CATHOLIC ETHICS AS SEEN FROM PADUA

During the summer of 2006, over four hundred Catholic ethicists from around the world gathered for four days in Padua, Italy. About sixty of the conference papers have become available in two edited collections, Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church: The Plenary Papers from the First Cross‐cultural Conference on Catholic Theological Ethics, and Applied Ethics in a World Church: The Padua Conference. As the conference was marked by a distinctive and creative tension—between the diversity which characterized the nationalities and cultural identities of the participants, on the one hand, and the commonness of their religious heritage, on the other—these essays can tell us much about contemporary Catholic ethics in its response to global pluralism. The following develops four reflections. First, the conference papers pursue a style of scholarship that is at once critically creative and ecclesially rooted. Second, the conference raises new concerns about the importance that Christian formation must have in a pluralist world. Third, the participants affirm and defend the ultimate universality of moral goods while also arguing that these goods are expressed and embodied in unavoidably particular ways. Finally, the most important contribution that Catholic ethics can make to public conversations about issues of common concern is through its articulation and defense of key human values.     

Feminism and Religion

Religion—capital R—effectively eliminated the feminine experience in its process of institutionalization as church; religion—small r—the whole human view, cannot be adequately reflected through such a myopic institution. All humans will not be equally respected, given unequal status. Thus, the church becomes a powerful contributor to inherently unjust social, legal, and economic systems. Feminism, negated as a philosophical and religious world view by Western religions, challenges the status quo insofar as it calls for endorsement of full human equality.     

Beyond the Four Loves

Abstract

By looking at C.S. Lewis's book The Four Loves through the critical lens of the work of Julia Kristeva, this paper considers how love can be defined and delimited through language and discourse, and how such limitations may be broken down. It examines how Lewis constructs a framework around which various loves are valorized, and how this leads to sexuality and physicality being pushed to the margins—leaving the ‘higher’ loves, such as friendship, safe and manageable. Kristeva's work is used to highlight the way in which Lewis treats the physical and the sexual as ‘abject’, and to explore some of the broader implications that this has in respect of language, culture and gender. Her understanding of love, with its roots in the psychoanalytic tradition, challenges Lewis by insisting on the connection between love, language and the body—and therefore suggests ways in which discourses about love, such as those offered by Lewis, can be disrupted and challenged, enabling us to move beyond The Four Loves towards a multiplicity of loves.     

INTUITIONS AND SEMANTIC THEORY

Abstract: While engaged in the analysis of philosophically central concepts, analytic philosophers have traditionally relied extensively on their own intuitions about when such concepts can be correctly applied. Intuitions have, however, come under increasingly critical scrutiny of late, and if they turned out not to be a reliable tool for the proper analysis of our concepts, then a radical reworking of analytic philosophy's methodology would be in order. One influential line of criticism against the use of intuitions argues that they only tell us about our conceptions of things, and not the things themselves. This venerable line of criticism can seem considerably strengthened if one endorses “externalist” accounts of meaning. Nevertheless, the move from semantic externalism to the rejection of intuitions will be shown to be illegitimate if one has a constitutive rather than expressive understanding of the relation between our intuitions and our concepts.     

Once More Unto the Breach: Type B Physicalism,Phenomenal Concepts,and the Epistemic Gap

Type B, or a posteriori, physicalism is the view that phenomenal-physical identity statements can be necessarily true, even though they cannot be known a priori—and that the key to understanding their status is to understand the special features of our phenomenal concepts, those concepts of our experiential states acquired through introspection. This view was once regarded as a promising response to anti-physicalist arguments that maintain that an epistemic gap between phenomenal and physical concepts entails that phenomenal and physical properties are distinct. More recently, however, many physicalists have lost confidence in the view, and have proposed less promising defences of physicalism—or have become outright sceptical about its prospects. I argue here that these physicalists have underestimated the resources of Type B physicalism and are thereby retreating too quickly—or fighting battles that have already been won.     

