THE ETHICS OF SELF & OTHER

SELF
I think …
I believe ….

OTHER
Christians believe …
The Church teaches …
According to Scripture …
In the Catechism we find …

During class discussion, one student said,
"Religion is how to live with other people."

I reconsidered her definition of religion in the following way:
How to love God / how to love others;
i.e.
· Love the LORD God

with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, all your strength;

· Love others as yourself.

The human being is most immature in infancy
– aware only of self and not any other.
An immature experience of pleasure or pain
is wholly associated with oneself.

However,
others define self.
As one matures,
one becomes aware of otherness
through interactive experience.
This social interaction with another
begins to form one’s conception of oneself.

Society is formed by many others
living in groups with one another.
God is the ultimate Other
of whom those in society may or may not be aware.
In Christian ethics,
awareness of the presence of God
is a constant consideration in all social interaction
no matter whether or not the one with whom a Christian interacts
claims to be agnostic or atheistic.

Any human ethic must consider the other.
Indeed, ethics is the way one deals with another.
It is oxymoronic to speak of "self-centered ethics."
In Christian ethics, consideration of others is paramount.