Re: Religious Life/Professional Ethics

Moorad Alexanian (alexanian@UNCWIL.EDU)
Fri, 06 Feb 1998 13:50:53 -0500 (EST)

At 10:39 PM 2/5/98 -0600, Keith B Miller wrote:
>From Tom's comments I think that perhaps he is assuming that a religiously
>guided ethics would yield a specific, and uniform, decision in a given
>ethical dilema. There would be a single "Christian" ethical answer to any
>given ethical question. I would argue that Christians, even when
>possessing identical theological positions, might arrive at different
>resolutions to a given dilema. As I commented earlier, I don't believe
>that scripture prescribes answers to particular ethical questions but
>rather directs us to develop the mind of Christ, adapting His priorities
>and His mission - to become His disciples. How that plays out specifically
>may vary from situation to situation and person to person. I am not
>disturbed by Christians coming to different conclusions on a given specific
>ethical question, as long they are all striving to follow scriptural
>priorities. For example: two Christians may argue on different sides of
>whether a new development project should be built. That is fine as long as
>both are consciously trying to be faithful to their stewardship of
>creation, concern for the poor, putting the good of others above their own
>interests, etc. However, if one would say "The possible impact of this
>project on the environment is not a significant issue" - then I would argue
>that their ethics are not biblically based.
>
>Keith

Perhaps someone can explain the following verse in view of the above
discussion: "We are from God; he who knows God listen to us; he who is not
form God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the
spirit of error." 1 John 4:6.

Moorad