‘Just Love,’ Reviewed

Margaret A. Farley’s Just Love: A Framework for Christian Social Ethics has been the subject of much discussion and controversey following the announcement by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in June 2012 that the book “contained erroneous propositions, the dissemination of which risks grave harm to the faithful.”

In 2007, theologian Lisa Sowle Cahill of Boston College offered a more positive view in a review for America:

This long-awaited work by America’s leading Catholic feminist theological ethicist, Margaret A. Farley, is the product of years of experience, reflection, scholarship and wisdom. Just Love is decisively shaped by Farley’s longstanding interests in the sexual equality of women and men, and of gay and straight couples; and, more recently, in advocacy for people affected by AIDS, especially women in Africa. Just Love’s thesis is that justice is central to sexual morality, especially justice in the sense of respect for the real identity and needs of the other.

This is an important message in a time in which sexual abuse and violence are rampant, and the Catholic Church has failed to protect children from sexual exploitation, while campaigning against the unions that many gays and lesbians view as essential expressions of their identities. It is just as important a message for a culture, like ours, that often reduces sexual morality to freedom and enjoyment, and regards commitment as an ideal or a luxury. It is even more important under conditions that systemically expose women to threats to their sexual integrity and health, and to their very lives.

Read the full review here.