Happiness, Friendship and Christian Ethics

As I mentioned in my previous post,

Happiness and the Christian Moral Life: An Introduction to Christian Life by Paul Wadell, a Roman Catholic, is not your typical intro to textbook to ethics.  As recently as last year, Trinity Evangelical seminary was offering Ethics for a Brave New World in their intro ethics course.  While I don't expect Wadell's book to be used at Trinity, its a great book to look at here, for he engages the role of friendship in the Christian life.
In Feinberg's book, you have the intro chapter of "Moral Decision-making and the Christian."  Then you have the rest of the chapters surveying thorny ethical issues for the Christian (like Euthanasia, sexual morality, capital punishment, etc.). 

Wadell's book begins with, "Finding a Path for Life" and then proceeds to "Not Going it Alone."  His next chapter is "Facing Shipwreck and Bandits."  Chapter 4 is "Every Person's Truth: Made in the Image of God, Called to do the Work of God."  Chapter 5 is "Freedom."  Chapter 6 is "False Steps on the Path to Happiness."  The seventh chapter is "Finding a Story Worth Handing On."  Chapter 8 is "Doing What the Good Requires."  Chapter 9 is "The Gift That Makes All Gifts Possible: Learning the Language of Love."  And the last chapter, "Reimaging the World: Why the Happiness of One Demands Justice for All."

Not Going It Alone

I loved this chapter--the interconnection between friendship and ethics.

Turning to Aristotle and then to Aquinas, Wadell writes a contemporary application of Aquinas, suggesting that friendship is central to our moral life.  "Our most exquisite happiness, Aquinas insisted, comes from all of us together seeking and enjoying a life of intimate friendship with God.  Human beings are created for communion, we are fashioned for intimacy" writes Wadell.  "Aquinas realized the deepest truth of our being is that collectively we are made for intimacy and communion with God, and nothing less will content us.  Friendship and community are a central element to the Christian moral life not just because we need and depend on one another, but more strikingly because our happiness, and therefore our goodness, pivots on all of us living in and from friendship with God."

He quotes contemporary author and theologian Gregory Jones, "The supremely happy person is the good person and in order to be both good and happy one needs and desires the presence of friends."

He then suggests four ways in which friends contribute to one another's moral development:

1. Every real friendship draws us out of ourselves.

2. Through friends we come to know ourselves better.

3.  Friends help us stay focused and committed on what is best and most promising.

4.  The best and most endearing friendships provide the very form of life necessary for growing in goodness and acquiring happiness.

In my next post on this thread, I will elaborate on these.