Roots of Relational Ethics


Book Description

H. Richard Niebuhr's major work, which he did not live to complete, was to be on theological ethics. Based on the published and unpublished writings that Niebuhr completed during the last decade of his life, Roots of Relational Ethics demonstrates that Niebuhr's conception of responsibility was the culmination of his thought about self, God, Christ, the church, ethics and decision-making, and social evil. R. Melvin Keiser examines the limitations and potential of Niebuhr's use of responsibility in comparison with relevant themes in liberation and feminist theological ethics. He suggests that Niebuhr's mature work can contribute to the alleviation of environmental exploitation, sexism, anti-Judaims, war, racism, and classism.




Relational Ethics


Book Description




The Ethics of Care


Book Description

The author assesses the ethics of care as a promising alternative to the familiar moral theories that serve so inadequately to guide our lives. Held examines what we mean by care and focuses on caring relationships. She also looks at the potential of care for dealing with social issues and global problems.




Roots of Relational Ethics


Book Description

H. Richard Niebuhr's major work, which he did not live to complete, was to be on theological ethics. Based on the published and unpublished writings that Niebuhr completed during the last decade of his life, Roots of Relational Ethics demonstrates that Niebuhr's conception of responsibilitywas the culmination of his thought about self, God, Christ, the church, ethics and decision-making, and social evil. R. Melvin Keiser examines the limitations and potential of Niebuhr's use of responsibility in comparison with relevant themes in liberation and feminist theological ethics. Hesuggests that Niebuhr's mature work can contribute to the alleviation of environmental exploitation, sexism, anti-Judaims, war, racism, and classism.




Relational Autonomy


Book Description

This collection of original essays explores the social and relational dimensions of individual autonomy. Rejecting the feminist charge that autonomy is inherently masculinist, the contributors draw on feminist critiques of autonomy to challenge and enrich contemporary philosophical debates about agency, identity, and moral responsibility. The essays analyze the complex ways in which oppression can impair an agent's capacity for autonomy, and investigate connections, neglected by standard accounts, between autonomy and other aspects of the agent, including self-conception, self-worth, memory, and the imagination.




Music for Others


Book Description

Musical activity is one of the most ubiquitous and highly valued forms of social interaction in North America (to say nothing of world over), being engaged from sporting events to political rallies, concerts to churches. Moreover, music's use as an affective agent for political and religious programs suggests that it has ethical significance. Indeed, many have said as much. It is surprising then that music's ethical significance remains one of the most undertheorized aspects of both moral philosophy and music scholarship. Music for Others: Care, Justice, and Relational Ethics in Christian Music fills part of this scholarly gap by focusing on the religious aspects of musical activity, particularly on the practices of Christian communities. Based on ethnomusicological fieldwork at three Protestant churches and a group of seminary students studying in an immersion course at South by Southwest (SXSW), and synthesizing theories of discourse, formation, and care ethics oriented towards restorative justice, it first argues that relationships are ontological for both human beings and musical activity. It further argues that musical meaning and emotion converge in human bodies such that music participates in personal and communal identity construction in affective ways-yet these constructions are not always just. Thus, considering these aspects of music's ways of being in the world, Music for Others finally argues that music is ethical when it preserves people in and restores people to just relationships with each other, and thereby with God.




The Ethical Seduction of the Analytic Situation


Book Description

According to Jacques Andre, "the patient's encounter with the analyst is a scene of seduction, the seductive statement being that of the fundamental rule or the invitation to address that which is most intimate or personal to a complete stranger." But the practice of psychoanalysis can only unfold if there is a strict respect for ethics. The words seduction and ethics, which at first sight seem mutually exclusive, are thus, as the author shows, at the heart of the analytic perspective. The author takes as her starting-point an encounter, which is not necessarily consensual, between Emmanuel Levinas' thought and his conception of philosophy as ethics - ethics understood as responsibility for the other - and that of the psychoanalyst Jean Laplanche, who posits the first adult other as a seducer of the young psyche from the outset, due to the transmission of enigmatic messages compromised by his or her unconscious. The analyst's ethical position is re-examined and with it the feminine/maternal origins of the human capacity for responsibility for the other.




Comprehending Care


Book Description

American psychologist Carol Gilligan holds that dominant ethical theories, with their strong emphasis on rights and justice, fail to see how care is an indispensable part of moral life. This failure weakens their credibility as adequate, universal ethical theories. In Comprehending Care, Tove Pettersen investigates whether an ethics of care really does give voice to a normative perspective that traditional moral theory has disregarded. More specifically, she considers whether Carol Gilligan's own theoretical contribution is an ethical theory of care, and if it is likely to contribute to such a revised understanding. Pettersen argues that central elements in a consistent and justifiable ethics of care theory can in fact be extracted from her works, and is an ethics that to some extent challenges traditional ethical theories by revealing some of their ontological and epistemological inadequacies, such as tacit assumptions, unforeseen disturbing implications, and deficient moral categories. Within Gilligan's theoretical stance, Pettersen finds suggestions for necessary revisions to remedy the flawed or deficient understanding generated by traditional ethical theory. She argues, however, that Gilligan exaggerates her general critique of Western moral philosophy, and specifically of the 'justice tradition,' and she exposes how Gilligan's portrayal of this tradition is misguided in places, arguing that accommodating the concerns of justice is a central challenge, yet to be met, for an ethics of care.




