Ethics

Introduction to Christian Ethics Sample Topics for Paper #1 ( I have the option to choose one these areas)

1. Richard Hays proposes Community, Cross, and New Creation as focal images unifying the New Testament. He says that the image of liberation cannot be considered a focal image, because it is “unable to bring the full spectrum of New Testament witnesses into focus” (203). Assess this claim, defending or critiquing it, and drawing on one or two other authors we have read in support of your argument. (Alternatively, defend or critique his claim that love cannot be considered a focal image.)

2. Katie Geneva Cannon writes that “to prevail against the odds with integrity, Black women must assess their moral agency within the social conditions of the community. Locked out of the real dynamics of human freedom in America, they implicitly pass on and receive from one generation to the next moral formulas for survival that allow them to stand over against the perversions of ethics and morality imposed on them by whites and males who support racial imperialism in a patriarchal social order” (7). Discuss what Cannon identifies as perversions of ethics and morality, what she identifies as moral wisdom, and how she goes about justifying her views of both. Assess her methodology and its conclusions.

3. According to Augustine, “even the Heavenly City makes use of earthly peace during her pilgrimage, and desires and maintains the co-operation of men’s wills in attaining those things which belong to the mortal nature of man, in so far as this may be allowed without prejudice to true godliness and religion. Indeed she directs that earthly peace towards heavenly peace” (Book XIX, ch. 17, p. 947). Unpack what Augustine is saying here, in relation to the argument of this section of the City of God. What do you understand him to be saying about what earthly peace and heavenly peace really are, and what does it mean to “make use of” or to “direct” earthly peace? How does this relate to Augustine’s vision of the Highest Good? Should this vision remain compelling to Christians today? Why or why not, or in what ways?

4. Miguel de la Torre argues that observing from below must be the first step in the process of ethical reflection (48). At the same time, he argues that ethical reflection proceeds in an ongoing hermeneutical circle. Unpack these claims, showing how they are related to one another. Do you agree with the claim that ethical reflection ought to begin with observing from below?

5. James Cone writes that “any starting point that ignores God in Christ as the Liberator of the oppressed or that makes salvation as liberation secondary is ipso facto invalid and thus heretical. The test of the validity of this starting point, although dialectically related to black cultural experience, is not found in the particularity of the oppressed culture alone . . . Divine revelation alone is the test of the validity of this starting point” (75). How would Katie Geneva Cannon or Miguel de la Torre (choose one) respond to this claim by James Cone? Is this a disagreement concerning authority in Christian ethics? If so, who do you find more convincing, and why?

Assessment of essay:

hree 5-7 page ethical reflection papers (1250-1750 words, due by 10 pm on Canvas March 1, April 5, and May 13; each worth 20% of final grade). Sample topics are available for the first paper. Each of your papers should take the form of an argument in support of a thesis. The goal is not merely to summarize what somebody else has said about this or that; the point is to wrestle with what others have said and then stake out and defend a point of view. Defend one of the authors we have read in the weeks prior to the due date from a critique that might be made of some aspect of the argument they have advanced. Offer a critique of some aspect of an argument made by one of our authors. Or, evaluate two authors in relation to one another, with respect to the kind of approach they take or the quality of the argument they develop. Define terms and draw distinctions. Advance reasons that carry a view to this consequence or that. Above all, try to anticipate objections from the other side. Imagine someone giving a critical reading of your paper and try to respond to the questions that they might put to your argument. Additional guidelines here.