicitly recognized and endorsed in the Catholic tradition, especially since the Second Vatican Council. These developments include the shift from a primary static worldview to a historically conscious worldview, one that recognizes reality as dynamic, evolving, changing, and particular. By employing such a historically conscious worldview, alternative claims about the moral legitimacy of controversial topics such as contraception, artificial reproduction, and homosexual marriage can faithfully emerge within a Catholic context. Convinced of the central role that love, desire, and fertility play in a human life, and also in the life of Christian discipleship, the authors propose an understanding of sexuality that leads to the enhancement of human sexual relationships and flourishing. This comprehensive introduction to Catholic sexual ethics--complete with thought-provoking study questions at the end of each chapter--will be sure to stimulate dialogue about sexual morality between Catholic laity, theologians, and the hierarchy. Anyone seeking a credible and informed Catholic sexual ethic will welcome this potentially revolutionary book.

From the internationally acclaimed Catholic biblical scholar, this is a meticulous reading of biblical teaching on sexuality, giving insight into how a disciple of Jesus is called to live out his or her existence as a sexual being.

Inasmuch as "sex" and "sexuality" are not words often spoken from pulpits and in academic theological circles, a vast number of utterances have been made in the name of so-called "Christian values" and "biblical views" on sex and sexuality. These are often given from moral-ethical perspectives, and seemingly very prescriptive: who should have sex with whom, when sex should take place, which purposes sex should serve--and especially, when sex is wrong. Moreover, often there is little or no recognition of the complexities surrounding human sexuality, resulting in what appears to be a blueprint for sexuality, applicable to all persons. This volume contains fourteen theological and ethical reflections by South African scholars on human sexuality, with the aim of exploring what a sexual reformation within Christian dialogue might entail. Presented in three sections--namely, systematic theological reflections, biblical reflections, and ethical reflections--the essays represent a range of topics from a variety of perspectives: Luther and marriage; sexual abuse in the Catholic Church; body theology and the sexual revolution; reproductive technologies, sexuality and reproduction; reproductive loss; hermeneutical choices and gender reformation in (South) Africa; queer engagements with "bra" Joseph; explorations on Paul and sex; rape culture and violent deities; the church's moral authority and sexual ethics; practical-theological considerations regarding infertility; empirical research on masculinities in Zambia; and the lived experience of transgender people in African Independent Churches.