Editor’s Intro

[1] Haiti’s centuries-old struggles never seem to end. Recent reports of increasing gender-based violence and degradation stress again the urgency of Haiti’s problems.1 This, of course, was completely predictable. It’s not the first time men caught up in a catastrophe have inflicted widespread rape on women and girls. The roughly 1,200 encampments throughout Haiti, not […]

[1] I remember what a shock it was, when I was pregnant, to find that my body no longer possessed its familiar boundaries between public and private. After I said no thanks to BUN testing and amnio despite my advanced maternal age, the doctor who conducted the ultrasound for my second child clearly thought I […]

[1] Colonel Nathan Jessup’s thunderous line, “You can’t handle the truth!” reverberated through the nineties.1 Provoked on the stand by Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee’s (Tom Cruise) questioning in the movie A Few Good Men, Jessep (Jack Nicholson) proceeds to lay out some of the harsh realities connected to the American way of life. “Son, we live […]

[1] Confronting the possibility of a worldwide flu pandemic has a way of throwing some of our most enduring health care quandaries into sharp relief. How can we distribute limited resources equitably and morally? How do we balance care for the individual and care for the community when they are in conflict? How much power […]

[1] This issue of the Journal of Lutheran Ethics deals with business ethics, a topic that impacts the lives of everyone – worker, manager, investor, and/or concerned citizen. Three authors in this issue speak to various facets of this topic. [2] Eric Mount sets forth an argument for recovering traditional norms of covenant, community, and […]

[1] Stem cell research is not only an issue for academic ethical reflection. It is an issue that has played prominently in recent elections, and has become a topic of discussion for journalists and the general public. It is an issue about which people, inside and outside the church, have been seeking guidance and direction […]

[1] Please indulge me with a few opening propositions that could be merely a statement of the obvious – unless, of course, you disagree with what follows. Lutheran ethics is neither legalistic nor so liberal in spirit as to verge on the antinomian. Lutheran ethics is grounded in Scripture but is neither biblicistic nor so […]

[1] Love, we know, stands at the heart of both Christian doctrine and ethics: The gospel tells of God’s love for the world in Jesus Christ, and faith in the gospel gives arise to a life active in love for neighbor. The message is clear and simple, yet it leads us into the most basic […]

[1] I take some comfort in knowing that the ELCA is by no means unique in its struggle to hear God’s call and find its way when it comes to same-gender committed relationships and ordination, consecration, and commissioning of people in committed same-sex unions. We keep company with many other denominations, not to mention our […]

[1] It’s all very fine and good when Luther says “My conscience is captive to the word of God,” and he’s the only one using that particular argument. But what to do when people claim to be conscience-bound to the Scriptures, but with entirely different results? Given that the Task Force for the ELCA Studies […]