Experimental Social Psychology, Situationism, and Creating a Virtuous Character

In an New York Times op-ed a couple of weeks ago, David Brooks drew on the work of Princeton philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah in order to suggest that the philosophical view of character and virtue is now being replaced by the “psychologist’s view” that there is no such thing as character. Instead of thinking of character as a firm and stable disposition to act and feel a certain way, Brooks explains that experiments in psychology suggest that character is actually more contextual, failing to exhibit what psychologists call “cross-situational stability.”

The psychologists thus tend to gravitate toward a different view of conduct. In this view, people don’t have one permanent thing called character. We each have a multiplicity of tendencies inside, which are activated by this or that context. As Paul Bloom of Yale put it in an essay for The Atlantic last year, we are a community of competing selves. These different selves “are continually popping in and out of existence. They have different desires, and they fight for control — bargaining with, deceiving, and plotting against one another.”

The philosopher’s view is shaped like a funnel. At the bottom, there is a narrow thing called character. And at the top, the wide ways it expresses itself. The psychologist’s view is shaped like an upside-down funnel. At the bottom, there is a wide variety of unconscious tendencies that get aroused by different situations. At the top, there is the narrow story we tell about ourselves to give coherence to life.

Brooks goes on to explain that philosophers see the development of character as a matter of “direct assault,” using reason and strength of will to distinguish virtue from vice. Psychologists, on the other hand, see the development of character as a more subconscious, indirect process:

In the psychologist’s version, the good life is won indirectly. People have only vague intuitions about the instincts and impulses that have been implanted in them by evolution, culture and upbringing. There is no easy way to command all the wild things jostling inside.

Brooks’ conclusion suggests that the psychological view may be more accurate, that the good life is not won through “heroic self-analysis but through mundane, self-forgetting effort, and through everyday routines.”

Brooks, in his use of Appiah, is referring to a debate that has existed for some time in moral philosophy over the “situationist” account of character. Situationists see the conclusions of experimental moral psychology suggesting that behavior changes according to situations in conflict with the philosophical view that behavior can be largely predictable due to stable virtuous and vicious dispositions in one’s character.

Some moral philosophers who embrace situationist social psychology argue that the conclusions drawn in empirical research have radical implications for virtue ethics. Gilbert Harman, who has written extensively on the implications of experimental social psychology on moral philosophy, argues that if we take a virtue to be a stable disposition to act in certain ways, than empirical studies indicating that human behavior is largely determined by the situation cast doubt on whether or not there is such a thing as a firm and consistent character, or whether or not character can be developed at all.

John Doris does not go so far as Harman in questioning the existence of character, but he does argue that situationist social psychology indicates that habits of character tend to be narrow rather than broad. That is, a virtue is not a general disposition to act in a certain way, but a disposition to act in a certain way under quite specific circumstances.

Doris and Harman both draw similar conclusions about the usefulness of virtue ethics. If there is no such thing as a virtue, meaning a firm and consistent disposition to act a certain way in a wide range of situations, than virtue ethics is not a useful moral theory and we would be better suited given the reality of our human nature to adopt a more deontological and utilitarian moral theory. In essence, virtue-based moral theories are more idealistic about human nature than the evidence tends to support. Situations, rather than character, are better predictors of behavior.

However, both Doris and Harman, and interestingly enough, David Brooks himself, have an inadequate understanding of character as it is conceived in traditional virtue ethics.

The understanding of characters offered by the situationists and traditional virtue ethics are not the same. The character traits that situationist psychological experiments investigate are dispositions to behave a certain way, apart from the reasoning process. They are studying character traits, such as the tendency not to lie or the tendency to help out strangers. These specific behaviors, however, are not the same as “character” understood in a more Aristotelian sense. Virtue ethics offers a more holistic view of character that is something more than particular traits, but rather consists of a complex set of desires, beliefs, and goals that dispose the person to act in certain predictable ways. That is, a person may consistently provide aid to a stranger in need not because of a disposition to help strangers, but rather because of an overall disposition of generosity and kindness. To pass by a stranger in need, for example, due to a hurried mood, a temporary bad mood, or any of the other factors that situationists claim cause us to behave unpredictably does not indicate that this person’s character is not generous and kind. It indicates rather that this person is acting out of character.

People may act “out of character” when their appetites conflict–say when a person’s emotions overcome his or her reason. A person may also act “out of character” due to competing obligations and the lack of resolutely good choices. Say our kind and generous individual in the above example has promised to give an important talk at a university about generosity and is running late. She may pass by a stranger in need because another obligation, an obligation she considers important because of her character, but which competes with another obligation to help a stranger in need. She may still be kind and generous, but the object of her kind and generous actions today is the university audience she has obligated herself to, rather than the needy stranger that passes her way.

What experimental social psychology provides moral philosophers like myself is not a challenge to an Aristotelian understanding of character that thereby undermines virtue ethics, but rather a warning that the temptations humans face in the goal to act virtuously comes not only from our own vices, but also from situations that we face, sometimes unconsciously, that challenge the sort of behavior that we would want to consider distinctive of our character. For example, I may be more prone to snap at my husband impatiently because somebody snapped at me impatiently earlier in the day. This tendency does not mean that my character is impatient (although in my case, it most definitely is), but rather that this external situation or getting snapped at predisposes me to act out of character. Once I become aware of the role this situation plays in determining my behavior, my reason can help resist such tendencies in order to allow the expression of my character to gain more cross-situational consistency.

So Brooks is wrong to suggest that the creation of the good life comes from self-forgetting. It is rather quite the opposite. The good life comes as a result of becoming conscious through the development of character of those situations when self-forgetfulness leads to out-of-character behavior, of rationally becoming aware of the inconsistencies of one’s actions with one’s desires, beliefs, and goals. Experimental social psychology does not challenge a virtue-ethics understanding of character or the existence of vice and virtue, but rather illuminates specific ways in which acts do not correspond to a person’s habits. Experimental social psychology is an ally in understanding character and virtue ethics, not a competitor.

Some Thoughts on Ecumenism and Christian Unity in Honor of the Feast of St. Richard Mullins

Ecumenical scholars are in a bit of disarray in the wake of the Vatican’s move to make it easier for Anglicans to convert to Roman Catholicism. In response to the Traditional Anglican Communion, an disaffected Anglican group opposed to the ordination of women and gay priests as well as the blessing of same sex unions, the Vatican announced the creation of new ecclesiastical structures which would allow Anglicans and U.S. Episcopalians to become members of the Roman Catholic Church while still holding on to their distinctive spiritual practices, including the ordination of married Anglican clergy as Roman Catholic priests.

The ecclesiastical structures would operate by allowing Catholic bishops’ conferences around the world to create personal ordinariates, basically, a diocese not attached to a specific geographical location, to accept Anglicans under the leader of a former Anglican priest who would be designated as bishop. Anglican clergy who are married would retain their holy orders but would be exempt from selection as bishops. Former Anglican seminarians could have separate houses of formation as well.

It’s a remarkable development in many ways because it will require Pope Benedict to release a new apostolic constitution in order to amend the Code of Canon Law. Notre Dame’s Cathleen Kaveny comments on this in today’s NYTimes:

It is worth noting that that the flexible, unity-in-difference that Rome has in mind is in fact an arrangement that is made possible only by the “modernizing” Second Vatican Council, and the new code of canon law produced in its wake.

Reginald Whitt, O.P. who is both a civil and a canon lawyer teaching at the University of St. Thomas Law School in Minneapolis, has shown that Canon 372 of that code makes possible “personal particular churches” which allow distinctive groups with distinctive needs to preserve their identities while remaining in communion with the universal church.

While this canon has been used to meet the needs of traditionalist Catholics, Professor Whitt argues that it could also be used to assist other distinct groups of Catholics with their own needs and cultures of worship — such as African-American Catholics.

The criticism is that the Vatican’s move endangers ecumenical efforts between the Anglican Communion and the Catholic Church by basically taking sides in a Christian community almost on the brink of schism, and providing refuge for conservative Anglicans who do not see themselves in union with the larger Anglican communion.

National Catholic Reporter’s John Allen counters that the Vatican’s move actually represents a victory for ecumenical efforts because it allows Anglicans to maintain their distinctively Anglican spiritual practices (including the beautiful Book of Common Prayer) whereas previously, Christians from other denominations who wanted to become Roman Catholic had to essentially leave their spiritual heritage behind in order to participate in the distinctively Roman Catholic forms of prayer, worship, and ministry. Allen writes, “Today’s decision instead represents an option for ‘unity in diversity,’ which at least tris to show respect for the tradition out of which these new Catholics are emerging.”