A Systems Dilemma

The current shift of interest, reflected in public policy, from the production of goods to the provision of services, has caused a major re-examination of the nature of the services the individual can expect from his society. This re-examination is producing a number of insights, some of them shocking. In particular, we are learning that many of the systems we have created to deliver services are, in the name of “progress” and “civilization,” contributing to the conditions of human distress they were designed to alleviate. Much has been written lately about how service systems of one kind or another subvert their announced goals—how a welfare system perpetuates poverty, or how the medical profession creates iatrogenic illness. There has not been very much written, however, about how several systems inadvertently combine in their day to day operations in such a way as to frustrate each others' activities, and how, in so doing, they destroy in varying degrees the lives of people, or render it difficult for them to improve their lives. We have all been much too tightly locked in our own niches by training, experience, and various types of private interest to see this kind of interlock. It comes into sharp perspective only when one studies the problems of a single person in terms of his total life space, his “ecology.” This paper represents an effort to describe one such situation in a family as viewed from a community health services program designed to approach human crises as ecological phenomena, and to explore and respond to them within this framework. We have found that the best way to organize our view of the environmental field people move in is according to the diverse systems which make it up, so we have labeled our theoretical base “ecological systems theory.” ( 1 ) What is of particular interest to the behavioral scientist in the situation described is that neither individual nor family diagnosis, nor the contributions of the larger systems (in this case a housing system and a system of medical care) will, if viewed separately, explain the state of the man in question. Only when the contributions of all of these systems are made clear, and their interrelationships explored, do the origins of the phenomena described begin to emerge.     

Doing Ontology and Doing Justice: What Feminist Philosophy Can Teach Us About Meta-Metaphysics

Abstract

Feminist philosophy has recently become recognised as a self-standing philosophical sub-discipline. Still, metaphysics has remained largely dismissive of feminist insights. Here I make the case for the value of feminist insights in metaphysics: taking them seriously makes a difference to our ontological theory choice and feminist philosophy can provide helpful methodological tools to regiment ontological theories. My examination goes as follows. Contemporary ontology is not done via conceptual analysis, but via quasi-scientific means. This takes different ontological positions to be competing hypotheses about reality’s fundamental structure that are then assessed with a loose battery of criteria for theory choice. Such criteria make up the constitutive values of ontology (e.g. providing a unified, coherent, non-circular, simple, parsimonious total theory). These values are distinguished from contextual values of a practice: the political and moral values embedded in the social context of inquiry. Although we may be frank about some meta-metaphysical value commitments, bringing in feminist contextual values is viewed as an unacceptable move when thinking about ontological theory choice. This paper then asks: is this move unacceptable? I think not and I aim to motivate this methodological insight here by examining recent work on grounding.     

Relational Psychoanalysis and the Tragic-Existential Aspect of the Human Condition

I suggest we may benefit by opening relational thinking to a certain aspect of a classical psychoanalytic worldview. Opening to what we can call the tragic and existential dimensions of the human condition: the universal experience of a certain inner dividedness, hiddenness, and self-deception—a strangeness within the “otherness” that constitutes ordinary, good-enough human environment; as well as the equally universal experience of impermanence—lack, inevitable loss, and finitude. Such openness entails listening to themes we hear in many critiques of relational thinking—critiques that often devolve into caricaturing relationality as avoiding the dark, internally divided side of our nature. It entails listening well enough to these universal themes in ourselves and in our patients so that we can radically reframe them—without recourse drives—in expanded, relational terms. As in Mitchell’s words, “dialectical tensions not taken as polarities … but rather as interpenetrating and, in some sense, as mutually creating each other.”     

