What Science, Faith, and Philosophy Teach Us about Love and Happiness
Written by Dr. Christopher Kaczor and his wife, Jennifer Kaczor.
Street Date: February 2014
This work explores some of the most interesting and vexing problems in contemporary life. Appealing to reason rather than religious authority, the book tackles the most controversial and talked about positions of the Catholic Church – on contraception, on marriage, on reproductive technologies, on cohabitation, and on divorce – arguing for the reasonableness of the Church’s views on these issues.
The book’s interdisciplinary approach, following the precedent of Thomas Aquinas, looks to human happiness and fulfillment, properly understood, in seeking the answers to questions about how to live. It aims to show to skeptical readers that what the Catholic Church teaches about controversial issues is rationally justified by considering evidence from psychology, sociology, and philosophy.
The foundation of Kaczor’s approach is happiness. We all want to be happy. Every day, in whatever we do, we seek this goal. But what exactly is happiness? And how can we find it? The saints and psychologists agree: there can be no real happiness without authentic love-erotic love, friendship love, and self-giving love (agape).
From this foundation of happiness Kaczor explores the nature of marriage, and the love they promise to each other, which is agape, a self giving love that is the choice to do good for the other. He also examines alternatives to covenant marriage, such as polygamy and samesex marriage, as well as cohabitation.
Finally the book explores the value of children. To make sense of Catholic teaching on contraception, he says that we must first reconsider the value of fertility and having children. Only in this perspective, can one begin to understand what the Church teaches.
Christopher Kaczor, Ph.D., a husband and father, is a professor of philosophy at Loyola Marymount University, and the author of The Seven Big Myths About the Catholic Church, The Ethics of Abortion: Women’s Rights, Human Life, and the Question of Justice, Thomas Aquinas on the Cardinal Virtues, and Life Issues – Medical Choices.
View Press Release here.
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