Colleen Carroll Campbell agrees with Allen that the Vatican’s move represents the true spirit of Ecumenical efforts. She writes,

[N]othing in this action by the Vatican contradicts the principles of genuine ecumenism: the commitment to speaking the truth in love, to seeking common ground where it can be found and to honestly acknowledging deep differences — including those differences that have divided the Anglican Communion. . . Genuine ecumenism does not require that the Catholic Church turn away converts knocking on its doors, just as the Catholic Church’s genuine respect for tradition does not preclude the creation of a canonical structure that allows Anglican converts to retain some liturgical riches of their Anglican heritage while uniting with Rome. As the saying goes, “Unity in the essentials; liberty in the non-essentials; and in all things, love.”

This brings me to Richard Mullins, whose birthday is today, October 21. Richard Mullins was a Christian singer and songwriter who not only dedicated much of his career to teaching music on a Navajo reservation, but also donated all the profits from his music to his church and to a charity called Compassion International/Compassion USA. My husband and I like to think of Rich Mullins, who died on September 19, 1997 in a car crash on the way to a benefit concert, as the patron saint of Christian unity and we are celebrating his feast day today. As a couple trying to live out Christian unity in our own lives by worshiping both in the Church of Christ, which is my husband’s heritage, and the Roman Catholic Church, which is my own, Richard Mullins is a source of inspiration for us both, and can also perhaps help us understand the Vatican’s recent ecumenical efforts.

Mullins was Protestant by background, raised by Quaker parents in Indiana and baptized when he was in third grade. He got his degree in music education from Friends University, a private non-denominational Christian university with a Quaker heritage in Wichita Kansas.

Richard Mullins interest in Roman Catholicism was due in large part to his attraction to St. Francis of Assisi. Rich and his best friend Beaker founded the Kid Brothers of St. Frank (i.e. Francis) in the late 1980’s as a ministry to mentor young men in the Christian faith. His family now runs what is called the Legacy of a Kid Brother of St. Frank sponsoring missionaries, interns, and volunteers as well as organizing programs in music and the arts for Native American youth. In 1997, he teamed up with his best friend Beaker and Mitch McVicker to write a musical based on the life of St. Francis in the post-Civil War United States entitled The Canticle of the Plain.

Rich also attended daily mass regularly at the Navajo reservation where he lived until his death. There is much speculation about whether or not Rich was truly planning on converting to Catholicism. Some say that Mullins was scheduled to be received into the church the Monday following his death, after completing the RCIA program under Father Matt McGuinness of the Newman Center at Wichita State University.

Wikepedia cites this quote from a radio interview Artie Terry in Wheaton Illinois in April of 1997:

A lot of the stuff which I thought was so different between Protestants and Catholics [was] not, but at the end of going through an RCIA [Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults] course, I also realized that there are some real and significant differences. I’m not sure which side of the issues I come down on. My openness to Catholicism was very scary to me because, when you grow up in a church where they don’t even put up a cross, many things were foreign to me. I went to an older Protestant gentleman that I’ve respected for years and years, and I asked him, “When does faithfulness to Jesus call us to lay aside our biases and when does it call us to stand beside them?” His answer to me was that it is not about being Catholic or Protestant. It is about being faithful to Jesus. The issue is not about which church you go to, it is about following Jesus where He leads you.

This quote points to something important about ecumenism and the move among the Christian churches to foster Christian unity: the goal of ecumenism is not conversion to a specific church like the Roman Catholic Church, but rather, conversion to Christ. As Christians, we are always in a state of conversion. Rich Mullins was once asked when he was born again, and his answer was “which time?” The way of Christian discipleship is constant conversion to a truer, more loving way of following in Jesus’ footsteps, and this is something I think Richard Mullins realized in his exploration of Catholicism, a realization that is especially reflected in his music.

Roman Catholics officially believe that the unity of the Church, which Christ bestowed from the beginning, subsists in the Catholic Church as something she can never fully lose, but is nevertheless not fully actualized at present. In order to recover the full unity of Christ’s Church on earth, the Catechism says that a number of things are necessary:

•Conversion of heart as the faithful try to live holier lives according to the Gospel for it is the unfaithfulness of the members to Christ’s gift which causes divisions
•Prayer in common, because change of heart and holiness of life, along with public and private prayer for the unity of Christians should be regarded as the soul of the ecumenical movement, and merits the name “spiritual ecumenism”
•Fraternal knowledge of each other
•Collaboration among Christians in various areas of service to human kind (821)

The reason my husband and I consider Rich Mulllins the patron saint of Christian unity is that his life provides a concrete example of how to live out these elements of Christian unity in our own life, by worshiping together, by learning each other’s tradition, by engaging in service together. Rich Mullins’ life is a reminder that the goal of the ecumenical movement is not to get more Catholics or more Protestants but to get more Christian disciples. Rich Mullins’ life is a clear example of how to live out St. Augustine’s ecumenical model: “Unity in the essentials; liberty in the non-essentials; and in all things, love.” In a concert in Lufkin, Texas, only a few months before he died, Rich Mullins told a concert audience:

Christianity is not about building an absolutely secure little niche in the world where you can live with your perfect little wife and your perfect little children in your beautiful little house where you have no gays or minority groups anywhere near you. Christianity is about learning to love like Jesus loved and Jesus loved the poor and Jesus loved the broken.

Lest you think that Rich Mullins is another wishy-washy advocate of ecumenism without doctrine, like those who, as Colleen Carroll Campbell writes, are “equated with a lowest-common-denominator approach to doctrinal differences that glosses over serious conflicts and seeks peace at any price,” remember that next to the Bible, his favorite book was Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton, who incidentally was a Catholic convert from Anglicanism.

On the unofficial feast of the not-yet canonized St. Richard Mullins, let us pray that Christians of every tradition and background can recognize that the end, the telos, of ecumenism is not conversion to a church, but conversion to Christ. There are a diversity of ways to be a Christian disciple, to worship, to pray, and to serve Jesus Christ in this life. But there is only one Lord. Let us pray also that through the intercession of the “kid brother of St. Frank,” the recent ecumenical developments between Catholics and Anglicans will be a means of realizing how through the grace of God, great diversity can exist within unity. In the words of St. Richard Mullins,

“The Christian faith is not about mere intellectual assent to a set of doctrines, but about a daily walk with this person Jesus. It’s about living in awareness of Christ risen, resurrected, and living in my life. Even though doctrine is important, wisdom in the Bible has more to do with character, and the art of living Christianity is about living out the will of God, and living abundantly.”

The Re-Emergent Interdisciplinary Nature of Scholarship

One of the complaints about scholarship these days, especially in the humanities but also in the natural sciences, is that each discipline has become so specialized, that it has become irrelevant to those on the outside. Young scholars in PhD programs are continually pushed to the marginalia in the search for new and original topics, and the dissertations they churn out are frequently so obscure and specific that nobody would read them except the author and their board.

My goal in this post is not to complain about over-specialization in scholarship but rather to suggest that over-specialization is not the way of the future. David Brooks’ op-ed in the New York Times this week, entitled “The Young and the Neuro,” addresses the necessarily-interdisciplinary nature of contemporary research being conducted in the humanities, and especially in cognitive neuroscience, which fuses the fields of bioetechnology, psychology, economics, as well as political science and ethics. Scholars involved in this emergent field are actually transversing disciplines, all in the hopes of trying to figure out how and why people interact in the way that they do.

The new interdisciplinary nature of such scholarship is a reaction against the reductionism we saw in the earlier part of the century, especially in the wake of new knowledge about genetics. A funny side note: in yesterday’s NYTimes crossword puzzle, one of the clues (33 across) was “essence of a person, one might say.” Not to spoil it for you, but the answer is DNA.

The research Mr. Brooks discusses challenges this notion that DNA actually is the essence of a person. People like Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins and E.O. Wilson wanted to use genetics to explain the essence of all human behavior. Ethics, once considered a branch of philosophy, entered into the natural sciences as scientists hypothesized and rapidly worked to confirm that one’s genetic constitution could explain why you as a person behaved the way you did. This field became known as sociobiology–the systematic study of the biological basis of all forms of behavior.

If the sociobiologists would have stuck to ethics, they would not have ruffled very many feathers. But sociobiologists also had to attempt to illustrate how genetics could even explain the great metaphysical questions faced by humankind such as the nature of the soul and the existence of God. What happened in the wake of such books like The God Delusion was a widespread religious reaction against science, especially science that extolled genetics as a causal mechanism or used the dreaded word “evolution.” This religious antithesis to the new work in biology, genetics, and evolution became another form of reductionism. Instead of using science to explain everything, the “theologians” and preachers and ordinary believers wanted to use God to explain everything.

