Collective<---->Individual
Monday, September 15, 2014
3:31 PM
The question here is first a question of "agent."  Who or what is the locus of the ethical decision to be made. The choice to volunteer time to build homes with Habitat for Humanity is an individual's decision.  The criteria used to evaluate persons applying to receive a home built by Habitat for Humanity is made by some collective entity within Habitat for Humanity OR if it is made by an individual person, it is made on behalf of Habitat as a whole.  So the question that must be answered with any ethical questions is "who's making this decision?"  
The Christian question becomes, how large a collective entity can reasonably be expected to discern God's will together?  
--At the individual level-->Are there parts of an individual Christian's life that need not be subject to theological-ethical decision making?  Are there any decisions which as a Christian you feel--God doesn't really care what I do?
If we want to think in terms of Christian Ethics, the question of collective entities become 
--Can the collective entity think theologically together OR is it sufficiently diverse to make it impossible to speak of shared texts, beliefs, or practices?
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Hobby Lobby