Beyond Virtue Ethics

A contemporary model of spiritual struggle shifts the emphasis from virtues acquisition to its pursuitBeyond Virtue Ethics offers a distinctive approach to virtue ethics, arguing not simply for the importance of struggle to virtue ethics, but that struggle itself is a manifestation of virtue. In doing this, Stephen M. Meawad offers a way of thinking about virtue not simply as a perfected state, but as a state that is to a greater or lesser degree a manifestation of the ideal itself, which is not attainable. Meawad affirms the concept of the unity of virtuesthat is, the idea that a virtue is not a virtue unless united with other perfected virtueswhich is found in God. Insofar as humans grow in unity with God, they too participate in the unity of virtues, although always to an imperfect extent. Meawad rejects a division between ethics and spirituality and provides two concrete examples of this suggested model. The first is the application of this model to the body and its implications for contemporary sexual ethics. The second is a reintegration of ethics and Scripture through the contemporary application of an ancient Patristic divine reading. This book establishes for readers a contemporary model of spiritual struggle, defining it as the exertion of effort in all conceivable dimensionsphysical, emotional, psychological, and intellectualwith the intent to attain a semblance of, knowledge of, and intimacy with Jesus Christ.