Here is what both sides missed. Different fields explain different phenomena and answer different pressing questions raised by human beings. This was something Aquinas (drawing on the Greek heritage of Aristotle) recognized in distinguishing the practical from the speculative intellect. The practical intellect deals with the natural world, the world that is contingent, subject to decay and change and evolution. The practical intellect deals with sense data derived from sensuous consciousness, that is, with this particular human being, this particular triangle, this particular action.

The speculative intellect is concerned not with the contingent, but with the necessary, the universal, the unchanging. The speculative intellect is concerned with the immaterial. It wants to know not “this particular triangle” but rather, what is the essence of “triangle?” What is the universal form that makes particular triangles come into being? The speculative intellect is not concerned with this particular action, but rather with the question of causation–what are the universal forces that causes anything at all to happen?

The practical intellect deals with what Aristotle called the practical sciences: physics, ethics, politics. The speculative intellect deals with the mother of all science: metaphysics (literally, “above or beyond the physics.”) Aquinas recognized in light of his theological preoccupations that even this neat division was not truly in accordance with reality with the recognition that theology was both speculative (metaphysical) and practical (ethical and political). That is, our study of God is primarily speculative but imminently practical. Theology is speculative because it deals principally with divine things which are immaterial, but secondarily practical because it is concerned with human acts insofar as these acts lead the person to beatitude. So even theology, the premier metaphysical pursuit becomes interdisciplinary in Aquinas’ work. The larger part of the Summa theologiae (“sum of theology”) deals with practical matters, what we would now call ethics.

But Aquinas’ ethics are a theological, and hence, interdisciplinary ethics. His ethics are most certainly theological in the sense that all human acts must be properly considered as part of the life in the spirit. Charity, the most important theological virtue, is the form and mother not just of the theological virtues, but of all the virtues, including the human or moral virtues of prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude. Thomas’ sum of theology shows how biology, anthropology, politics, ethics, economics, metaphysics, and theology are interwoven, each answering different particular questions in order to draw the really important conclusions concerning why we (humans) are here on this earth, what we are supposed to be doing while we are here, and where we are ultimately meant to end up.

In Aquinas’ day, he could be a theologian, an ethicist, a political scientist, an economist, and an anthropologist, but such “renaissance men” were thought to have been long-extinct in the contemporary period in light of the increasing specialization of each of the disciplines. We assumed that to really know anything in the wake of the proliferation of knowledge that followed the modern scientific, industrial, and technological revolutions, you had to be a specialist.

What Brooks’ article indicates to my Thomistic eyes is that we are beginning to re-recognize the important ways in which the practical and speculative concerns overlap, the dangers of reductionism, and the importance of interdisciplinary pursuits in drawing the right sort of conclusions about the questions we are asking. As Brooks points out, we now know the important influence that genetics has on our behavior. But we are beginning to recognize also how complementary processes of social interactions and culture influences genetics and physiology. He writes,

All of these studies are baby steps in a long conversation, and young academics are properly circumspect about drawing broad conclusions. But eventually their work could give us a clearer picture of what we mean by fuzzy words like ‘culture.’ It could also fill a hole in our understanding of ourselves. Economists, political scientists and policy makers treat humans as ultrarational creatures because they can’t define and systematize the emotions. This work is getting us closer to that. . .

The hard sciences are interpenetrating the social sciences. This isn’t dehumanizing. It shines attention on the things poets have traditionally cared about: the power of human attachments. It may even help policy wonks someday see people as they really are.

The challenge faced by young scholars like myself is no longer how to get my questions and my language specific enough to generate a new idea. Rather, young scholars are faced with the new challenge of how to gain a broad enough base of knowledge to re-ask the really old questions without dabbling too much, or drawing conclusions that are too broad to actually be meaningful.

My own dissertation asks how we can integrate a moral theological discourse into the already-interdisciplinary discourse about eating disorders, that is, anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. Researchers have already acknowledged that eating disorders are physiological, biomedical, psychological, and sociological disorders; I argue that they are also moral disorders. So if you want to really know why people have eating disorders and what can be done about it, you need more that psychology, biomedicine, and sociology. You also need ethics, metaphysics, and yes, even theology.

Choosing to Conceive: Should IVF be Restricted in the Same Way We Restrict Unhealthy Food?

An article in today’s NYTimes online provocatively titled “The Gift of Life and It’s Price” discusses both the economic costs and emotional toll of the fertility industry. The issue of IVF is receiving renewed attention in light of the debate about healthcare and the significant costs that IVF children, particularly IVF-conceived twins who are frequently born premature with severe health problems, contribute to overall healthcare spending:

The hospitalization and doctor’s care for Ms. Hare and her son exceeded $1 million. Most of that, about $750,000 to $800,000, was for Carter. The bill was picked up by the self-funded health plan of the Trammell Crow Company, the Dallas real estate investment company where Ms. Hare worked.

“The following quarter during the earnings release, somebody asked why there was a sharp increase in medical costs,” Ms. Hare said. No one identified her, but Ms. Hare knew that her family had contributed heavily.

In Atlanta, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hired an economist to predict what would happen if single embryo transfer were used in a large number of IVF cases.

Dr. Macaluso, the C.D.C. reproductive health official, estimates the patients, businesses and insurance providers would save more than $500 million annually, even taking into consideration the cost of extra in-vitro rounds, by lowering neonatal intensive care, special education and other costs of premature babies.

In an effort to be competitive in today’s fertility industry, clinics grant the maximum autonomy possible to clients in choosing how many fertilized embryos to transfer, despite the fact that higher implantation success rates means that multiple transfers is significantly more likely to lead to multiple births. Potential parents know the risk, but since IVF procedures frequently come out of their own pocket, most are unable to afford multiple rounds, and multiple embryo transfers makes it much more likely that the first round of IVF will lead to conception. Twins are much more likely than single births to have complications at birth.

According to one federal study, about 30 percent of all twins end up in a neonatal intensive care unit, with twins eight times as likely as single babies to be born below 3 pounds, 4 ounces. These are the babies who often need the longest hospital care and face the most sever health problems. Dr. Macaluso, the doctor featured in the article, calls them “million-dollar babies.”

The story does a good job balancing between discussing the extreme financial costs of IVF and multiple births with the more emotional side of the story. The parents discussed (and many of the ones weighing in with comments at the end of the article) are couples who want ever-so-badly to have children and are willing to bear any costs to make this a reality. Moreover, they are providing their children the gift of life, a gift that outweighs any financial burden.

This article brings to the mind of the everydaythomist the morality of choice, and in particular, a distinction made by the renowned Servais Pinckaers between freedom of indifference and freedom for excellence. Pickaers argues that in the contemporary period, we are accustomed to thinking of choice as a matter of choosing between what he calls “freedom of indifference” and “freedom of excellence.” Much of Pinckaers discussion of these two freedoms is a rhetorically charged jab at a caricature of nominalism, and particularly William of Occam (I am more inclined to blame Scotus for the sins of nominalism), but in essence, freedom of indifference is a conception of human freedom that reduces the matter of choice completely to the will’s ability to choose between contraries.

Essentially, freedom of indifference for Pinckaers is the freedom to do whatever is within the realm of possibility for human beings. Human beings have the ability to implant one or two or ten embryos into a woman’s uterus, thus, a woman has the freedom to decide how many embryos will get transferred. Freedom of indifference is the freedom of choice, the choice to say “yes” or “no” to whatever is possible.

Freedom for excellence is, on the contrary, a more limited construal of freedom. This conception of freedom is not one that focuses on the will’s ability to choose “yes” or “no” to whatever possible, but rather the will and intellect’s ability to choose “yes” to whatever is good. Freedom for excellence is a freedom limited to the telos of human flourishing. Choosing what is conducive to flourishing, both for the individual and the community, is an exercise of such freedom; choosing what is not conducive to flourishing, despite the fact that it may look like an exercise of freedom, is actually a mere expression of the will and reason’s enslavement to the passions, or custom, or some other power that prevents the person from becoming the person that God intended.

Freedom for excellence is not something that is simply given, but is rather something that humans need to develop through the exercise of virtuous external activities, and particularly through the development of the virtues. When I resist gorging myself on Halloween candy because I know it will make me feel sick and sluggish afterwards, I am exercising my freedom for excellence. When my husband and I choose not to buy a TV because we know that our default evening activity will be to veg out in front of the tube rather than engaging in more productive and life-giving activities, we are developing our freedom for excellence, despite the fact that we are limiting our ability to “choose” what to do each night.

Pinckaers distinction between the two freedoms is overly-simplistic, and my summary is even more so, but I think this distinction can illuminate an element of this debate about the cost, both financial and human, about fertility treatment. We think of the ability to choose whether or not to engage in fertility treatment as a foregone conclusion. After all, the technology is available, and much that is good is resultant of the use of this technology, namely the freedom for infertile couples to have their own children. Couples previously denied a choice concerning whether or not to have children now have their freedom to choose restored. This article discusses the cost of couples choosing whether or not to utilize this technology, but does not discuss the choice itself.

