Many evangelical Christians have faith in the Bible, but struggle with confidence in its ethical principles. Some believe that biblical morals are not as effective as secular ideologies in promoting human well-being and societal progress. Others feel that using the Bible as a basis for moral arguments lacks persuasive power in public discussions.
In Faithful Reason: Natural Law Ethics for God’s Glory and Our Good, Andrew T. Walker argues that developing a comprehensive Christian ethic is not simply a matter of appealing to biblical authority, but also of understanding the way that God has ordered creation and our place within it. In this work, he provides a comprehensive and accessible introduction to natural law ethics from an evangelical perspective.
In the first section of Faithful Reason, Walker develops a robust framework of natural law ethics, guided by biblical and theological evidence. In the second section, this framework is applied to various contemporary ethical issues within dignity ethics, embodied ethics, personal ethics, social ethics, and political ethics. Through a natural law framework, readers are empowered to reason through the particulars of any situation and develop a godly ethical response.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword by Carl Trueman
Introduction: His Glory, Our Good
Part 1
1. Confidence in Creation: Natural Law as Christian Catechesis and Cultural Renewal
2. Grace in the Garden: Worldview and Christian Natural Law Ethics
3. Toward a Christotelic Natural Law Theory: Defining the Natural Law and Natural Law Theory
4. Faith, Reason, and Moral Epistemology
5. Philosophical Foundations for the Natural Law, Part 1: Origins and Knowability
6. Philosophical Foundations for the Natural Law, Part 2: Content and Utility
7. The Biblical Case for Natural Law
8. The Theological Case for Natural Law
Part 2
9. Interlude: Thinking about Applied Natural Law Ethics
10. Life and the Natural Law
11. Relations and the Natural Law
12. Order and the Natural Law
Conclusion: Christian Mission in the Post-Rational Society
Appendix #1: Responding to Natural Law Objections
Appendix #2: Deploying the Natural Law in Public Apologetics
Name Index
Subject Index
Scripture Index