A Common Morality for the Global Age

First Things readers in the DC area might be interested in an international symposium on natural law, hosted by Catholic University’s Center for Law, Philosophy and Culture . Beginning this Thursday evening and continuing through Sunday afternoon (March 27-30), the symposium will include plenary addresses from a number of FT board members and contributors, including Hardley Arkes, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Robert P. George, Kevin Hart, Stanley Hauerwas, Thomas S. Hibbs, and Gilbert Meilaender. Organized at the request of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, shortly before his election to the papacy, the conference “will focus on the human capacity for knowledge of universal moral principles across faiths and traditions.”

Until quite modern times all teachers and even all men believed the universe to be such that certain emotional reactions on our part could be either congruous or incongruous to it—believed, in fact, that objects did not merely receive, but could merit, our approval or disapproval, our reverence, or our contempt . . . . As long as we remain within [this shared understanding] . . . we find the concrete reality in which to participate is to be truly human: the real common will and common reason of humanity, alive, and growing like a tree, and branching out, as the situation varies, into ever new beauties and dignities of application. (C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man )

The symposium is free and open to the public, but advance registration is recommended.