I am not so convinced that IVF and other fertility treatments are an authentic and moral exercise of human freedom. Consider this comment from one reader:

I’m sure I share many readers’ thoughts and feelings. Although I acknowledge people’s primal and mindless urges to procreate, in the world we share, “want” doesn’t equal “should have”. Our country and planet are places of finite resources of every kind. To squander them on IVF and its incredibly resource-intensive consequences is simply an outrage. There is no tenable argument in favor of IVF.

Many of the comments reflect this sentiment, and criticize the article for never mentioning adoption. The logic behind these comments is that it is more moral to choose adoption than to choose IVF.

Why wasn’t adoption ever mentioned in this article? Why do these women put themselves and their families through such risky procedures when there are so many children who could need loving, supportive families?

And another.

There are always options for adoption (although it is my understanding that this process can be equally time consuming, emotionally draining, and financially burdensome.

I think there is a case to be made for limiting the freedom to choose IVF, which is a restriction of one conception of freedom, in order to expand another conception of freedom. I think we need to bring the debate about IVF back down to the morality of the choice itself. Our society is limiting the ability to “choose” in all sorts of ways in order to make people “more free” in another way. We are taking coke and snack machines out of primary schools, for example, which is limiting the freedom our children have to choose between healthy and unhealthy dining options in order to make them more free by making them less disposed to obesity and diabetes as adults. In many cities across the US, including my own, it is illegal to smoke inside public buildings in order to make people more free to enjoy a meal or a drink without exposure to second-hand smoke.

We choose to limit our ability to choose in order to make us more free to make choices that are conducive to health, flourishing, and excellence. Why do we not do the same for IVF. Yes, in one sense, it is wonderful for parents who cannot conceive naturally to be able to conceive artificially, and there are many beautiful IVF success stories that serve as a testimony to its advantages. But are fertility procedures like IVF allowing individuals and society to make choices that are really conducive to excellence and flourishing?

This article points to one way in which IVF may be detracting from individual and societal flourishing by causing a huge burden to the health care system which is already over-stretched and under-accomplished. The comments about adoption point to another way in which the ability to choose IVF is not conducive to flourishing—it makes people more likely to choose IVF and less likely to choose adoption, leaving millions of kids unwanted in under-resourced foster care system. By restricting the freedom to choose IVF, we increase the freedom to choose adoption, in the same way that restricting the freedom to choose a treat from the snack machine increases the freedom to choose a healthy snack of veggies or whole grains.

Deep down, most of us are libertarians in some way. We want to maximize our choices as a way of maximizing our freedom. But most of us also recognize that on a society-wide scale, maximizing choices is not usually conducive to either making us more free or making us more happy. If given the choice to eat unhealthy snacks or a balanced lunch, most people are going to choose the latter. And we may say that it is a good in itself that they can make this choice, but when we get a society where over 30% of the population is obese, and we can’t provide adequate healthcare to all because the healthcare industry is already over-taxed in treating preventable illnesses like heart disease and obesity, we have to step back and ask whether the inherent ability to choose an unhealthy lifestyle is so good after all.

In a similar fashion, we might think it inherently good that couples at one time debilitated by the disease of infertility can now choose to bear a child of their own to love and care for. But when we get a bloated foster care system, and another giant strain on the healthcare system from couples having IVF babies demanding millions of dollars of expensive lifesaving treatments, maybe we have to step back again and ask whether the inherent ability to choose the IVF procedure is so good after all as well.

Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse and Thomistic Anthropology

My husband and I are big Joss Whedon fans, probably because his shows (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, and most recently Dollhouse), have such interesting philosophical and theological components. Joss Whedon’s new show Dollhouse is perhaps his most thoroughly philosophical.

The premise of the show is that the “Dollhouse” is a powerful, cutting edge organization that recruits young, beautiful individuals to be “dolls,” to have their brains wiped and memories erased so that they can be uploaded with different personalities to serve the needs of the Dollhouse clients. The leading scientist, the nerdy Topher, has designed a technology to quickly and practically effortlessly install the dolls’ brains with complete personalities, including memories, skills like rockclimbing and breaking into bank safes, and emotional connections with other people.

The most recent episode, starring, as always, Eliza Dushku as the evolving doll Echo, includes a new twist, as Topher figures out a way to change Echo on a glandular level in order to meet the demands of a distraught Dollhouse client who recently lost his wife in childbirth and can’t bond with his son. The man needs a mother for his son, and the Dollhouse provides. The opening scene shows Echo nuzzling an adorable baby as she breastfeeds him while her “husband” sleeps in the next room.

The client, Nate, quickly comes to recognize that the doll Echo is not his wife, and that hiring the Dollhouse to provide a mother for his son was a mistake. He calls the Dollhouse, demanding they remove her “or he’ll get rid of the baby,” while Echo surreptitiously listens at the door. Echo, fully installed with maternal instincts and lactating breasts, fears that her son is in danger, and desperately tries to escape.

She is almost successful. Echo is a remarkable doll in the show’s ongoing storyline, who is always sharp, smart, and talented, no matter what her personality, and always equipped with the best survival instincts. Her handler, Paul Ballard, ends up having to drag her screaming from a police station, while the father goes to recover his child. Even the standard calming line “Would you like a treatment,” fails to soothe the maternal Echo who fully believes that her child has been stolen from her.

When Topher goes to wipe the personality, returning Echo to the irenic “doll” state in which she walks around in pajamas and talks in naïve monotone, the story gets particularly interested. Echo’s maternal instinct doesn’t get wiped. When Topher asks her how she feels, Echo, half doll and half mother, punches Topher and makes for the exit, showing up at Nate’s house with the baby and a knife in hand, still fighting to keep her child.

When asked what went wrong, Topher responds:

“Maternal instinct is too strong for a normal wipe. I outplayed myself. . . Perhaps triggering lactation was a bridge too far.”

The father is eventually able to talk Echo down, explaining to her that he hired her to be a mother because he could not be a father, but that the real mother is a part of his son. Echo is not. In a poignant realization of what she is, a doll and not a mother, Echo hands over the baby. The next scene shows her in a playground, as Paul Ballard tentatively approaches.

Echo: I had a baby, now I don’t have him anymore. I feel sad. All of these things that happen to me, I feel them.
Paul: I know, Echo. I know you remember everything.
Echo: Not remember. Feel. I was married, I felt love. And pain, fear. It’s not pretend for me. They made me love my little boy, and then they took him away. They make it so real, every time, they make it so real. Why do they do that?. . .

Paul: If you want I can tell Topher what is going on with you and he can wipe you. You won’t have to feel sad anymore.
Echo: Feeling nothing would be worse. That would be like being asleep, like before. I’m awake now. I don’t want to go back to sleep.

What is so interesting about this episode from an EverydayThomist perspective is that Joss Whedon is implicitly endorsing an Aristotelian-Thomistic anthropology. For Aristotle and Aquinas, form subsists in matter. This means that the form of a person, their soul if you will, is not contained or trapped in the body, but is an integral, inseparable part of the body.

In Aristotelian studies, this concept is pitted against a Platonic metaphysic and anthropology that sees the body and soul or the matter and form of a substance as two different opposing realities that are connected, but not necessarily so, in the human person. For Plato, the human person is primarily spirit. The matter, and this includes the entire sensitive appetite including the emotions, is unnecessary, transitory, and disruptive. Aristotle argued against such a dualistic anthropology that body and soul were what made a human being a person. Matter, including the emotions, is not disruptive but necessary. The human form cannot subsist without matter.

In Thomist studies, this concept is referred to as Aquinas’ hylomorphic anthropology, hyle meaning “matter” and morphe meaning “form.” The passions or emotions like love and fear which Dushku mentions in the above quote must be understood in light of this hylomorphism. The subject of the passions is not only the body, nor is it only the soul, but is rather the substance, the unification of the two. The passions are accidents which are predicated of the hylomorphic unity of the person who can only subsist as both body and soul.

Every passion, therefore, involves a psychosomatic change in the person. This means that every passion, properly understood, effects both the immaterial soul of the person and the material body. This is not a question of cause and effect, as it was for the neo-Platonist Descartes who assumed that the immaterial mind/soul of the person was affected by the passions emerging from the body. Rather, the psychosomatic movement of the passions is a unified event for Aquinas. One quippy way of putting this is that every act of love is also an act of knowledge, and every act of knowledge is also an act of love. The intellect and the passions, the soul and body, the form and matter, are always moving as a unified, hylomorphic unity.

