Living a Christian Life by Germain Grisez, Ph.D.

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Living a Christian Life: Volume 2
The Way of the Lord Jesus
Author: Germain Grisez, Ph.D.
ISBN:0-8189-1269-3
Hardbound: xxiv + 950 pp.
Price: $35.00 + shipping
To order call:
1 800-343-ALBA (2522)
Please have your American Express,
Master or Visa Card ready.
To order online click here.
To order the 3-volume set online click here. This second volume in Germain Grisez'a monumental study treats the specific moral responsibilities common to all or most lay people as well as those common to clerics and religious. Like Volume One, Christian Moral Principles, the chapters in this work are divided into questions and answers based upon the conviction that the whole of the unique life to which God calls each Christian is his or her personal vocation. Each vocation embraces the whole of one's life, not merely part of it, for God calls each believer -- a calling not limited to the specific "vocations" to priesthood or religious life, marriage or the single state -- to love and serve Him with the whole of his or her heart, mind, soul, and strength. Vatican II adopted this inclusive understanding of vocation because it is eminently conducive to the integration of faith and daily life. Christian morality goes beyond the concept of laws imposed by God to an approach that promotes the good to be found in this world without going to the extreme of secular humanism which offers redemption without the cross. Insofar as Christians who try to fulfill their personal vocations are cooperating with Jesus, they are not left to their own resources. They are bolstered by God's grace. Hence, this volume deals with faith, hope, charity, justice, mercy and the other virtues, using them to illuminate and unify many specific norms of Christian morality. Volume Three, Difficult Moral Questions addresses 200 plus matters confronting the world today that have no easy answers.

Dr. Germain Grisez, Ph.D., is the Harry J. Flynn Professor of Christian Ethics (1978- ) at Mount Saint Mary's College, Emmitsburg, Maryland. He received his B.A. at John Carroll University; his M.A. and Ph.L from the Dominican College of St. Thomas Aquinas; and his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Along with philosopher John Finnis, who teaches at Oxford and Notre Dame, Grisez launched a new, theoretically sophisticated version of natural law theory, sometimes referred to as the "New Natural Law Theory".

Reviews

Here is an unimpeachably orthodox source, Germain Grisez's The Way of the Lord Jesus, vol. 2: Living a Christian Life, p. 237: "It is always direct scandal to encourage anyone to do any moral evil, however slight, so as to avoid any non moral evil, however great. Moreover, to intend that a lesser sin be committed so that a greater sin will not be committed is to intend the lesser sin, and so give scandal. Therefore, counseling someone to do a lesser evil can be permissible only if the counselor, rather than leading the wrongdoer to choose an evil he or she has not yet willed to do, only tries to persuade the wrongdoer to bring about less harm than he or she has willed to bring about. The counseling must bear on the wongdoer's outward performance with the intention of mitigating its harmful effects; and the advice -- to do something less harmful -- must be given in such a way that the counselor need not intend, but only accept, the wrongdoer's additional immoral choice to do the lesser rather than the greater evil. For example, a woman whose drunken, brutal husband often beats their son with a leather belt might dissuade him from using a baseball bat by saying: 'Don't hit the boy with that bat! Beating him with your belt as you usually do is bad enough.' A legislator may propose amendments to mitigate the injustice of a bad law which a legislature is about to approve. When Reuben's brothers were about to kill Joseph, he rightly advised them instead to cast him into a pit, from which Reuben hoped to rescue him (See Gn 37:20-22)." In the footnote for that passage, Grisez has a citation from St. Alpohonsus Liguori's Theologia moralis, so that's a pretty authoritative source. --From Matthew Shadle literatecatholicsunite@yahoo.com

"Living a Christian Life is, like its predecessor volume, exhaustive and encyclopedic. The contents range from faith and reverence for God (chapter one) through patriotism, politics and citizenship (chapter 11). Like its predecessor, too, it seems destined to have an impact even on those who disagree with it in whole or part. Dissenting theologians generally avoid engaging Grisez's ideas, and the dissenting community as a whole has tried to deal with him politically by ignoring him, but anyone seriously doing moral theology today must take him into account. At the halfway mark of his summa of moral theology, that looks likely to remain true far into the future." --Russell Shaw in Catholic Insight, March 3, 1993

"Living a Christian LIfe, the second volume of Germain Grisez's masterwork The Way of the Lord Jesus, is a brilliant response to the Council's call to renew moral theology. Here Grisez carefully explains and defends the Church's moral teachings, including her most controversial norms, in a way that is entirely free from legalism and voluntarism or much pre-conciliar work in moral and pastoral theology.... His work represents the most important advance in the field of moral theory at least since the Christian humanist movement and scholastic revival of the sixteenth century.... The insights, explanations, and arguments of Living a Christian Life, I predict, will provide those called upon to follow the way of the Lord Jesus, as well as those entrusted with teaching Christ's Gospel into the next millennium, with resources far too valuable to ignore." --Robert P. George, Department of Politics at Princeton University in Lay Witness, Vol. 15, No. 2, October1993

"Grisez's new volume is a major contribution to his new synthesis of Catholic moral theology. It deserves the widest possible audience." --James G. Hanink, Professor of Philosophy at LOyola Marymount University, Los Angeles in Our Sunday Visitor, Vol. 82, No. 30, November 21, 1993

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Living a Christian Life: Volume 2 The Way of the Lord Jesus Author: Germain Grisez, Ph.D. ISBN:0-8189-1269-3 Hardbound: xxiv + 950 pp. Price: $35.00 + shipping To order call: 1 800-343-ALBA (2522) Please have your American Express, Master or Visa Card ready. To order online click here. To order the 3-volume set online click here.		This second volume in Germain Grisez'a monumental study treats the specific moral responsibilities common to all or most lay people as well as those common to clerics and religious. Like Volume One, Christian Moral Principles, the chapters in this work are divided into questions and answers based upon the conviction that the whole of the unique life to which God calls each Christian is his or her personal vocation. Each vocation embraces the whole of one's life, not merely part of it, for God calls each believer -- a calling not limited to the specific "vocations" to priesthood or religious life, marriage or the single state -- to love and serve Him with the whole of his or her heart, mind, soul, and strength. Vatican II adopted this inclusive understanding of vocation because it is eminently conducive to the integration of faith and daily life. Christian morality goes beyond the concept of laws imposed by God to an approach that promotes the good to be found in this world without going to the extreme of secular humanism which offers redemption without the cross. Insofar as Christians who try to fulfill their personal vocations are cooperating with Jesus, they are not left to their own resources. They are bolstered by God's grace. Hence, this volume deals with faith, hope, charity, justice, mercy and the other virtues, using them to illuminate and unify many specific norms of Christian morality. Volume Three, Difficult Moral Questions addresses 200 plus matters confronting the world today that have no easy answers.