Part IV: Book Summary The idea of justice in the world today is often misconstrued; the most commonly accepted definition of justice is giving someone what the rightly deserve. This definition in itself is accurate, but it is not complete. Keller, in his book Generous Justice: How God’s Grace makes us Just, endeavors to inform the reader of the biblical definition of justice. He proposes that justice is not only giving someone what they deserve, but also graciously giving to the undeserving. He urges his readers to identify with
Many philosophers have tried to distinguish the source of our conscience but have all concluded with different theories. Some for instance believe the conscience to be the voice of God; others believe it to be a human faculty, a special moral sense or even the voice of reason. Some see morally ‘good’ behaviour as the practical answer to a moral dilemma. They would argue that the ‘right’ or ‘best’ course of action is seen through the use of what we call, ‘common sense.’ They would also regard the use of the conscience as the process by which this decision making, between ‘right’ and ‘evil,’ takes place. Some however may question, how do you name a conscience if it is not a physical matter and one cannot distinguish where it originates from?
In making sure that the secular psychology principles align with biblical thinking the biological issues seem to be forgotten. While it is optimal that every human’s make up consist of all the right parts, not every personality will come to counseling complete due to external circumstances and life’s path in general. Hawkin’s model implies that every human beings make-up contains a complete personality and the core is influenced by the Holy Spirit. This is a weakness because only a Christian’s core has the ability to be influenced by the Holy Spirit. It is more reasonable to lean towards Crabb’s model in this area because he discusses the development of maturity in the Christian walk.
Even in contemporary society, we tend to associate morality with some kind of divine will, but through the Euthyphro, Socrates seems to suggesting we think along another line altogether. Is something moral because God commands it? Does morality depend on religious belief? A common view among religious, and even some secular, philosophers is that just as conventional laws require lawmakers, morals also require some ultimate source. The Divine Command Theory is the view that moral actions are those that conform to God's will.
Secular worldviews often see human relationships as self-serving with an ultimate goal of getting ahead of the other person for bettering on oneself. In contrast, a biblical worldview of human relationships seeks to serve others first and place God above all else. Romans 2:8 speaks on the ultimate fate for the “selfishly ambitious” who do not obey the Word of God. Throughout the Bible, there are several instances of the ultimate human relationship found in Scripture. For example, Mark 12:31 states, “ …’You shall love your neighbor as yourself,’” as Jesus’ proclamation of human relationships with one another and God.
One negative aspect to his essay would have to be his bias toward conservatives and the rich. He deliberately labels out the rich in many of his examples by pointing out how they claim to be Christian but do not wish to help aid the poor. As for conservatives, he not only points out George W. Bush but refers at times to religion as “conservative religion.” This clearly shows his bias toward them and could be a way for him to associate them with the American Christianity problem. I believe McKibben has a great point on this issue. As American Christians, we always believe that if we do good deeds or help ourselves we go to heaven.
Hitchens is very anti-religious and is a well-known atheist. This is something that they differ in, I believe that Emerson doesn’t think there is a higher power but isn’t sure what, while Hitchens is anti-religious completely. They did differ in their views on charity for the most part, since Hitchens still believed there should be some, but it isn’t the duty of himself, it was the duty of the government. Emerson for the most part would have like Christopher Hitchens for his views on religion and consistency alone. Hitchens tended to be inconsistent on his view of war And the Bush administration making him a person who changed his mind based on what he though was right, which is what Emerson thought was
Through practicing situation ethics, you show pragmatism, the Christian goal is love, and you must try and achieve love no matter what. The second of the four working principles is relativism, you don’t have to do it perfectly- but as long as you try, and it is still to the benefit of others, you’ve succeeded, through doing this, you may have to break some rules, or go
On the other hand, the Address mainly focused on the argument of unity. In the above discussion, other major principles of the document include the purpose and the method of restoring peace and unity with the Christendom. For instance, the primary objective, in this case, entails the unification of Christians as the people of God. Disunity in Christianity is a stumbling block to progress among Christian faithful. About the method of restoring peace and unity, Thomas Campbell in his document highly believed in a direct appeal to the
This means that do we do good things because God says is good or do we do good things so than God says that it is good. Another argument I am going to examine, is for the statement, and it is an argument based on a group of people called Anti-Theists. They don’t believe in God, so they agree with the statement. However, Anti-Theists like Richard Dawkins say that anyone who believes in religion or in a god is an extremist and it clouds and distorts your view on morality. The next argument that I am going to examine is what some people in the world think, but it is based around Cultural Relativists, who say that if morality was decided for by God then he could say one day to murder somebody and it would be fine.