Moral Wisdom Book

Writing in a conversational style filled with stories and examples, Jim Keenan breaks open the treasure trove of resources in the Catholic tradition for developing moral wisdom. He reclaims four key texts that bishops and lay people alike appealed to in nurturing their moral wisdom—the person of Jesus in the New Testament, the ten commandments in the catechism, the practice of the corporal works of mercy, and the development of the four cardinal virtues—and lifts up the lessons on love, conscience, sin, and suffering within these texts that form the content of the Catholic moral tradition.

Library Journal

Keenan (Weston Sch. of Theology) notes that, for the greater part of its history, Roman Catholic moral theology texts have been written to help priests in the sacrament of Penance. Moral theology has thus been a theology of sin and sinfulness and has had little to say about the array of factors that have formed the moral lives of the members of our churches and the heroes of the faith. Keenan proposes to examine some of these factors by considering four key "texts" that have served as the sources for developing our moral wisdom: the person of Jesus in the New Testament, the Ten Commandments, the corporal works of mercy, and the "cardinal virtues" of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance. From these texts, he teases out lessons on love, conscience, sin, and suffering, ultimately producing a readable, uncommonly good book that should be required reading for anyone preparing for or engaged in pastoral ministry. Highly recommended for academic and church libraries, as well as for public libraries with a good religion circulation.-David I. Fulton, Coll. of St. Elizabeth, Morristown, NJ Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.