Читать книгу The World's Christians - Douglas Jacobsen - Страница 37

The Catholic tradition affirms the communal and interconnected character of human life. In particular, it stresses that the actions and attitudes of individuals affect those around them. Catherine of Siena (1347–80) put it this way: “There is no sin that does not touch others, whether secretly by refusing them what is due, or openly by giving birth to the vices.”⁵ Virtues work in much the same way. While a virtue is first of all an individual characteristic – a disposition that allows someone to act in a morally good manner – the living of a virtuous life has the potential to impact others positively both by modeling good behavior and by eliciting gratitude from those who are positively affected by those good actions. Growing out of this vision of human interconnectedness, Catholics recognize the need for community within the church. Being a Christian is being part of the people of God who together are making their way forward in faith. It is within the community of the church that vices are slowly unlearned and that virtues are encouraged and nurtured.

The Catholic tradition takes this communal perspective one step further and applies it to society as well as to individuals and the church. The assumption is that the accumulated moral choices of individuals in a society will slowly create a certain kind of moral ethos within that society that will, in turn, shape the morality of individuals. People who grow up in a materialistic culture are more likely to become materialistic themselves, and people who grow up in a sexually liberal society are more likely to become sexually promiscuous. By contrast, cultures that emphasize spiritual, as opposed to material, values and that stress sexual self‐control, as opposed to libertinism, are more likely to produce citizens who are nonmaterialistic and sexually chaste. Consequently, public rules of behavior – especially the legal codes of nations that touch on explicitly moral matters – are assumed to be serious and relevant concerns for the church. Historically, the Catholic Church has often opposed government actions that decriminalize or encourage behavior deemed immoral by the Catholic Church. In recent years, some Catholics have taken public stands against abortion and LGBTQ rights and other Catholics have been involved in antiwar protests and rallies for peace and justice. Whatever their particular cause, many of these participants are motivated by a spirituality that is deeply rooted in Catholicism’s assumption that human beings are morally interconnected.