God, Science, Sex, Gender: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Christian Ethics (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: God, Science, Sex, Gender: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Christian Ethics Margaret Robinson P.B. Jung and A.M. Vigen , eds. God, Science, Sex, Gender: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Christian Ethics. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2010. Pp. 296. Paper, US$30.00. ISBN 978-0-252-07724-1. The essays in this collection respond to recent social developments such as legally recognized same-sex marriage, passing of hate crime legislation, increasing visibility of inter-sex, transgendered, and transsexual people, and the ordination of out gays and lesbians. The aim of the book is to urge Christian ethicists to use interdisciplinary scholarship as a foundation for Christian ethics, and the essays themselves demonstrate its success. Several authors show their familiarity with the other writings in the collection and respond to them in their own work, creating a sense that the reader is witnessing a dialogue. God, Science, Sex, Gender contains fifteen essays, an introduction, and a conclusion, and is organized into three parts. The first section, “Establishing Base Points for [End Page 128] Dialogue,” sets science and religion in historical context with essays on power dynamics in the Catholic Church and the field of science. In “Medieval Attitudes toward Philosophia Naturalis in Relation to Scientia Moralis,” Francis J. Catania proposes the methodology of Albert Magnus and Thomas Aquinas as a model for present-day ethical dialogue. We could learn much, he argues, from their interdisciplinary investigation and from the tentative nature of their conclusions. He uses homosexuality as a test case and relates this approach to the essays in this same volume by Joan Roughgarden and Stephen J. Pope. The second section, “Reflecting on Human and Sexual Diversity,” brings in dialogue partners from science and the humanities. The biological chapters do a good job of framing current research on the animal kingdom and of establishing the relevance of such work for theology. While Joan Roughgarden points out that science’s search for truth is sometimes tainted by bias, and Aana Marie Vigen notes that the findings of science must be rigorously tested, for the most part the essays share an optimism about the benefits that would accrue to moral theology by better incorporating scientific knowledge. The star of the collection is Joan Roughgarden’s essay, “Evolutionary Biology and Sexual Diversity.” Roughgarden critiques Charles Darwin’s theory of sexual selection and notes the reluctance of scientists to question his hypothesis. Roughgarden offers a theory of social selection, which favours practices and social bonds that are not directly reproductive (such as homosexuality) but do enhance reproduction and survival. Her work breaks new ground in offering concrete moral deductions from the scientific data, and several writers respond to her work in their own essays. In Part 3, “Sexual Diversity and Christian Moral Theology,” the authors attempt to demonstrate how Christian ethicists might incorporate science into their work on specific moral issues. Stephen J. Pope’s article, “Social Selection and Sexual Diversity: Implications for Christian Ethics,” places Roughgarden’s social selection theory in dialogue with the sexual ethics of Pope John Paul II and Catholic feminist Margaret Farley. This article is significant in that Pope takes a step beyond dialogue, to propose concrete changes in Catholic theology and practice. This collection is at its best when it offers scientifically grounded arguments on specific moral issues, and Pope’s contribution is a good example. Patricia Beattie Jung and Joan Roughgarden’s “Gender in Heaven: The Story of the Ethiopian Eunuch In Light of Evolutionary Biology” is a solid piece of biblical exegesis done in light of historical critical research on eunuchs and current scientific research on intersex people. This article stands out as an example of how the theory behind this collection might function on concrete issues of sex and gender. In the Conclusion, “Descriptive and Normative Ways of Understanding Human Nature,” Vigen argues that Christian ethics must place greater value on human experience in its task of forming normative claims about sexuality and gender. Because we are an embodied creation, experience is not simply one theological resource among others, but is the lens through which we understand all other sources of knowledge. Individual scholars, Vigen argues, cannot wait for the use of...