Millennial Dreams and Moral Dilemmas
Seventh-Day Adventism and Contemporary Ethics

Technological developments on many fronts have created in our society some extremely difficult moral predicaments.

Michael Pearson (Author)

9780521091480, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 4 December 2008

340 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.9 cm, 0.43 kg

Technological developments on many fronts have created in our society some extremely difficult moral predicaments. Previous generations have not had to face the dilemmas posed by, for example, the availability of safe abortions, sperm banks and prostoglandins. They have not had to come to terms with an unchecked exploitation of natural resources heralding imminent ecological crisis, or, worst of all, with the recognition that only in this current generation have people the capacity to destroy themselves and their environment. This book seeks to show how, and why, Seventh-day Adventism has addressed these moral issues, and that the ethical questions arising from these issues are especially relevant to the Adventist Church and its development. Dr Pearson looks specifically at the moral decisions Adventists have made in the area of human sexuality, on such issues as contraception, abortion, the role and status of women, divorce and homosexuality, from the beginnings of the movement to 1985.

Part I. Introduction: 1. Confrontation with the issues
Part II. Major Influences in Adventist Moral Thought: 2. Advent and remnant: two major doctrinal influences
3. Keeping the family together: stable homes and a united church
4. A cultural legacy: Victorian and American
Part III. Issues of Human Sexuality: 5. Marital relations among Adventists: the pursuit of purity
6. Adventists and intimacy: the celebration of sex
7. Adventists and abortion: early hostility
8. Abortion: tensions in the institutionalised church
9. Early Adventist women: in the shadow of the prophetess
10. Adventist women in the modern church: the pain of liberation
11. Divorce in Adventism: a perennial problem
12. Divorcing and enforcing: problems with principles and procedures
13. Homosexuality: the sin unnamed among Adventists
14. Homosexuality in Adventism: sin, disease or preference?
Part IV. Postscript: 15. Adventism in transition.

Subject Areas: Christian theology [HRCM]