Theological Ethics Paper Essay Examples

It can surely be said that the extract from the Bible called “The Sermon on the Mount” plays the role of ethical foundation for every Catholic Christian. This extract tells the story of how Jesus “went up on a mountainside and sat down” (Matthew 5:2), and after gathering His disciples around Him, He started to introduce the rules that Christians had to follow in order to enter Heaven after their death. Although some people might find these rules too strict (for example, Christianity doesn’t allow a divorce), they can greatly increase the quality of human relationships once they are applied to them. In the modern world, it becomes more and more difficult for us to build a strong relationship, whether it is friendship, partnership or love to our parents, because there are so many things that we disagree on. Differences in political views, backgrounds, and even the smallest things like sport preferences get in the way of connecting with other people. The question is: how to live a proper life in order not to harm anyone? How to preserve closeness and intimacy with our loved ones? And how do we apply theological ethics to our every day life? This paper answers these important question by concentrating on the Beatitudes and sharing personal experience. It is important for each of us to acquire these skills and it doesn’t matter what religious background we belong to.
Metz says that the poverty of spirit is the basis of every theological virtue. What is the poverty of spirit, and why is it so important? If we come back to the story of Jesus from the Bible, we can easily remember that He didn’t own anything physical. He refused from the material goods in order to clear His soul for something more valuable. The Bible says that the material cannot be taken to Heaven, and thus, shouldn’t be invested in. What one takes to Heaven is his or her experience and all those good things that he or she has done for others. That is what will truly be valuable for the Lord when He will be judging Christians. The belief that owning things only spoils people is not only relevant in Christianity. If we remember other religious like Islam, we can see that prophet Muhammad didn’t want to be buried in a rich coffin that could later become a place of worship. He didn’t want to be worshipped like God. In Buddhism, the tradition of refusing from worldly pleasures is even stronger: Buddha was a prince, but left his palace in order to find peace. In the list of harmful goods there were also tasty food, comfortable clothes and shelter. Monks believe that when a person feels comfortable, he distances himself from God. In the comfort, not many people are willing to concentrate on a higher realm. They have other things to think about, and those are usually the material things. Of course, it is hard to live without enjoying travelling, eating and drinking. However, that is the reason why the rich are usually considered to be so sinful in Christianity. Poverty of spirit is one of the key concepts that Jesus introduces. Once we learn to let all of the material things go, we will discover God within ourselves.
Let us now have a closer look at The Sermon on the Mount in order to understand why it is so important for every Christian. That day, Jesus gave all of the most important rules to His disciples. He gave them instructions of how to live a proper life and enter Heaven upon their death. The Beatitudes are little lines where Jesus explains whom He considers to be blessed. Poverty of spirit that I have discussed in the first paragraph is the first line of the Beatitudes. Jesus blesses those who are poor in spirit, because their treasures are not material, and thus, can be taken with them to Heaven. In the next line, Jesus blesses those who are in mourn, because God will take care of them and bring them comfort. I would like to stop here for a while and expand on this line. Later on in the passage, Jesus says: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7,8). This line is one of my favorite in the whole Bible, and it is very related to the second Beatitude. Jesus encourages people pray, mourn, cry and ask God for things that they need. Or, better to say, He wants people to just ask God for help. Sometimes things that we think are right for us are actually not. Sometimes we pray and we ask for one certain thing, and if God doesn’t give it to us, we blame Him for ignoring our prayers. This is a very wrong understanding of faith. One of my relatives, a 67-year-old woman, divorced five years ago. She didn’t care about her marriage properly when she had it, and she viewed her husband as a source of income. When she lost him, she suddenly realized that she needed him (of course, I don’t know if her regret was sincere or if it was connected with the material part again.) She identifies as a Christian with a strong faith; she goes to the church every Sunday and asks God to return her husband back. She thinks that if he comes back, her life would be comfortable and perfect again. But what if the man returned and started arguing with her every day because he no longer loves her? What if God separated them in order for her to find someone who will truly love her? I am not the one to judge her, however, if I were her, I would ask God to help me be happy again. And God will find the right way of doing so Himself. It is important how we articulate our prayers. He perfectly knows what is right for us and when, and so when we ask a certain thing that we don’t receive, the fault shouldn’t be put on God. Our faith shouldn’t decrease as a result. On the contrary, what Jesus is saying is that we should trust God fully and stop questioning His actions. If we truly believe in Him, we should live without hurting anyone and ask sincerely for happiness. The problem of many modern people (including my relative) is that they are so tied to the material that they expect an take-give relationship with God. In other words, if God exists, He should make our wishes come true right after we prayed or helped the needy. I will even dare to call this approach corrupt, because people are helping others not because they feel sorry for them, but because they want to be granted with God’s attention. One should always give without thinking of the consequences. We should give to the poor only because it eases our hearts and makes us feel light. And so, we should ask God for help and let Him decide what kind of help is going to be the best for us, because we often have no idea of what we are asking for.
