Method and Catholic Theological Ethics in the Twenty-First Century

Abstract

The article proposes a Catholic ethical method for the 21st century. To that end, the authors first address the magisterium's concerns with relativism and distinguish relativism from Bernard Lonergan's perspectivism. After proposing perspectivism as an epistemological tool that accounts for a plurality of Catholic ethical methods, the authors explore virtue ethics, virtue epistemology, and a Christian stance that contribute to a reconstructed Catholic ethical method. The article concludes with a definition of chastity from two methodological perspectives that have different anthropological and normative implications.