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1 in Faith: A Christian Bible Study |
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Notes: Chapter 5 - Christian Consensus 1 Jürgen Moltmann, On Human Dignity: Political Theology and Ethics, trans. M. Douglas Meeks (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 7.2 As Muslim Ali A. Mazrui observes, "The cross was a statement on human rights." Mazrui, "Human Rights and World Culture," in Philosophical Foundations of Human Rights (Paris: UNESCO, 1986), 247.3 Wilfred Cantwell Smith, "Philosophia, as One of the Religious Traditions of Humankind: The Greek Legacy in Western Civilization, Viewed by a Comparativist," in Différences, Valuers, Hierarchie: Textes Offerts á Louis Dumont et Réunis par Jean-Claude Galey (Paris: École des Sautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 1984), 269.4 Christopher F. Mooney, S.J., Public Virtue: Law and the Social Character of Religion (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1986), 145.5 C. S. Lewis, "The Poison of Subjectivism," in Christian Reflections, ed. Walter Hooper (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1967), 79.6 Carl F. H. Henry, "Religious Freedom: Cornerstone of Human Rights," Quarterly of the Christian Legal Society 5, no. 3 (1984):7.7 Helmut Frenz, "Human Rights: A Christian Viewpoint," Christianity and Crisis 36, no. 11 (21 June 1976):149.8 Jürgen Moltmann, On Human Dignity, 17.9 Jacques Ellul, The Theological Foundation of Law, trans. Marguerite Wieser (London: SCM Press, 1960), 49.10 "The Meaning of Human Rights and the Problems They Pose," The Ecumenical Review 27 (April 1975):143.11 Helmut Frenz, "Human Rights: A Christian Viewpoint," Christianity and Crisis 36, no. 11 (21 June 1976):149.12 James M. Childs, Jr., "The Church and Human Rights: Reflections on Morality and Mission," Currents in Theology and Mission 7 (February 1980):15.13 In Soundings 67, no. 2 (Summer 1984):209-39.14 "Introduction," Human Rights: A Challenge to Theology (Rome: CCIA and IDOC International, 1983), 10-11.15 Ibid. Trutz Rendtorff describes the role of the Christian tradition in "the development of human rights in the modern age" in "Christian Concepts of the Responsible Self," in Human Rights in the World's Religions, ed. Leroy S. Rouner (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988), 33-45.16 Jacques Ellul, The Theological Foundation of Law, 42; John Warwick Montgomery, "A Revelational Solution," Human Rights and Human Dignity (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1986), 131-60; Jürgen Moltmann, On Human Dignity, 13; Theological Perspectives on Human Rights (Geneva: Lutheran World Federation, 1977), 14.17 Richard McCormick, S.J., quoted in Robert A. Evans, "From Reflection to Action," in Human Rights: A Dialogue Between the First and Third Worlds (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1983), 245.18 Jean Giblet, "Human Rights and the Dignity of Man," Convergence, no. 2 (1979):2.19 Human Rights and the Salvation Army, 5.20 Quoted from Citizen and Churchman (Eyre and Spottiswoode), 2. In Francis A. Evans, "Human Rights and Divine Grace," in Human Rights and the Salvation Army (London: The Campfield Press, 1968), 9.21 Francis A. Evans, "Human Rights and Divine Grace," in Human Rights and the Salvation Army, 9.22 Pablo Martínez, "The Right To Be Human," Evangelical Review of Theology 10, no. 3 (July 1986):271-72.23 Ibid., 272.24 Max L. Stackhouse, "Public Theology, Human Rights and Missions," in Human Rights and the Global Mission of the Church (Cambridge, Mass.: Boston Theological Institute, 1985), 13.25 J. Robert Nelson, "Human Rights in Creation and Redemption: A Protestant View," in Human Rights in Religious Traditions, ed. Arlene Swidler (New York: The Pilgrim Press, 1982), 1.26 David Hollenbach, Claims in Conflict: Retrieving and Renewing the Catholic Human Rights Tradition, 131-33.27 Robert Bellah, "Faith Communities Challenge—and Are Challenged by—the Changing World Order," in World Faiths and the New World Order: A Muslim-Jewish-Christian Search Begins, ed. Joseph Gremillion and William Ryan (Washington, D.C.: Interreligious Peace Colloquium, 1978), 166.28 Richard John Neuhaus, "What We Mean by Human Rights, and Why," Christian Century 95 (6 December 1978):1180.29 Dietrich Bonhoeffer argues that duties come from rights, as the gift of God creates a natural right for all creatures: "To idealistic thinkers it may seem out of place for a Christian ethic to speak first of rights and only later of duties. But our authority is not Kant; it is the Holy Scripture, and it is precisely for that reason that we must speak first of the rights of natural life, in other words of what is given to life, and only later of what is demanded of life. God gives before He demands. And indeed in the rights of natural life it is not to the creature that honor is given, but to the creator. It is the abundance of His gifts that is acknowledged. There