Is Conscience Best Understood as a Particular Form of Consciousness? Theological and Ethical Reflections Inspired by the Phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Since its emergence after the Council of Trent, moral theology as a discipline has had an intimate but problematical relationship with philosophy. It is not rare, even today, to hear or read moral theologians expounding their views with no explicit acknowledgement of the importance of the philosophi...

Description complète

Enregistré dans:  
Détails bibliographiques
Auteur principal: McKeever, Martin 1958- (Auteur)
Type de support: Électronique Article
Langue:Anglais
Vérifier la disponibilité: HBZ Gateway
Journals Online & Print:
En cours de chargement...
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Publié: MDPI 2023
Dans: Religions
Année: 2023, Volume: 14, Numéro: 1
Sujets non-standardisés:B Phenomenology
B Ethics
B Consciousness
B fundamental moral theology
B Conscience
B Merleau-Ponty
Accès en ligne: Volltext (kostenfrei)
Volltext (kostenfrei)
Description
Résumé:Since its emergence after the Council of Trent, moral theology as a discipline has had an intimate but problematical relationship with philosophy. It is not rare, even today, to hear or read moral theologians expounding their views with no explicit acknowledgement of the importance of the philosophical terms and theories they use in the formulation of their positions. All this would seem to be particularly the case with a term that has gradually become quite central to moral theological discourse: conscience. The purpose of this article is to suggest that phenomenology, as a relatively new and profoundly revolutionary branch of philosophy, has become an indispensable resource for moral theological reflection on conscience. In particular it will be argued that the thought of Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961) constitutes a profound -unintentional- critique of traditional conceptions of conscience and simply cannot be ignored (as it normally is!) in contemporary discussions of this theme. What follows, then, divides into four sections: the first on a traditional vision of conscience, the second on consciousness in the thought of Merleau-Ponty; the third on conscience as a form of consciousness; and the fourth on the potential contribution of this line of thought to ethics and fundamental moral theology.
ISSN:2077-1444
Contient:Enthalten in: Religions
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.3390/rel14010010