What's the Point of Blame? A Paradigm Based Explanation

When we hope to explain and perhaps vindicate a practice that is internally diverse, philosophy faces a methodological challenge. Such subject matters are likely to have explanatorily basic features that are not necessary conditions. This prompts a move away from analysis to some other kind of philosophical explanation. This paper proposes a paradigm based explanation of one such subject matter: blame. First, a paradigm form of blame is identified—‘Communicative Blame’—where this is understood as a candidate for an explanatorily basic form of blame. Second, its point and purpose in our lives is investigated and found to reside in its power to increase the alignment of the blamer and the wrongdoer's moral understandings. Third, the hypothesis that Communicative Blame is an explanatorily basic form of blame is tested out by seeing how far other kinds of blame can reasonably be understood as derivative, especially in respect of blame's point and purpose. Finally, a new and quasi‐political worry about blame is raised.     

Methodological issues in prevention research: An introduction to the special issue

In recent years increased attention has been directed to prevention research as a means of solving the multitude of complex social and health problems which confront individuals and their societies. Abuse of substances, behavioral dysfunctions, violence, emotional disorders, educational failures, unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases are but a few examples of these most difficult problems. As our recognition of the need for sound prevention strategies has grown, so has our sophistication in designing prevention research studies to evaluate the effectiveness of these new strategies. And that sophistication has brought new challenges, some of which are capable of stifling progress because of their complexity. This problem is certain to grow in importance as interventions with multiple components are used more frequently to meet the challenges of the complex social and health problems we face. This special issue evolved out of the recognition that prevention researchers are confronted by a myriad of difficult methodological issues which have inhibited progress in this area. The articles in the issue present innovative methodological solutions designed to overcome these problems so the field can move forward. Editor's Note: Dr. Edward Seidman edited Methodological Issues in Prevention Research while serving as Associate Editor for Methodology.     

Evangelical Elites’ Anti‐Homosexuality Narratives as a Resistance Strategy Against Attribution Effects

While attribution theory expects that beliefs about the origins of homosexuality are directly related to beliefs about the moral acceptability of homosexual behavior, we use content analysis of the popular evangelical magazine Christianity Today to show that evangelical elites have developed a series of anti‐homosexuality narratives that allow them to resist attribution effects. In particular, we find that even when evangelical elites have expressed belief in the physiological origins of homosexuality, such as the influence of genetics and/or prenatal hormones, their negative beliefs about the moral acceptability of homosexual behavior have not varied. We argue, then, that evangelical elites’ anti‐homosexuality narratives provide them with a strategy for influencing rank‐and‐file evangelicals, so that while allowing for a diversity of beliefs about the origins of homosexuality, rank‐and‐file evangelicals still have a viable mechanism for connecting these beliefs—whatever they may be—to negative beliefs about the moral acceptability of homosexual behavior. Our findings thus extend attribution theory, illuminate the potential power of moral narratives, and amplify the need for future research.     

The content of aliefs

In “Against alief”, Mandelbaum (Philos Stud 165(1):197–211, 2013) argues that if aliefs—a sui generis kind of mental states originally posited by Gendler (J Philos 105(10):634–663, 2008a; Mind Lang 23(5):552–585, 2008b; Analysis 72(4):799–811, 2012)—are to play the explanatory role that is usually ascribed to them, their contents must be propositionally structured. However, he contends, if aliefs have propositional contents, it is unclear what distinguishes them from beliefs. I find Mandelbaum’s arguments in favour of the idea that aliefs must have propositional contents to be compelling. However, I think aliefs should only be credited with a deflated kind of propositional content that I will baptize as “semi-structured propositional contents”, since they are composed by representational units that are neither fully un-detachable nor fully re-combinable. As I will argue, this way of understanding the content of aliefs not only allows us to accommodate all the worries raised by Mandelbaum regarding the nature of their contents, but it also it helps explain why aliefs have some of the peculiar features that Gendler ascribes to them. Consequently, it gives to the advocates of aliefs new tools to defend, against Mandelbaum, that these are sui generis mental states with their distinctive functional role in our cognitive lives.