A more Cartesian anthropology assumes that the mind is the controlling force of the person. In other words, Descarte’s cogito, ergo sum posits that the person is a subject who thinks, or a mind who happens to have a body. The body, and the emotions, are not essential to anthropology (although there is some debate about whether this is a caricature of Descartes. Another story for another blogpost).

What Joss Whedon gives us in Dollhouse is a challenge to this Cartesian metaphysics and anthropology. Topher assumes that the mind is the operating principle of the person—change the brain, change the person. Moreover, he assumes that the brain controls the body as he illustrates in this episode. With the proper changes to the brain, Echo goes from gun-fighting superwoman to lactating mama.

But the person, as “Instinct” cleverly points out, does not subsist just in the mind or the form of the person, but in the body itself. Echo does not just think as her infused personalities do, she also feels the way they do. And when Topher wipes her brain at the end of each mission, what he fails to recognize is that he cannot fully wipe each personality because each personality is somehow in Echo’s body, and specifically in her sensitive appetite which is still left with the somatic imprint of the psychosomatic emotional changes that each of her personalities experienced.

In contemporary Thomistic studies, this is becoming more of an important point, post-Grisez and Finnis who, along with the other neo-Thomists, assigned too much control to reason, and neglected the dynamism of the sensitive appetite in Aquinas’ philosophical anthropology. This mistake was based on a larger cultural assumption that the “mind over matter” mentality encapsulated what it meant to be a human being. More recently, we are rediscovering the importance of human matter in moral psychology. Joss Whedon’s “Instinct” perhaps unwittingly pointed that out. Another point for the Thomists.

Two Forms of Judgment: Judgment per modum cognitionis and per modum inclinationis

Aquinas distinguishes between two types of knowledge at the beginning of the Summa Theologiae that correspond to two modes of judging. The first is judgment by cognition (per modum cognitionis), the second is judgment by inclination (per modum inclinationis):

Since judgment appertains to wisdom, the twofold manner of judging produces a twofold wisdom. A man may judge in one way by inclination, as whoever has the habit of a virtue judges rightly of what concerns that virtue by his very inclination towards it. Hence it is the virtuous man, as we read, who is the measure and rule of human acts. In another way, by knowledge, just as a man learned in moral science might be able to judge rightly about virtuous acts, though he had not the virtue. The first manner of judging divine things belongs to that wisdom which is set down among the gifts of the Holy Ghost: “The spiritual man judges all things” (1 Corinthians 2:15). And Dionysius says (Div. Nom. ii): “Hierotheus is taught not by mere learning, but by experience of divine things.” The second manner of judging belongs to this doctrine which is acquired by study, though its principles are obtained by revelation (I, Q. 1, art. 6, ad. 3).

According to Aquinas, right judgment can be achieved either through the perfect use of reason or by way of inclination. Judgment per modum cognitionis is notional knowledge attained by rational study. In other places, he refers to this mode of judging as per studium et doctrinam, per modum rationis, and secundum perfectum usum rationis.

Judgement per modum inclinationis is not cognitive, and not a judgment which takes place through the cogitative power, but rather, judgment according to affection or desire, and thus a kind of affective knowledge. Elsewhere Aquinas writes,

Wisdom denotes a certain rectitude of judgment according to the Eternal Law. Now rectitude of judgment is twofold: first, on account of perfect use of reason, secondly, on account of a certain connaturality with the matter about which one has to judge. Thus, about matters of chastity, a man after inquiring with his reason forms a right judgment, if he has learnt the science of morals, while he who has the habit of chastity judges of such matters by a kind of connaturality (II-II, Q. 45, art. 2).

Aquinas is distinguishing the two different forms of judging, or assigning value to something, using the example of virtue. A person may judge a thing like chastity should or should not be desired because he or she has been taught and understands how such a thing should be considered moral or immoral. On the other hand, a person may judge rightly as to whether something should or should not be desired not through a cognitive decision, but rather on the basis of whether or not he or she actually desires the thing in question. In the case of the former, the intellect is clearly providing the basis of judgment through the cogitative power. In the case of the former, the affective inclination of the person provides the basis for the judgment. In this way, the virtuous person is the rule and measure of human actions. The virtuous person is inclined towards the object of virtue (inquantum ad illa inclinator) or through a certain connaturality with the object of virtue (per quondam connaturalitatem ad ipsa).

We might think of an example in eating. Some individuals need to mentally check themselves to ensure that they do not overeat. How much food this person should desire on any given occasion is a cognitive decision. This individual may desire to eat a second helping of a dish, but decide that this second helping would make him or her too full, and therefore decline. Others, however, just naturally desire the right quantity of food on a given occasion. This individual does not have to decide whether a second helping of a dish is appropriate—the individual simply acts on his or her desires.

We must be careful not to go too far in pitting these two forms of judgment against each other as opposites, but see them rather as corollaries. Affective knowledge and judgment per modum inclinationis is not a judgment made without knowledge, but is rather the synthesis of love and knowledge—a synthesis of cognitive and affective activity. If we understand the two modes of judgment in this way, as a single activity of knowing and loving, we may resolve the apparent tension in Aquinas between the passions and reason. Recall that Aquinas holds that the human person is a hylomorphic unity of body and soul, and that the sensitive appetite stands between these two in a unified activity of putting the whole human person substantially in relation to the world. Knowing and loving are distinct activities, but with the same principle of operation, which is the substantial unity of the human soul.

Moral knowledge, therefore, is not either purely rational knowledge or purely affective knowledge, but is rather a synthesis of both knowledge per modum cognitionis and knowledge per modum inclinationis.

The hylomorphic unity of the human person also explains how one particular power can overcome the other. If the soul’s full energies are employed in the act of cognition, of knowing, such cogitation can impede the affective movement of the soul. Aquinas says that the concentration of the intellect can actually overcome the sensitive appetite so that it no longer experiences certain sensible functions: “In the powers of the soul there is an overflow from the higher to the lower powers: and accordingly, the pleasure of contemplation, which is in the higher part, overflows so as to mitigate even that pain which is in the senses” (I-II, Q. 38, art. 4, ad. 3). More commonly, however, the soul’s activities get concentrated on affection and its accompanying form of judgment. In this way, a person under the influence of anger may judge a thing good that he would not so judge if not under the influence of that passion:

Now it is evident that according to a passion of the sensitive appetite man is changed to a certain disposition. Wherefore according as man is affected by a passion, something seems to him fitting, which does not seem so when he is not so affected: thus that seems good to a man when angered, which does not seem good when he is calm (I-II, Q. 9, art. 2).

What is important to note, however, is that the sensitive appetite seems to present the intellect with an object already laden with value. This challenges the view among some Thomists that the role of the sensitive appetite is only to obey reason.

The Ethics of Golf

My esteemed adviser and I have been in an ongoing debate over the steamy summer months about the essence and ethics of golf. Initially, our conversation focused on whether or not golf was a sport. I argued based on the etymological root of “sport” coming from “disport,” meaning “to be lively or frolic” or “spiritus” meaning “life, breath, or wind” that to be a sport, a certain degree of liveliness, vigor, and activity that transcended that of ordinary activity, was necessary for the essential nature of a sport. Football, basketball, and hockey were clearly included; baseball was more tenuous. Golf, because the level of activity was lacking liveliness and vigor, could not be included.

My adviser argued (I think rightly) that the level of bodily motion of a golf player in full swing was both “aesthetically beautiful as well as intellectually complicated.” He went on to argue (I think wrongly) that such motion included a certain degree of liveliness, at least in the moment of the swing, that led gold to be rightly categorized in the realm of sport.

After a long discussion with my husband, we have established the following three essential criteria for a sport: (1) physical activity which, if using an instrument, requires that the instrument not be capable of acting on its own (baseball bats are acceptable; Nascar vehicles are not); (2) competition. That is, sports are something that are played against another party. So competitive golf could potentially be a sport whereas golf played alone or casually with a few buddies who don’t keep score may be an activity, but is not a sport. And finally, (3) a set of rules that maintain the integrity of the game and allow for clear winners and losers without a judge acting as a third party. So basketball is in, but gymnastics, which requires a judge to determine winners and losers would be an athletic activity but not a sport.

The debate about whether or not golf is a sport is fun, but my real vocation is in the realm of ethics. Thus I find this article from the New York Times Ethics Columnist Randy Cohen much more up my alley. Cohen examines the recent vote to include golf in the 2016 Olympics and the subsequent protests from Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez who, in response to the Olympic committee’s decision, denounced golf as a bourgeois sport and took measures to close some of Venezuela’s courses. My adviser wanted to know whether I had more in common with Chavez than I did the Olympics Committee.

