Summaries / Resúmenes - Studia Moralia

THE 50 TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE LAW OF CHRIST 241sis on the crucially important influence of the social andhuman sciences in this same project. Conceived of at first asancillary sciences, these are increasingly influential on Häring’sunderstanding of the task of moral theology .Having set the scene is this way, Römelt takes up the morecomplex question as to how Häring integrates this new-foundappreciation of the human sciences into his moral theologicalthinking. The novelty of Häring’s position is portrayed as amarked shift away from a natural law based normative ethictoward a Christ-centred personalistic ethic which takes greatercognisance of human subjectivity and historicity (101). Such achange of approach, particularly in a secular and pluralistsocial context, imposes upon moral theology a humbleacknowledgement of the fact that it too must learn from thehuman sciences. Without of course abandoning the integrativeand critical resources supplied by moral tradition, moral theologycomes to understand itself as fides quaerens scientiam(104), particularly in the face of emerging sciences. A key meritof Römelt’s presentation is his sensitivity not just to the inherentvalue of Häring’s ideas and intuitions (which he admits attimes remain rather unsystematic) but also to their reception inthe Church after Vatican II. Häring finds a new language inwhich to discuss moral and theological issues which a greatnumber of people were able to understand.The final section of Römelt’s piece focuses in turn on thefamily and bioethics as two fields which illustrate the dialoguediscussed above. In the case of family life, Häring’s approachstands in rather stark contrast to approaches more typical ofthis period. Depending first on sociology and then on the psychologicalsciences, Häring recognises the need to respond tothe complexity of emerging forms of family life with somethingmore than a repetition of norms articulated in another epoch.The challenge is of course to do this without betraying the keymoral principles of the whole tradition (109). In this fieldHäring’s proposal centres on the experience of conscience asthe necessary mediation between traditional values and currentsituation.The field of bioethics is even more dramatically illustrativeboth of the problems posed by Häring’s in his time and of thedifficulty of judging a suitable response for our time. Römeltacknowledges an extraordinary openness on Härings part, in