Open and Relational Theology


Book Description

Most theologies suck. They're too technical or they describe a God nobody understands. Sometimes the God portrayed sounds like a controlling boyfriend or absentee parent. Rather than woo or persuade, most theology books clobber readers into submission. This book is different. Thomas Jay Oord presents a theology that makes sense. It fits the way we live our lives and matches our deepest intuitions. To the surprise of some, it harmonizes with sacred scripture... at least the good parts. And it promotes a genuinely loving God. Open and relational theology is controversial. Oord and others have lost their jobs because they embrace it. Others have been booted from religious communities or shunned by families and friends. It's that radical! This way of thinking is life-changing - for good - for so many. This theology doesn't suck. People around the world are turning to open and relational theology. It answers our biggest questions about good and evil, purpose and freedom, love and science. "Timely!" - Cody Stauffer & Craig Morton, All That's Holy Podcast "Cosmic!" - Pete Enns & Jared Byas, Bible For Normal People Podcast "Conceptual!" - Seth Price, Can I Say This in Church? Podcast "Inspirited!" - Jay McDaniel, Conversations in Process Podcast "Clear!" -Joe Smith and Drew Dunbar, Crisis of Faith Podcast "Radical!" - Shaleen Kendrick & Holland Fields, Desert Voices Podcast "Prodigious!" - John Williamson, Deconstructionists Podcast "Relieving!" - Joey Monteleone, Dismantle Podcast "Compelling!" - Loren Richmond Jr, Future Christian Podcast "Liberating!" - Melanie Mudge & Gary Alan Taylor, Holy Heretics Podcast "Magnificent!" - Tripp Fuller, Homebrewed Christianity Podcast "Enlivening!" - Michael Frost, In the Shift Podcast "Tantalizing!" - Jim Stump, Language of God Podcast "Captivating!" - Jason Elam, Messy Spirituality Podcast "Thought-Provoking!" - Gabriel Gordon, Misfits Theology Podcast "Interrogating!" - Todd Littleton, Patheological Podcast "Exceptional!" - Keith Giles, Peace Catalyst Podcast "Zesty!" - Mason Mennenga, A People's Theology Podcast "Tangible!" - Hayden Bruce, Pragmatic Christian Podcast "Clarifying!" - Mary-Anne & Andre Rabe, Question Your Answers Podcast "Trailblazing!" - Todd R. Vick, Reconstruction Rebel Podcast "Peace-Bringing!" - Chris Harman, Redrawing the Bath Podcast "Stimulating!" - Greg Boyd and Dan Kent, ReKnew Podcast "Punchy!" - Ryan T. Mullins, Reluctant Theologian Podcast "Exciting!" - Josh Patterson & Marty Fredrick, (Re)thinking Faith Podcast "A Gift!" - Beth Hayward, Souls in Soles Podcast "Inviting!" - Kurt Willems, Theology Curator Podcast "Accessible!" - Dustin Kensrue, Thrice & Carry the Fire Podcast "R-/evolutionary!" - Tim Victor, Urban Mystic Podcast "User-Friendly!" - Glenn Siepert, What If? Podcast "Reinvigorating!" - Jon Steingard, Wonder & Mystery of Being Podcast




A Relational Ethics of Immigration


Book Description

To understand the ethics of immigration, we need to start from the way it is enacted and understood by everyday actors: through practices of hospitality and hostility. Drawing on feminist and poststructuralist understandings of ethics and hospitality, this book offers a new approach to immigration ethics by exploring state and societal responses to immigration from the Global North and South. Rather than treating ethics as a determinable code for how we ought to behave toward strangers, it explores hospitality as a relational ethics—an ethics without moralism—that aims to understand and possibly transform the way people already do embrace and deflect obligations and responsibilities to each other. Building from specific examples in Colombia, Turkey, and Tanzania, as well as the EU, US and UK, hospitality is developed as a structural and emotional practice of drawing and redrawing boundaries of inside and outside; belonging and non-belonging. It thereby actively creates a society as a communal space with a particular ethos: from a welcoming home to a racialised hostile environment. Hospitality is therefore treated as a critical mode of reflecting on how we create a 'we' and relate to others through entangled histories of colonialism, displacement, friendship, and exploitation. Only through such a reflective understanding can we seek to transform immigration practices to better reflect the real and aspirational ethos of a society. Instead of simple answers—removing borders or creating global migration regimes—the book argues for grounded negotiations that build from existing local capacities to respond to immigration.