Cohen, if you read the article, introduces his argument with some pretty arcane points like the facts that golfers are overwhelmingly upper-middle class, male, and conservative. He brings these issues up because they are probably what Chavez is referring to when he calls golf “bourgeois.” But the people playing golf are accidental to the ethics of golf in itself. So in that sense, I disagree with Chavez.

What I find much more convincing is the arguments (which Cohen raises though Chavez does not) is that golf in environmentally unsound. He writes,

Unesco warns of the lamentable consequences of building golf courses to attract international tourists: “An average golf course in a tropical country such as Thailand needs 1500 kg. of chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides per year and uses as much water as 60,000 rural villagers.” Some courses have become more frugal with water, and a team of British scientists argues in “The Biologist” that “many golf courses actively promote nature conservation and harbour some of our rarest plant and animal species.” But it is hard to believe that the best-designed nature preserve includes 18 putting greens, or that even the most sophisticated golf course is better for the environment than no golf course at all. These considerations are putatively important to the Olympic Movement, which declares its intent “to encourage and support a responsible concern for environmental issues, to promote sustainable development in sport.”

An extraordinary amount of natural resources and labor go into maintaining golf courses, which are largely private and available to only a select few who can pay the extraordinary fees to gain the “rights” to play on such prime property. While some public course are available (16,000 nationwide, as Cohen notes), they still require exorbitant green fees. The golf course nearest to me charges anywhere from $25-50 in green fees, clearly precluding the vast majority of people from participating. From a market perspective, it makes sense to charge such high fees to participate–the upkeep of the course probably requires it.

But let’s think about what this upkeep entails. The course constantly needs to be watered, which, for 18 holes, is already quite a strain on at least one valuable natural resource. The green needs to stay green, which in most cases requires pesticides and fertilizers, which not only pollute the natural environment, but also cause chemical run-off that also contaminates neighboring environments and water supplies. And to build golf courses in the first place, you have to cut down trees and destroy existing ecosystems. As this article points out, golf courses cover more than 1.7 million acres and soak up nearly 4 billion gallons of water daily. All of this to feed an upper-middle class desire to play a game.

When ethicists talk about consumption of the environment and of natural resources, a word they throw around a lot is “sustainability.” Sustainability is based on the principle that current consumption practices in no way limit the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. The question about the ethics of golf, to me, boils down to the question of sustainability. Obviously, there is no way to tell if future generations are being deprived by present golf practices. But we can say that generally, golf courses consume environmental resources without contributing anything in return. A farm which cuts down trees and uses fertilizer and consumes water at least produces a product that in some way allows that use of natural resources to be sustainable in the long run. But a golf course, at least as far as I can tell, contributes nothing accept some pleasure and some minimal athletic activity to mainly upper-middle class suburban folks.

The question of sustainability is also a question of virtue. Are we a society that is flourishing? That is, are we a society who is practicing social activities in such a way as to support and build up the common good? A society which is only interested in its present needs, and especially of meeting the need of satisfying the appetite of middle and upper-class individuals at the definite expense of the environment and the probable expense of the good of future generations is probably not a society which is striving for the common good.

Let me be clear. I am not saying that if you play golf and if you enjoy it and if you want to keep playing in the future you are in some grave way an unethical person. I am simply asking that we look at a widely-accepted society practice and question how this practice is forming us as a society. I am not convinced that a practice like golf, which consumes resources without contributing any resources in return, and which is a luxury that can only be enjoyed a select few with the prerequisite financial resources and leisure, is a practice that is making us a more virtuous society. Maybe Chavez has a point.

How do Academicians Become Holier? Renewing Hagiography for the Professional Ethicist

In New Wine, New Wineskins, Christopher Steck, SJ has an article entitled “Saintly Voyeurism: A Methodological Necessity for the Christian Ethicist?” In this essay, Steck notes the lack of attention to the personal qualities and character of the professional ethicist, and argues that contemporary Catholic moral theology should incorporate of his proposed method of “saintly voyeurism” into moral education. “Saintly voyeurism” according to Steck is a return to concrete models of Christian holiness as found in the stories of the saints in order to facilitate a neglected goal for the moral practitioner, namely, their own holiness.

Steck’s concern is that contemporary moral theologians are not sufficiently rooted in and transformed by the Christian story. On an institutional level, Steck complains that that there is insufficient support both from the church and the academy to support the development of catholic ethicists own development of Christian disciples as they practice their trade. He writes,

Achieving such a vision [of Christian discipleship for the professional ethicist] is complicated in the academic culture in which Catholic ethicists practice their trade. That culture is given shape by a constellation of values whose form does not align well with that of the field of Christian ethics, especially insofar as it is concerned with questions of what constitutes the holy life. This misalignment, I argue, is due in part to the dominance of rationalistic and acutely critical modes of contemporary research, along with a lack of concern for the personal moral character of the one engaging in research. . . More though needs to be given too how Catholic moral theologians can ‘form’ themselves into Christian ethicists and address issues of Christian discipleship and the holy life.

In essence, Steck’s concern is that not enough attention is being directed towards making ethicists more ethical, and within a Christian context, more holy. Instead, the virtues of the professional ethicists encouraged in the academy are the virtues which Steck identifies with scientific rationalism. They are

• Agorism: the virtue of argumentation and debate, or the “need to position one’s work in opposition to someone else’s and disprove others’ arguments in order to be original, [to] make a contribution and demonstrate intellectual ability” (28).

• Circumscription: the inclination against universalist or comprehensive claims

• Unmaking: a kind of hermeneutic of suspicion or “belief that truth claims conceal subtle and pernicious advancements of self-interest (whether personal, group, social, or institutional) and unconscious desires of power” (28-9).

Such critique-oriented rationalistic virtues have their advantages in the academy and particularly for scholarly research, but Steck worries that such virtues are not in themselves sufficient for the development of the scholar, and particularly the Catholic ethicist. That is, such virtues encourage intellectual competency but neglect other fundamental parts of the academician’s character. As Steck puts it, “Our ends [as scholars] are not just intellectual ones; they have to do with what brings us emotional well-being, psychological peach, and deep satisfaction about a life lived well” (30).

What we need in the academy, argues Steck, are spiritual practices that nurture a more comprehensive vision of the Christian life for the professional Catholic ethicist. That is, the Catholic academy needs institutionalized ways of encouraging Christian discipleship and Christian holiness among its professional ethicists.

What Steck recommends is a sort of “saintly voyeurism,” or as he describes it, “ethical reflection on the ordinary acts of a holy existence to better understand the demands of Christian discipleship” (36). Concretely, this takes the form of a kind of revised hagiography, a study of the lives and actions of the saints with an eye toward discerning which actions are most consonant with a saintly life. He quotes Richard McCormick who says “that the meaning of Christian discipleship is best gathered from the lives of the saints” (37):

Elizabeth of Hungary’s disobedience of her husband’s wishes in order to serve the poor, Elizabeth Ann Seton’s engagement with religious antagonism of her time, and Ignatius of Loyola’s apostolic choice to minister not only to the poor but to the powerful represent choices that raise interesting ethical issues for those wishing to better understand the saintly life.

Steck does not recommend an exact imitation of the saints, but rather a “casuistry at a distance,” that is, an observation of what sort of actions might be considered saintly in a given situation in order to train the ethicist’s own vision of holiness. This moral tutoring through hagiography can occur in five ways, according to Steck:

1. It can confirm for the ethicist the viability of the Christian vision, and strengthen the ethicist’s commitment to living as a Christian disciple even in the face of great adversity
2. Studying the lives of the saints can reemphasize the theological dimension of the Christian life by emphasizing such features as surrender, obedience, participation in the paschal mystery, and trust in the abiding power of love
3. The saints can offer new paradigms for how Christian discipleship can be lived out in changing historical situations
4. The lives of the saints can offer a context for examining how holiness can break through the trial and limitations of creaturely existence.
5. Finally, the saints challenge us always to respond to the situations we find ourselves in, rather than passively accepting the lot we are given. The saints give us options for our own lives for how to live out a life of holiness.

Steck concludes:

Christian moral theology is not simply a deductive or rationalistic science. It requires that its practitioner have a well-formed heart that is attuned to the Gospel and the values at its core. In an ideal world, Catholic moral theologians would be saints and scholars. However, Catholic ethicists now perform their trade in a context that often does not sustain the kind of Gospel vision associated with a saintly existence. The indifference of the academy toward traditional virtues and the loss of preconciliar spiritual practices within Catholicism leave Catholic moralists more susceptible than moralists of an earlier generation to an almost exclusively secular and narrowly rationalistic formation. . . . Scriptural mediation, prayer, devotional practices, and liturgical participation are just some of the practices that form the Christian into a disciple. But examining the lives of the saints, ordinary people achieving great moral character, is one practice that allows ethicists to practice their art—that is, scholarly reflection on human action—and thus represents a distinctive resource for moralists.

