Political and Social Ethics

Sexuality has been a major theme of debate in the Christian Church in general and the Anglican Communion in particular. Homosexuality has been made the dominant shibboleth issue to divide one side from another in the widely anticipated schism in Anglicanism. It was the concern of the Windsor Report (2005).

Other ethical issues continue to be important. MCU made this submission on euthanasia to the the House of Lords Select Committee on the Terminally Ill Bill (2005). A short summary is here.

Jonathan Clatworthy addresses here some of the issues raised in the Mental Incapacity Bill.

Other issues include gambling and religious education.

A review of Being Human: A Christian Understanding of Personhood illustrated with reference to power, money, sex and time, The Doctrine Commission of the General Synod of the Church of England, London: Church House Publishing, 2003 is here.

Books on social ethics may be found though the bookshop.

The reading list for the 2007 MCU Conference Violence: a Stubborn Pandemic is here.

The reading list for the 2003 MCU Conference Being Urban, being global: contextual theology in the space of flows is here.

John Plant, MCU Chair

Let there always be quiet, dark churches in which people can take refuge ... Houses of God filled with His silent presence. There, even when they do not know how to pray, at least they can be still and breathe easily.

Thomas Merton

New Seeds of Contemplation (1961)