When you hear the word truth, what do you
think? Who/what represents truth in your life?
When you hear the word goodness, who/what
comes to mind for you?
When you hear the word beauty, who/what do
you think about?
We seek truth,
goodness and beauty.
Human beings yearn for
happiness.
The moral life is the human experience of
goodness, beauty and truth. We desire and seek
what we believe to be good, beautiful and true
because possessing these “goods” lead to
happiness.
Moral Obligation
Human beings “want to” and “have to” possess
goodness and beauty and truth. This feeling of
“should” or “ought” in life is the experience of
moral obligation.
Moral obligation is our human propensity to be
attracted to the good, the true and the
beautiful.
How do you feel when you “miss the mark” or
choose poorly in life?
In other words, what feelings do you have when
you make a mistake?
When we ignore the “should” or “ought” in life,
we experience feelings of evasion or regret.
When we fail to seek or possess goodness, truth
and beauty we fail in our moral obligation and
feel that something is missing. We are unhappy.
The moral life is predicated upon human
freedom and human choice. As human beings
we are free to choose which goods to pursue,
which beauties to embrace and which truths to
believe. As finite creatures in time and space we
must choose from an array of “goods.” We
cannot pursue every good, or experience every
beauty, or know every truth.
We can be mistaken in our moral choices:
something we thought was good ends up harming
us (and others); something we saw as beautiful ends
up being an illusion; something we believed to be
true is really a lie. As a result, we feel betrayed,
unfulfilled, disillusioned and unhappy.
Genuine good, inspiring beauty and authentic
truth must be rightly ordered. Right order
means choosing the right “goods” in the right
way, at the right time, for the right purpose, in
right relationship with all the goods of life.
The moral life depends on rightly ordering
goods according to one’s situation in life
(opportunities and responsibilities) and
one’s relationships with others. Leading a
balanced life is not the same as leading a
moral life; a moral life is a rightly ordered
life.
The key to the moral life is freedom. To be
truly free to live a righteous life we must
cultivate our moral character so that we are
disposed by habit to choose rightly in any
given situation. We must be free from
disordered affections which cloud our
perception of goodness, beauty and truth.
We must have moral character,
which means we must become
persons of virtue, people who
have developed excellent
human qualities and good habits
of action and reflection which
lead to happiness.
Catholic Christianity
In the Catholic Christian tradition the study of
ethics is called moral theology.
Catholic moral theologians, Catholic
scholars who study and teach ethics, teach
how Christians and all men and women
ought to live in response to God’s creative
and saving love for us as revealed in the
life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Truth, Goodness, and Beauty
Peter Kreeft , Phd., a philosophy
professor at Boston College, says that
“God is infinite truth, infinite
goodness, and infinite beauty. And
God created man in his image
(Genesis 1:27). That is why man
naturally seeks truth, goodness, and
beauty. ”
The source of Jesuit education is Ignatian
spirituality as exemplified in the Spiritual
Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola. The “First
Principle and Foundation” of Ignatius’
Spiritual Exercises is the belief that human
beings are made to praise, reverence and
serve God.
St. Ignatius Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises guides
persons in the practice of spiritual discernment.
The goal of Ignatian spiritual discernment is
freedom to choose to live and act in loving
service of others for the common good of all and
the greater glory of God.
Ignatian spirituality and Jesuit
education are rooted in the belief
that the morally good life is a life of
love and service of God and others
in the manner of Jesus Christ.
In other words, when we seek happiness and
use our freedom to appropriately choose the
goods of truth, goodness and beauty, we are
leading a virtuous life, a Christian life of love and
service to God and others.
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Primary sources consulted:
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Translated and edited by Roger Crisp. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge
University Press, 2000.
St. Augustine. Confessions. Translated with an introduction by R.S. Pine-Coffin. New York, NY: Penguin Books,
1961.
Catechism of the Catholic Church. 2d ed. Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic Conference, 1997.
Gula, Richard M. Reason Informed by Faith: Foundations of Catholic Morality. New York, NY: Paulist Press, 1989.
Gustafson, James M. Christ and the Moral Life. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1968.
Hamel, Ronald P. and Kenneth R. Himes, eds. Introduction to Christian Ethics: A Reader. New York, NY: Paulist
Press, 1989.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. A Short History of Ethics. New York, NY: Collier Books, 1966.
Mahoney, John. The Making of Moral Theology: A Study of the Roman Catholic Tradition. New York, NY:
Clarendon Press, 1987.
National Directory for Catechesis. Washington, D.C.: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2005.
Pope John Paul II. The Splendor of Truth / Veritatis Splendor [1993]. Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic
Conference, Office for Publishing and Promotion Services, Publication No. 679-4, n.d.
The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius. Translated with commentary by George E. Ganss. St. Louis, MO: Institute
of Jesuit Resources, 1992.
Spohn, William C. Go and Do Likewise: Jesus and Ethics. New York, NY: Continuum, 1999.
page 162
Kreeft, Peter Catholic Ignatius Press Christianity: A Complete Catechism of Catholic Church Beliefs Based on the
Catechism of the Catholic Church 2001