Analytic Moral Theology as Christ-Shaped Philosophy

This paper contributes to the “Christ-Shaped Philosophy” web project by claiming that analytic moral theology is an important form of Christ-shaped moral philosophy. For the analytic moral theologian takes Christ to be the starting point for moral reflection, given that He is our moral and intellectual exemplar. Christ is also the end of such moral reflection, insofar as the proper aims of analytic moral theology include both the imitation of and union with Christ Himself.

This type of Christ-shaped moral philosophy begins with inquiry into the character of Jesus Christ and properly ends with the application of the results of that inquiry to the personal and social lives of those who seek to follow the “outcast Galilean.”

The paper concludes with a call for Christian moral philosophers and analytic moral theologians to imitate the pattern in philosophy of religion by producing scholarship of the highest quality and then translating that scholarship into more popular forms in service to the church and the world.

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