Lesson 9- Discipleship Through

Discernment and Virtues

Introduction
This lesson reflects on discernment as
part of how one lives out Catholic
discipleship. Discernment is not just an act of
moral decision- making, but also a part of
how we become better disciples of Christ. It
is a life long journey of growing in virtue,
which is what the Christian discipleship and
commitment entails.
Learning Objectives
At the end of the session, the ReEd3
students are expected to:
 Understand discernment as part of the
development of the human person;
 Synthesize discernment and its sources
with virtue ethics; and
 Deepen the Catholic faith commitment
through discernment and virtues.
Exposition
 Discernment is more than just an act-based. It is a process
also of becoming a better person- a more virtuous person.
 Kenneth R. Melchin (1998), “Moral action is self-constituting: it
tends to reinforce the state of feelings, capacities, skills, and
anticipations expressed by the actions themselves.” This self-
constituting thrust can lead decisively to growth.
 Developing and cultivating our virtues thus help us be more
consistently ethical, hopefully helping us "miss the mark'' less
often.
 This consistent loving and ethical behavior is what discipleship
entails. Discipleship is often understood as following Jesus
Christ (Matthew 16:24-26, Luke 9:23).
Exposition
Our daily lives are filled with many decisions, ranging
from the extraordinary to the mundane.

For this lesson, we will discuss how discernment

can and should help us becoming better persons
throughout our entire life, helping us hone the
virtues and ''skills'' needed to continue to do the
good we ought to do in life. We will now turn to
virtue ethics, a moral philosophy that is concerned
with both doing the good and becoming a better
person.
Virtue Ethics

Most people know of consequentialism and deontological ethics as

two common ways of making decisions.
 Consequentialism is a form of decision making that
focuses on the consequences the decision maker is aiming
for as the ultimate criteria on choosing what action to
take. Deontological ethics, on the other hand, focuses
more on universal principles or rules as the criteria for
making decisions.
 Rather than just deontological ethics or consequentialism,
Catholic moral theology needs another form of moral
philosophy to engage Scripture and Tradition in
discernment.
What is Virtue Ethics?
Virtue ethics, as an ethical
framework, focuses on the
development of the person to make
such complex decisions,
complements and supports Catholic
Social Teaching as it “appropriates
the moral vision of the New
Testament well.”
Why choose virtue ethics to be the optic for
examining the story of Jesus?
 Firstof all, it is necessary to select one form of
ethics. It is impossible to give an account of
Christian moral life without opting for some form of
moral philosophy (Spohn, 2000).
 Spohn also argues that virtue ethics is able to
engage Scripture, helping people understand the
moral vision that Jesus wishes to impart through the
attention to Jesus' character and how the ''story of
Jesus shapes the moral character of individuals and
communities.”
Virtue ethics helps a person discern
through the development of virtues
and going beyond the tendency to
reduce complex ethical dilemmas down
to rules and consequences. It also
emphasizes that who we become is just
as important as making the right
decisions and articulating the moral
precepts which we as a society strive
to live by.
Activity #1 (One Paragraph Summary)

What has become

of you while
taking ReEd3 this
semester?
 The Virtues
There are many virtues that
virtue ethics espouses, which
can allow for
human flourishing, but this
lesson will focus on the four
proposed cardinal virtues of
James Keenan.
 There are
many virtues
that virtue
ethics takes up.

These virtues
can allow
human
flourishing.
Martha Nussbaum highlighted
the fact that virtues were used by
the Greeks as standards for
what is right or wrong.

 But, there’s a difficult question:

“What virtues make a person
morally good?”
 With that, James Keenan
noted that the difficulty
stems from 2 reasons:

 The claims of culture

 The claims of individual

The claims of culture:
 Culture can affect the determination of what
virtues are focused on in a community…. or
where they live.
 Also, it would be unfair to reduce the
embodiment of moral excellence to
simply one archetype, as history will
show, morally excellent people differed
from each other in many different ways
due to their backgrounds, experiences,
professions etc.
Due to these difficulties, Keenan focuses not
on the specific, culturally articulated virtues
of a morally excellent person, but rather the
basic qualities of a minimally virtuous
one- hence the focus on the cardinal
virtues.
 Keenan (1995) thus proposes justice, fidelity, self-care,
and prudence, as a new set of cardinal virtues that
ought to be developed in a person in order to help
him or her understand how to handle conflicting
goods

Justice Fidelity Self-Care Prudence

Justice asks people to treat each
other equally give what is due to
the other regardless of race, class,
and so on.
Is cheating
justifiable?
Keenan (1995), “Justice is about
ordering all our interior
dispositions so that the claim of
equality originates from within”
rather than from the external laws.
Justice acknowledges that even
if we may not know certain
people or communities, they still
have a claim on us and do have
certain inalienable rights
simply because they are also
fellow creatures of God.
Fidelity calls us to sustain the
special relationship we have with
our family, friends and loved ones.
Keenan uses the word fidelity
to describe the love we have for
our community.
While there is tension between
justice and fidelity, it is important
to acknowledge and develop the
relationships we have to specific
people alongside with the other
people who we may not be
acquainted with but are still
connected with us in the society.
Self-care also acknowledges that
the love and justice for the self is
also as important.
Today, people push themselves to the
extreme, valuing overwork, sacrifice
and busyness to the detriment of the
self. However, we are called to do
otherwise.
 We are supposed to rest when
needed, to take care and nourish
ourselves physically and
spiritually.
 Some Christian activists may balk
at self-care… but we have every
reason to believe that the historical
Jesus took care of himself.
These three virtues are not
hierarchical- one is not less of a
priority than the other; each
of the three have equally
competing claims, and are thus
integrated by prudence
(phronesis ), a practical wisdom
that takes into account all three
relational virtues in living
out a morally good life.
Prudence is always vigilant, looking
to the future not only trying to realize
the claims of justice, fidelity and
self-care but also calling us to
anticipate occasions when each of
these virtues can be more fully
acquired.
This moral wisdom of prudence
is not something that is acquired
overnight. It takes practice and
over time, a keen sense and
intuition for what is most needed
at the moment, not just for
oneself, but for society at large.
Prudence as a virtue is helped by other virtues. Three of these assistive
virtues worth mentioning are epikeia, eubolia, synesis, and gnome.
 Epikeia is the virtue that means ''reasonableness.‘’
 Eubolia is the principle that helps one apply
universal precepts to more concrete situations.
 Synesis is a principle that assists prudence in
identifying which concrete means is suitable for
the moral action, according to what is available
(Murphy, 2006)
 Gnome, on the other hand, is a special awareness or
intuition that inclines one to make good decisions
(Virt, 2013).
Conclusion
The course ends with virtue ethics as a way
of focusing one’s discernment- we do not
simply discern right actions from wrong
actions using a one-step iteration. Rather,
discernment is a life-long process, one that
does not just help us figure out individual
decisions, but also helps the person in
becoming a better person and helping the
person habituate good discernment
practice.
Activity # 2- Exit Log
Choose one virtue that
you like the most. Explain
how can this virtue help
you become an authentic
disciple of Christ.
Assessment

Content
Assimilation 9