is no right before God, but the natural, purely as what is given, becomes the right in relation to man. The rights of natural life are in the midst of the fallen world the reflected splendor of the glory of God's creation. They are not primarily something that man can sue for in his own interest, but they are something which is guaranteed by God Himself. The duties, on the other hand, derive from the rights themselves, as tasks are implied by gifts. They are implicit in the rights. Within the framework of the natural life, therefore, we in every case speak first of the rights and then of the duties, for by so doing, in the natural life too, we are allowing the gospel to have its way." Bonhoeffer, Ethics, ed. Eberhard Bethge, trans. N. H. Smith (SCM Press, 1971), 127. Quoted in Andrew Linzey, Christianity and the Rights of Animals (New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1987), 70.30 See Lisa Sowle Cahill, "Towards a Christian Theory of Human Rights," The Journal of Religious Ethics 8, no. 1 (Fall 1980):285.31 Erich Weingärtner, Human Rights on the Ecumenical Agenda: Report and Assessment (Geneva: CCIA, World Council of Churches, 1983), 11. Warren Holleman develops the arguments between Christian idealists and realists, as exemplified by the thought of Jacques Maritain and Reinhold Neibuhr. This is basically the old controversy over the extent to which sin has impaired human nature. See Holleman, The Human Rights Movement: Western Values and Theological Perspectives (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1987), chapters 6 and 7. Despite this continuing theological debate, there is substantial agreement on human rights, as I have shown.32 Quoted in David Hollenbach, "Both Bread and Freedom: The Interconnection of Economic and Political Rights in Recent Catholic Thought," in Human Rights and the Global Mission of the Church, 31. See Speeches of John Paul II, 1980, 74. However, the religious organizations which support economic, social, and cultural rights do very little to realize them. See Lowell W. Livezey, "US Religious Organizations and the International Human Rights Movement," Human Rights Quarterly 11, no. 1 (February 1989):81.33 John Warwick Montgomery, Human Rights and Human Dignity, 169-75.34 Bernard Quelquejeu concludes that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights "is not, and would not claim to be, the establishment of a genuinely universal morality, but it is an irreplaceable formulation, of course open to improvement, of the general criteria which must be satisfied at present by the moral systems in force, in their geographical, national, ethnic and other diversity and according to their economic, juridical, social, civic, political and cultural solidity, if they are not to be destructive of the human dignity which it is their vocation to protect and promote." Quelquejeu, "Diversity in Historical Moral Systems and a Criterion for Universality in Moral Judgment," trans. Francis McDonagh, in Christian Ethics: Uniformity, Universality, Pluralism, ed. Jacques Pohier and Dietmar Mieth, English ed. Marcus Lefébure (New York: The Seabury Press, 1981), 52.35 David Hollenbach sees the consensus achieved at the UN on human rights to be very similar to the global consensus achieved at Vatican II. Hollenbach, Justice, Peace, and Human Rights (New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1988), 91.36 Jürgen Moltmann, On Human Dignity, 30; Max L. Stackhouse, "Theology, History, and Human Rights," Soundings 67, no. 2 (Summer 1984):195.37 Walter Harrelson, The Ten Commandments and Human Rights (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1980), 192-93.38 Stanley Harakas, "Human Rights: An Eastern Orthodox Perspective," in Human Rights in Religious Traditions, 24.39 Carl F. H. Henry, "Religious Freedom: Cornerstone of Human Rights," Christian Legal Society Quarterly 5, no. 3 (1984):7.40 However, the National Association of Evangelicals does not endorse the Universal Declaration or the international human rights covenants developed to realize it. Lowell W. Livezey, "US Religious Organizations and the International Human Rights Movement," Human Rights Quarterly 11, no. 1 (February 1989):34.41 Helmut Frenz, "Human Rights: A Christian Viewpoint," Christianity and Crisis 36, no. 11 (November-December 1978):146.42 Erich Weingärtner, Human Rights on the Ecumenical Agenda, 10.43 "Melbourne Conference Section Reports," International Review of Mission 69, nos. 276-77 (October 1980-January 1981):401.44 Richard John Neuhaus, "What We Mean by Human Rights, and Why," Christian Century 95 (6 December 1978):1177.45 See Edward Norman, Christianity and the World Order (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979).46 Jacques Ellul, The Theological Foundation of Law, 137. See Erich Weingärtner, Human Rights on the Ecumenical Agenda, 63.47 John Warwick Montgomery, Human Rights and Human Dignity, 206. |
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