I think Steck is right on the money. I would recommend two developments to his argument. First, I think we need to accept the fact that much of the lives of the saints can be psychologized in today’s rationalistic environment, but that need not deter us from recognizing moments of great holiness or the fact that God has worked throughout history through very flawed individuals. My pet example is St. Catherine of Sienna who allegedly went seven years eating nothing but the Eucharist and occasionally some bitter herbs. Clearly, this part of her life seems psychologically unsound, and for good reason. However, the important point to be gleaned from a study of her life is that God inspired her to do great feats of holiness requiring great courage, like caring for victims of the plague and confronting the pope concerning matters of politics, despite the fact that she was a flawed, psychologically fragile and vulnerable individual. Clearly, a great lesson for us all.

Second, I would encourage Catholics to look beyond the boundaries of Catholicism to identify both historical and contemporary saints that were not necessarily a part of the Catholic faith. Due largely to my husband’s influence, I consider the Christian singer Rich Mullins a great saint. Mullins, inspired by the Christian message and anxious to live a life of Christian witness, gave his profits from his singing career to charity, and dedicated large portions of his life to charitable activities not associated at all with his career, like moving to a Native American reservation to teach the children there about music. When I listen to Rich Mullin’s music, I cannot help but be inspired by the vision of the Christian life he encourages both through his music and the story of his life. Clearly, Rich Mullins can be considered a contemporary saint for Catholics today.

I’m interested for all the professionals or soon-to-be professionals reading this post: (1) what role do the lives of the saints play in your own professional and personal life, and (2) what ways institutionally can you think of that you are encouraged to live a life of holiness within your profession, rather than a life of pure academic achievement?

Should Theologians Get to Preach in Mass?

This summer, I read a great book called New Wine, New Wineskins edited by William Mattison III. Here’s a review of one of the essays by Christopher Vogt who questions whether Catholic theologians should not be given an invitation by the bishop to start preaching during Mass. His essay is entitled, “Finding a Place at the Heart of the Church: On the Vocation of a Lay Theologian.”

In this essay, Christopher Vogt’s main complaint, drawn largely from his own personal experience, is that theologians are not engaging in practices that make them better Christians. The vocation of the theologian has become, he claims, disconnected from the life of the Church. Theologians do lots of things that might in some way be considered for the Church like writing papers, teaching, or presenting at conferences, but such activities are not conducted in the Church. He writes,

There is no venue in which I regularly interact with the people of God as an audience or as a source for my work. There is no mechanism in place for me to be heard by local clergy or my local bishop, nor is there any ongoing practice in place for me to hear the concerns, criticisms, or ideas of pastoral leaders. In the absence of such practices, I am becoming a professional academic but one with only loose, informal connections with the church (48).

Vogt acknowledges that lay theologians might just be encouraged to go to Mass more, to pray the liturgy of the hours, or to attend regular devotions like rosaries or Eucharistic adorations. Such practices, while valuable in their own right, are insufficient for lay theologians who wish to strengthen the connection between their profession work and their life of faith as Christians. What is needed, he argues, is not a replacement for these practices, but an additional practice specifically for the lay theologian to become more connected to the life of the church. The practice he argues for is preaching.

Vogt says that the local bishop should support lay theologians by inviting them to preach during mass. The first reason for this is that it is important for the theologian to have a deep connection to the community of faith in this community’s worship, a connection that is currently missing in the church. Theological reflection is not meant to be undertaken by a neutral observer in a context wholly separate from the life of the church, but rather, theology exists only in and for the church. Allowing lay theologians the opportunity to preach would draw them into a closer relationship with living church, and would thereby strengthen them in their vocation to speak about this living church and the faith that it holds.

Vogt identifies several ways theologians can benefit from an invitation to preach. First, they can talk about theological reflection in a more personal (i.e. “first-person”) way that the academy does not encourage. Vogt complains that theological argumentation, while valuable academically, is not necessarily a practice that strengthens one’s spirituality. Second, preaching gives the opportunity for the lay theologian to become more immersed in the liturgy by following the liturgical calendar and presenting theological reflection on scriptural selections that the theologians may not have chosen for themselves. Third, allowing the lay theologian to preach provides an opportunity for the theologian to understand in a deeper, more profound way, the lives of the people of God who hold the faith.

Vogt also thinks that the church itself will benefit by inviting lay theologians to preach. He notes that many priests give quite bad homilies due to insufficient theological knowledge (think of how bad the homilies frequently are on Trinity Sunday). Other priests might be “morally absent,” meaning that the presiding priest is physically present, and thus able to say mass, but unprepared to preach. And there is also the problem of the priest shortage. The German bishops have already received permission from Rome to allow lay people to preach on a regular and ongoing basis at Sunday liturgy. In the U.S., lay people can lead a Liturgy of the Word when a priest is absent.

Moreover, there is both historical and juridical precedent to allow lay theologians to preach regularly. Pope John Paul II lifted to outright ban on lay preaching in 1983, though the current code prevents lay people from preaching a homily. Vogt claims that the term homily has taken on a legal meaning such that it simply means “preaching by a priest or deacon in the context of the regular liturgy.” He argues that “if a lay person performs the same task of ‘offering a reflection,’ by definition it cannot be a homily, and therefore it can be permitted” (58). He concludes,

Given the lack of a definitive theological closure on this issue, I would humbly suggest that it should be reconsidered whether the current discipline of an absolute prohibition on homiletic preaching by lay people is the best discipline by which to ensure the unity of the Liturgy of the Word and Eucharis and to preserve the theological distinction between ordained priesthood and the universal priesthood of the baptized. . . Regular preaching would be a practice appropriate for theologians because their vocation demands that they serve the church as interpreters of the Word and because preaching would draw on their considerable training in a way that complements their pursuit of teaching and research and leads them to be more pastorally aware (59).

Vogt’s recommendation is bold, provocative, and initially very persuasive. Actually, maybe because I am married to a member of the Church of Christ where lay people, including my husband, preach all the time, I did not think Vogt’s recommendation was that shocking or provocative at first read. Nevertheless, Vogt is right to say that theologians have both a professional and a spiritual vocation to engage in faith seeking critical understanding. The theologian should also definitely have a strong connection with the Christian community. I disapprove highly of theologians and theology students who stop going to mass or church all-together. One cannot be a theologian if they are completely disconnected from the life of the church. That being said, the vocation of a theologian is not an ecclesial vocation. In other words, Christian theologians have a distinct (i.e. different) vocation from priests and bishops.

As important as it is for the theologian to be immersed in the life of the church, it is also important to keep a critical distance between the university and the episcopate. Theologians must be given a certain freedom to think freely, to make provocative inquiries into the nature of the faith, and to challenge the church’s teaching when necessary. It would, however, be very dangerous if ordinary lay people were exposed to the sort of critical inquiry that theologians engage in. The job of the theologian is to critically examine the faith; the church in both the people of God and the magisterial teaching body discerns what should get passed on to the flock.

I think that Vogt has recommended a practice that in some cases could be very good for some churches. There are lay theologians, like ordained theologians, that have been given a gift to preach. In these cases, it should depend on the prudential discernment of the bishop to decide who, where, and under which circumstances a lay theologian should give a sermon during Sunday liturgical services. I think that it is probably wise for canon law for allow for this possibility. But I also think it would be rash to suddenly allow lay theologians to preach in a liturgical role that should be occupied for someone as both a theological authority and a spiritual shepherd.

I have one friend who said that this issue should call us as a church to rethink ordination. That some people are called and given the grace by God to be teachers, preachers, healers, and evangelists, and you should not have to be ordained as a priest to have the church sanction you in your work in any one of these given areas. So there could be a sort of analogous ordination for people to preach, whereby the church “lays hands on” the person and sanctions their work for the good of the church’s body. This could also be one way of addressing the issue of women’s ordination, without saying that women need to be made priests.

Perhaps a more prudent immediate step would be to encourage more communication and hands-on work with priests and theologians. That is, rather than having a theologian give a sermon or homily, theologians could be given roles as theological advisers to parish priests who may have had improper theological education. Of course, this does not solve the problem of the shortage of priests, or the problem of “morally absent” priests, as Vogt calls them. In parishes where this is a problem, it might be a good idea for the bishop to find some trusted theologians to take over, or at least heavily supplement, the preaching responsibilities. Nevertheless, Vogt’s essay encourages us to think about the vocation of the theologian and the relationship of the theological profession and the life of the church.

A Thomistic Response to N.T. Wright on Metaphysics, Trinitarian Formulas, and the Historical Jesus

In Chapter 4 of Scripture and Metaphysics, Matthew Levering takes on N.T. Wright who argues that traditional Western Trinitarian theology bypasses the narrative account of Scripture especially regarding the historical Jesus, and instead presents a fundamental non-narrative Trinitarian theology which “approache[es] the Christological question by assuming this [ontological] view of god and then fitting Jesus into it” (Wright, “Jesus and the Identity of God,” 54).