Another important line from the Beatitudes is the one about mercy. Jesus blesses those who forgive the sins of other people, because they themselves are going to receive the forgiveness of God. We usually tend to underestimate the power of forgiving. For a long time, I couldn’t forgive my parents for some of the things that we disagreed on when I was a teenager. I couldn’t understand why they were treating me a certain way when I was a completely different person. They had their own cliché understanding of me (that I was, for example, irresponsible and too easy-minded) and refused to see my efforts of trying to prove the opposite. Lack of forgiveness creates an uncomfortable atmosphere; negative thoughts build up on one another, and at some point, I found myself thinking that every word of my parents had a double meaning. When we cannot forgive, we become suspicious and lose trust to our closest relatives. Forgiveness is truly beautiful; it creates a feeling of freedom, like if one was carrying a mountain on his shoulders, and it fell. Forgiving can be difficult, especially if those people have hurt us, willingly or accidentally. When two people decide to end a relationship, there is usually a lot of anger and bitterness. These negative feelings are nothing but a result of lack of forgiveness. If a person starts hating on someone he or she someday loved, it means that he is not able to accept the decision of his partner and let go. There was one time in my life when I had to end a relationship with my partner, and that person became very, very angry. The person started to scream at me, and cry, and then tried to persuade me that the relationship could still work. A year later, the person is still having a hard time building a new relationship because of lack of forgiveness. Once we let our loved ones go, we open our hearts for the new beautiful feelings that God is ready to send us. Of course, it is very easy to say and hard to do, because we get attached to people, plan our future with them, and it feels like the world collapses when those people disappear. However, there are ways to learn to accept. Christians go to church and pray for God’s help; people that are not very religious try to find help within themselves. They talk to themselves and try to explain themselves that life doesn’t end with a break up or a divorce. But these horrible experience can actually lead to a better life.
That is probably why Jesus’ take on divorce is the only thing I disagree with. Sometimes, people make mistakes and choose people without thinking properly. When we are young, the idea of marriage seems to be “cool”, and everyone wants to try it out. Girls often get married because of the pressure from the society and relatives. I understand, however, that Jesus encourages people to work on the relationship rather than quit it, but in the modern world, things can get more complicated. There are many arranged marriages that make women especially unhappy. That is why, in my opinion, going through a tough divorce or a break up can play the role of being reborn. Many people later find out that their self esteem increased and their circle of friends expanded. Many people come to church in order to make their minds quite, and church becomes a part of their lives from then and on.
Let us now look at other rules that Jesus teaches people. Probably the most important thing that people learn from Him that day is the main prayer. The reading of “Our Father” during a daily mass is a special moment for every Christian. The prayer is so short, but it covers so many important things! In fact, it is not just a message from people to God. It also helps to get us close together and realize the presence of each other. In the end of the prayer, people usually look at each other and grant each other with a sign of peace. That is exactly what Jesus wanted us to do; He wanted us to not just to care for ourselves, but to look around and start paying attention to our neighbors and even strangers that surround us at a certain moment. It is extremely hard for us to notice each other in the modern world, where everyone is in a hurry to complete their daily routine. We often forget that there are people around us that need our attention, sympathy, and help. Church doesn’t only teach us to believe in God, but it teaches us to build friendships and partnerships. A lot of friendships are made among the church volunteers, because those people are united with one task. And that task is usually to help others.
Another important thing that I would like to discuss is judging others. Jesus prohibits us to judge others, because only God is able to do it as He can clearly see the actions of each of us. We, however, are very often biased and are not able to understand why certain people do certain things. Many of them have reasons that we are not able to understand. Jesus teaches us to keep an eye on ourselves rather than trying to control others. He says that in order to see clearly, we must clean our eyes first and then care about cleaning our brother’s eyes. Things that we consider to be wrong are not always so. Truly, there are always two sides of the coin. If every person looks at himself and takes responsibility for his actions, God will take care about the rest. I think that being judgmental is our big problem. Nowadays, we judge people based on their gender, religious identity and social class. As a result, we tend to ignore things that are really important. In past, many artists didn’t get any credit for their works just because the society judged them based on their sexual identity, for example. Sadly, we lost a lot of significant artworks because our world is so judgmental.
So, what should we do in order to live a moral life? Is there a universe advice that would works also for those who are non-Christians or don’t believe in any God? The question of good and bad is very tricky, because there are no fully good and fully bad people. Each of us is a mixture of a variety of character traits. However, some things are universal. And those things can be found in a short extract from the Bible called “The Sermon on the Mount”. In this passage, Jesus gathered His disciples around Him and gave them the instructions of the proper life. He promised that if they follow all these rules, they will be saved and welcomed to Heaven by God. In this paper, we have figured out that very often it is hard to follow Jesus’ guidelines: not all of us is able to forgive and let go; not all of us notice other people and not all of us is able to be detached from the material things. Even if some of the people don’t identify as Christians, there are some things that they can learn from. “The Sermon on the Mount” can be read by anyone who is trying to find a way to live properly. The Beatitudes, which is a part of the extract, also points out at the character traits that Jesus respect in people. And we have to keep those in mind not because we believe in God or not, but because they help us create a healthy relationship with other people.