     

Jonah: His Story,Our Story; His Struggle,Our Struggle: Commentary on Paper by Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg

The Book of Jonah, one of the best known of the biblical tales, is much more than a children's fable about a man and a whale. This brief narrative about a prophet who refuses to be a prophet is our story—how we too often give in to our nature which pulls us toward resentment, parochialism, and narrowness, too often avoid what we need to face within ourselves and our responsibilities, too often are crippled by our inability to transcend our anger and forgive. After examining Aviva Zornberg's analysis of the Book of Jonah in which she argues that the message, like the latent dream à la Freud, is obscure, I argue that the meaning of the Book of Jonah is clear. Psychic unity requires that we face our objects—God and conscience, Nineveh and storm and mother, self and other—struggle with them, stare at them, allow them to breathe and live in the same room. As God, Jonah's “psychoanalyst,” argues, it is only then that we can find our way to where His analysand Jonah never quite arrives—forgiveness of the self and of the other.     

Psyche,Soma, and Gene Expression

Abstract

Slim, elegant, insightful, and fragile, Aniela Jaffe at 85 is a veritable symbol of our eternal quest for meaning. Aniela has authored many books in Jungian Psychology; among them are The Myth of Meaning, Apparitions: An Archetypal Approach to Death, Dreams, and Ghosts, and lung's Last Years. In addition, she recorded and edited Jungs autobiographical volume, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, and contributed a chapter in Man and His Symbols. For a time she served as Jungs private secretary and edited his Collected Letters as well as the book, Jmg: Word and Image. Much of JafJb's writing published in German still remains to be translated. Some hints of these riches yet to come in English are currently being published by Daimon Press as a series of four essays entitled, C.G. Jung — A Mystic? She herein recalls some of the turning points in her personal analysis with Carl Jung. Robert Hinshaw, a Jungian analyst and her editor at Daimon, was present during this intewiew focilitating Jaffis English when she spontaneously broke into German toexpress her impassioned spirit.     

The ethics of return migration and education: transnational duties in migratory processes

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that most prominent normative theories on immigration neglect a critical dimension of the migratory phenomenon, a neglect that blinds them to important rights that, under some circumstances, immigrants ought to have as a matter of justice. Specifically, the paper argues that these theories fail to appreciate that the children of immigrant families, regardless of whether they were born in their parents’ country or in the host country, should benefit from educational rights addressing needs that are particular to their situation. These children may be forced to move between these two countries. This situation generates an obligation for both states (‘receiving’ and ‘sending’) to act jointly to provide educational opportunities so that these children are fully conversant with both cultures and in both languages. Put succinctly, then, we argue that since children of immigrant families lack any certainty of permanent residence in the host society owing to the threat of deportation and the precarity of their legal status, host and home societies bear the duty to offer an education that allows them to be functional in both societies.     

Agent-Regret,Accidents, and Respect

I explore how agent-regret and its object—faultlessly harming someone—can call for various responses. I look at two sorts of responses. Firstly, I explore responses that respect the agent’s role as an agent. This revolves around a feature of “it was just an accident”—a common response to agent-regret—that has largely gone ignored in the literature: that it can downplay one’s role as an agent. I argue that we need to take seriously the fact that those who have caused harms are genuine agents, to ignore this fails to allow these agents to move on. Secondly, following Sussman and MacKenzie, I explore responses that benefit the victim. I argue that we should strive to understand how to configure these responses in a way that does not blame the agent. To do this I look at the role of actions in our self-understanding, as people who have done particular things. I end by briefly considering the ways in which tort law and restorative justice might help us to understand how to appropriately respond to accidentally harming someone. I urge that we need to take this as a starting point to find a better way to respond to the agents of faultless harms.