Wright begins his essay with a personal anecdote of talking to students who claim to not believe in god. Wright probes them to explain “which god they don’t believe in” and determines that when students say this, what they mean is that they do not believe in a god who sits on high, looking down and casting out judgment, what Wright calls the “spy-in-the-sky.” To these students, Wright responds that he does not believe in such a god either, but rather, believes in the God that is revealed in the historical Jesus of Nazareth.

Wright’s point is that we need historical studies of Jesus because it is all too easy to create an idol of Jesus, a heavenly, perfect, sinless, and non-Jewish Jesus “who wanders round with a faraway look, listening to the music of the angels, remembering the time when he was sitting up in heaven with the other members of Trinity, having angels bring him bananas on golden dishes.” Rather than starting off with the Orthodox, post-Nicaean and post-Chalcedonian Jesus as the second person of the Trinity (what Wright calls the kyriarchal portrait of God), Wright argues that we need to start with the historical Jesus who reveals to us not a creedal formula, but rather, the Old Testament God of Israel:

In Jesus himself, I suggest we see the biblical portrait of YHWH come to life: the loving God, rolling up his sleeves (Isa 52:10) to do in person the job that no one else could do, the creator God giving new life the God who works through his created world and supremely through his human creatures, the faithful God dwelling in the midst of his people, the stern and tender God relentlessly opposed to all that destroys or distorts the good creation, and especially human beings, but recklessly loving all those in need and distress. “He shall feed his flock like a shepherd; he shall carry the lambs in his arms; and gently lead those that are with young” (Isa 40:11). It is the OT portrait of YHWH, but it fits Jesus like a glove.

In this chapter, Levering wants to save Aquinas from the implicit criticism of people like Wright, namely, that his conception of Jesus is sterile and formulaic, and completely detached from the Jesus as revealed in Scripture. Instead, Levering claims that Aquinas rejects the kyriarchal portrait of God just as strongly as Wright does. He cites the Tertia Pars, QQ. 46, art. 3. where Aquinas asks whether there was a more suitable way of delivering the human race than by Christ’s passion. In the first objection, alluding to St. Anselm’s Cur Deus Homo, Aquinas states that God could have liberated humankind solely by His Divine Will! This could have not only spared the life of the incarnate son of God but would have more suitably revealed God’s superior power.

But Aquinas rejects the mighty display of God’s power as more suitable than the Passion (as does Wright) on the grounds that Christ’s passion teaches us about the God who saves us: “In the first place, man knows thereby how much god loves him, and is thereby stirred to love him in return, and therein lies the perfection of human salvation” (IIIa, Q. 46, art. 3). As Levering writes:

Christ’s Paschal mystery reveals to human kind the extraordinary depth of God’s love. Without Christ’s passion, humankind would not have known the superabundance of God’s love. The Paschal mystery reveals the Trinity (God-in-himself) in terms of a wisdom of wondrous love,, to the point of the Son of God giving his own life for the salvation of sinners, that is, for the salvation of those who by pride had cut themselves off from God” (Levering 134).

Aquinas does not give us the “disembodied theological cipher” which Wright wants to counter with the historical Jesus, but rather, to use Wright’s own words, “the Jesus whose body was killed as the revelation of the love of God and raised to new life.”

Aquinas gives another reason that Christ’s bloody passion was more fitting than a mighty display of God’s power neatly accomplishing the same task. That is, by his passion, Christ “set us an example of obedience, humility, constancy, justice, and the other virtues displayed in the Passion which are requisite for man’s salvation. Hence it is written (I Peter 2:21): ‘Christ also suffered for us, leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps” (IIIa, Q. 46, art. 3). Levering’s point is this, that like Wright, Aquinas appeals to the cross and the scriptural account of Jesus to dispel what Wright calls the “kyriarchal” or aloof, uncaring and philosophically formulaic God. But unlike Wright wants to argue that his scriptural and historical account of Jesus reveals a God of superabundant love, of humility, and of personified wisdom, as opposed to the philosophical accounts of God that his students reject, Aquinas uses philosophy to probe the depths of this mystery further. Namely, Aquinas draws a Trinitarian conclusion.

Jesus, Aquinas argues, was able to endure such suffering (which we have already established is intended to suitably reveal the intimate love of God that God is willing to suffer with and for God’s people) because of intimate knowledge of the Father. In suffering, and suffering without sin, for the sins of others, Jesus had full knowledge of Father, which gave Jesus the ability to suffer the most profound sorrow for sin out of the love which is manifest in the Father. As Levering writes, “the Father inspired Christ’s human will with this perfect charity by infusing Christ’s humanity with the fullness of the grace of the Holy Spirit. In Christ’s passion, one thus sees manifested the incarnate Son’s obedience to the Father through the Holy Spirit. The Paschal mystery of Jesus Christ reveals God’s wisdom and love in Trinitrarian form” (136).

For Aquinas, the scriptural Jesus, and especially the scriptural account of Jesus’ death reveals the Father as the one who sends the Son as the Father’s Word of love for the world, reveals the incarnate Son who is God’s perfect Word in the world, and reveals the Holy Spirit who enables the incarnate Son to suffer with supernaturally-inspired love. That is, for Aquinas, it is not the study of metaphysics, though metaphysics certainly helps, and not the study of creeds, though creeds are important, but precisely the study of Scripture and especially the Passion which reveals the Trinity.

We see the central and foundational importance of scripture in Aquinas’ Trinitarian formulas elsewhere, specifically in his commentary on John. Commenting on John 5:20, Aquinas writes that “because the Father perfectly loves the Son, this is a sign that the Father has shown him everything and has communicated to him his very own power and nature” (Super Ioan. 5, lect. 3, no. 753). Because the Father gives the Son everything he has, the Son is the perfect image of the Father (Hebrews 1:3, Colossians 1:15) or as Aquinas reflects using metaphysical language “since likeness is a cause of love (for every animal loves its like), wherever a perfect likeness of God is found, there also is found a perfect love of God” (Super Ioan 5, lect. 3, no. 753). Just as the Father bets the Son by absolute self-gift, so too the Son, in order to reveal the Father, must give himself completely.” Hence, we get the Passion.

This is not a way of ignoring the God of Israel which Jesus reveals perfectly through his earthly life (as Wright wants to argue); it is, however, a fuller revelation of the God of Israel. Levering writes, “Before Christ’s coming, the people of Israel knew God the father, but they only knew him as father in the sense of Creator, and as the one and only God. Christ’s disciples, on the other hand, are able to know Father by faith (by the grace of the Holy Spirit) as the Father of the only-begotten son” (139). Aquinas cites John 5:36 on this point: “The very works which m Father has given me to perform—those works that I myself perform—they bear witness to me that the Father sent me.” According to Aquinas, by the power of the Holy Spirit, Jesus, by revealing himself through his works, also reveals the Father. This is the basis of Trinitarian formulas—the works of Jesus as related by Scripture.

Wright wants to say that if we really study the Jesus as revealed in Scripture, we will not get at a creedal Trinitarian formula. The real Jesus and the Second Person of the Trinity have nothing to do with each other. He writes,

After fifteen years of serious historical Jesus study, I still say the creed ex animo; but I now mean something very different by it, not least by the word “god” itself. The portrait has been redrawn. At its heart we discover a human face, surrounded by a crown of thorns. God’s purpose for Israel has been completed. Salvation is of the Jews, and from the King of the Jews it has come. God’s covenant faithfulness has been revealed in the good news of Jesus, bringing salvation for the whole cosmos.

But for Aquinas, as Levering points out, it is precisely by studying this historical, earthly Jesus that we are taught, as Jesus taught his friends, about the Trinity. Jesus teaches us through his words and actions. On this, Aquinas would agree with Wright. But whereas Wright uses only historical and literary methods to understand this Jesus, Aquinas also integrates metaphysical methods to not only exegete the historical Jesus, but also to be conformed to true knowledge of the living God revealed in scripture. Metaphysical speculation does not, as Wright criticizes, lead to the construction of an aloof kyriarchal idol, but rather, seeks to illuminate the true meaning of scriptural narrative of the transcendent and immanent God revealed to Israel as YHWH. In short, metaphysical speculation, in addition to historical and literary methods of understanding, complement one another by instilling within the believer greater contemplative understanding of the mystery of the Trinity. Or as A.F. Gunten, O.P. remarks,

“The texts of Scripture invited [Aquinas] to undertake a philosophical study that bears its fruits. It then permits him to give a more precise interpretation of Scripture.”