Religious Ethics

In this paper, we explore young Polish Catholic mothers' moral reasoning on abortion. We draw on the concept of maternal knowledge and theoretical insights developed within the ethics of care to shed light on the complexities and contradictions experienced by Catholic mothers in the context of reproductive choices. The narratives we gathered through in-depth interviews illustrate how mothers evoke embodied, experience-based maternal knowledge to challenge hegemonic frameworks associated with legal, medical, and religious authoritative knowledges. We show how mothers engage critically (...) with ideologized notions of sacrifice and suffering by placing these concepts in the context of relational maternal care work and argue that mothers adopt a position on the moral permissibility of abortion by reinterpreting religious norms and ideas, such as the protection of the family and vocation of care. (shrink)

Adults in the United States are having fewer biological children in part due to worries about climate change and population growth, yet Christian environmental ethicists frequently avoid or dismiss these “eco-reproductive” concerns. I argue that these avoidances lead to important limitations in the literature, which I address by employing a pragmatic approach for religious ethics. Learning from environmentalists who are critically engaging with their Christian inheritances, I find that informants draw upon religious repertoires to “kinnovate.” Namely, they expand notions of (...) family beyond biological lineage by taking up vocations as godparents, youth mentors, foster parents, or chosen kin. I claim that these practices of Christian kinnovation are significant because they help to advance creative moral responses to eco-reproductive concerns in religious contexts—interventions that currently remain underdeveloped in relevant ethical and theological literatures. (shrink)

Developments along various epistemic fronts have been gradually modifying our ethical conception of what constitutes agency. For several reasons, we should acknowledge in particular that there is an irremediably ecological character to moral action, in a number of respects. After providing a broad analysis of the ecological turn in moral theory, I reflect on some of its implications for our understanding of the historicity of morals. I then comment on ways in which the field of comparative religious ethics can enrich (...) this emergent account of ecological agency, and vice versa. (shrink)

The purpose of this coauthored research is to develop a Christian ethical argument that better addresses the various social ills of financial neoliberalism, especially the growing wealth gap between the haves—the top 1%—and the have-nots—the bottom 50%. We find that a more progressive and integrative approach to monetary and fiscal policy is necessary. First, we critically review the histories of United States and Swedish monetary policies. We then provide a theological perspective regarding how Christian ethicists should engage with neoliberal structural (...) injustice. Finally, we propose an ethical principle of justice for use in the state's macroeconomic management of money: the accumulation of financial capital should also promote the increase of social capital. Put negatively, the accumulation of financial capital should not be achieved at the expense of depleting social capital. (shrink)

Discussion of the ethics of war has long been a subject of essays published in the Journal of Religious Ethics (JRE). This essay focuses on three recent books that deal with various aspects of that topic. It begins with a discussion of Lisa Cahill's advocacy for peacebuilding as an expression of Christian discipleship, then turns to works on the topic of limited force by Daniel Brunstetter and Christian Braun. It concludes with comments about the role of theology in these works, (...) and stresses the importance of statecraft for just war thinking. (shrink)

[1]. Or la-yesharim -- [2]. Netive ha-yosher.

Ḥeleḳ 1. Haḳdamah - pereḳ 4 -- Ḥeleḳ 2. Pereḳ 5-10 --.