     

Book Reviews

King, Nicholas Hearing the New Testament: Strategies for Interpretation (edited by Joel B. Green) Alison, James Resurrection Reconsidered (edited by Gavin D’Costa) Alison, James The Beginning and End of ‘Religion’ (by Nicholas Lash) Main, Roderick The Allure of Gnosticism: The Gnostic Experience in Jungian Psychology and Contemporary Culture (edited by Rogert Segal with June Singer and Murray Stein) Deane-Drummond, Celia Beliefs and Biology: Theories of Life and Living (by Jennifer Trusted) Thomas, Janice The Mind and its World (by Gregory McColloch) Meynell, Hugo Arguing for Atheism: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (byRobin Le Poidevin) Meynell, Hugo Philosophical Idealism and Christian Belief (by Alan F. P. Sell) Waterfield, Robin The Dialogues of Plato, Volume 3: Ion, Hippias Minor, Laches, Protagoras (trans. and comment. by R. E. Allen); The Plato Reader (by T. D. J. Chappell) Levi, Anthony Michel de Certau: Interpretation and its Other (by Jeremy Ahearne) Saliba, John Moon Sisters, Krishna Mothers and Rajneesh Lovers: Women’s Roles in New Religions (by Susan Jean Palmer) Craske, Jane Feminism and Christian Ethics (by Susan Frank Parsons) Linnane, Brian Christian Perspectives on Sexuality and Gender (edited by Adrian Thatcher and Elizabeth Stuart) d’Ardenne, Patricia Men, Women, Passion and Power: Gender Issues in Psychotherapy (by Marie Maguire); Feminism and Sexuality: A Reader (edited by Stevi Jackson and Sue Scott) Creagh-Fuller, Tomas Law and Family in Late Antiquity (by Judith Evans Grubbs) King, Nicholas Lydia’s Impatient Sisters: A Feminist Social History of Early Christianity (by Luise Schottroff) Laird, Martin Collectanea Augustiniana. Augustine: Mystic and Mystagogue (edited by Frederick Van Fleteren, Joseph C. Schaubelt O.S.A. and Joseph Reino) Louth, Andrew The Martyrs of Córdoba: Community and Family Conflict in an Age of Mass Conversion (Jessica A. Coope) Swanson, R. N. Peter des Roches: An Alien in English Politics, 1205–1238 (by Nicholas Vincent) Swanson, R. N. Runaway Religions in Medieval England c. 1240–1540 (by F. Donald Logan) Fox, Rory Aquinas and the Jews (by John Y. B. Hood) Hamilton, Alistair The Elect Nation: The Savonarolan Movement in Florence 1494–1545 Hamilton, Alastair Church and Politics in Renaissance Italy: The Life and Career of Cardinal Francesco Soderini, 1453–1524 (by K. J. P. Lowe) Swanson, R. N. The Cartulary of the Knights of St John of Jerusalem in England, Part 2: Prima Camera Essex (edited by Michael Gervers) McCoog, Thomas M. The Jesuit Mystique (by Douglas Letson and Michael Higgins); The Jesuits: A Story of Power (by Alain Woodrow) Levi, Anthony Collected Works of Erasmus (University of Toronto Press – various volumes involving various translators, annotators and editors) McCoog, Thomas, M. Voracious Idols & Violent Hands (by Lee Palmer Wandel) Ditchfield, Simon Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-Reformation Rome (by Frederick J. McGinness) Chibi, Andrew, A. Catholic and Reformed: The Roman and Protestant Churches in English Protestant Thought 1600–1640 (by Anthony Milton) Butler, Perry The Nineteenth-Century Church and English Society (by Frances Knight) Aspinwall, Bernard The Catholic Philanthropic Tradition in America (by Mary J. Oates) Kollar, RenéFaith and Family: The Life and Circle of Ambrose Phillipps de Lisle (by Margaret Pawley)     

A Gentle Critique of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Mourning Religion</Emphasis>

This article offers three points of critical reflection about Mourning Religion, a collection of essays edited by William Parsons, Diane Jonte-Pace and Susan Henking, (University of Virginia Press 2008). It is suggested that the word “religion” and related terms ought to have been contextualized, that Melanie Klein’s theories ought to have been used more extensively and that nostalgia expressed for the loss of an idealized paternal authority ought to have been made more explicit.