Agape as the only Christian ethical principle (OCR A-Level Religious Studies): Revision Notes

Agape as the only Christian principle

Agape: Unconditional, Christian love

Autonomy: Individual people have to figure out for themselves what is right or wrong.

What is love according to Jesus?

• Comes from God, so Christians's love must reflect this.
• Unconditional.
• Challenging.
• Love comes from within.
• Sacrificial, put others first.

Joseph Fletcher

• Advocated for agape being the guiding principle in our everyday Christian lives.
• Situation ethics places love at the centre of all decisions.
• It is about applying the process of reason to decide when they should be broken.

Agape as the only source of ethics

• The central rule of love is unique to Jesus and should therefore be the basis of our ethics as we have God-given reason to follow the example of Jesus.
• Love when properly understood is complex enough to put that a moral system can be gained from it.
• Ensures Christians put others first even in difficult situations Jesus did this with authority. Jesus focused on Agape and is the ultimate role model.
• Agape is not just any love, it is selfless Christian love that still provides guidelines.
• A world where everyone adopts selfless Christian love seems to be very positive.
• Jesus said agape was his greatest commandment.
• Robinson: Humanity has "come of age" and we can therefore be trusted to be guided by the principles of agape. Strict rules and guidance made sense before however now humans can be trusted to make their own decisions without these strict rules and laws in place.

Agape is not sufficient

• Pope Francis states that love is central to Christian life but not as a moral guideline, we still need to learn alongside the rules of the church.
• We need love to understand how to follow the church's rules.
• To suggest the only thing we need to take from the bible is the importance of love is to deem everything else irrelevant.
• The Bible cannot be reduced to the matter of agape, otherwise, God would not have communicated it with us, the bible is full of commandments and stories.
• Love is very subjective, how this is interpreted may differ and we therefore need the guidance of the church and the rest of the bible.
• Religious acts of violence are often done in the name of love, demonstrating the danger of relying on such a subjective principle.