DISCERNMENT AND DECISION MAKING

 

The theological foundations of Christian discernment

and decision making.

Concerning the place of a person in the process of discovering the call of God, in recent years the Catholic Church has developed the idea of discernment and decision making. In the Christian tradition, discernment has always been highly esteemed. It has been seen not as merely part of the natural virtues of prudence but as one of the directed gifts of the Holy Spirit[1]. Knowing that discernment is very important in the way of making a moral judgment, in this exercise we will try to outline and discuss the theological foundations of Christian discernment and decision making.

            To reach the level of reflected discernment, many aspects are involved and to talk about the fundamental drives of discernment is not an easy task because of their huge number. Reading the conception of Saint Thomas Aquinas about the issue of discernment, we find the focus on the fulfillment which orients the decision of human person. What ought I to do? First answers the question ‘What is my goal?’ Here it is clear that the point of reference in making a moral decision is neither laws nor duties but the consequences[2].

            Others attempt to answer the question ‘what ought I to do?’ by asking first ‘what is happening?’ In this way one decides what to do by determining what action is most harmonious or proportionate to the meaning of the whole relational context[3].

According to Richard Gula, four theological foundations stand out for special consideration: faith which helps us to discover the presence and the action of God, the will of God who is always and everywhere redemptively present to us, Jesus the model of human life lived in response to the presence of God and the human person as the moral agent.

Considering the place of faith in the process of discerning is to understand that discernment is only possible for a man who looks at life from the perspective of oneself commitment to God in Christ and through the Holy Spirit[4]. Faith is fundamental because it is a personal identity which shapes the values we have and illumines our convictions and dispositions of moral life in the light of the Holy Spirit. Faith helps us to discover the hand of God and leads us to a deep relationship with our God.

The will of God influences discernment in the way that we are always oriented towards good which is God for us. Far from taking it as a preconceived plan, already fixed and existing in its fullest where human person needs only to fit in that divine plan, the will of God means the prophetic word revealed to us in Scripture, prominently in the person of Jesus as well as in the tradition of the Church, it includes as well the ‘here and now’ word of the call of God to each one[5].

Christian discernment presupposes that we have oriented our life towards Jesus who is the fundamental meaning of human life lived in response to the presence of God. If we are going to profess Jesus as Lord, truly divine and truly human, then our fundamental relation to him ought to shape the framework for all the decision caring out of the discernment process. Discerning with reference to the word and deeds of Jesus sets us in the direction a disciple is to go even if it does not quite yield the detailed knowledge for a decision which fulfills the imperative of the moment[6].

Discernment is also founded on some basic convictions about the human person. This perspective leads us to the notion of personalism which puts the person in the center. With this understanding, discernment goes beyond the question ‘Is this action morally right?’ to the more personal question of appropriateness: ‘Is this action consistent with who I am and what to become?’

On the basis of this anthropological feature, the tradition of discernment maintains that what we want in the depths of our hearts will be consistent with what God is enabling and requiring us to be and with what we are to do. The fundamental role of personal conviction in the process of discernment and decision making call upon the notion of experience. Here we argue that discernment can be scrutinized by attending to the central symbols which dispose the self-understanding and to the dominant affective convictions which dispose the self action. As a personal skill, discernment needs not to be strictly private but should be accountable to the public conviction of the Christian tradition. It seeks to be responsible to social contexts by aid of the image with which they shape our self-understanding. Our sense of self is defined in large part by images of being parents, citizen, colleagues, friends, committee members, theologians and like[7].

Freedom is the core of what we call person. This means that talking about the human person as theological foundation of discernment, free-will of the person is to be taken into consideration. This concurs with the idea that when I act, I know that I am acting and what I intend. Hence, the possibility of action implies free-will. To deny free-will is to deny possibility of action. ‘I am free’ is an immediate implication of ‘I do’, and to deny freedom is to assert that no one ever does anything, that no one is capable even of thinking, observing or discerning[8].

To discuss discernment in Christian life it is necessary to link the moral agent, God and the world, prayer is the process which makes that link. The human person as the moral agent passes through the process of interiorizing his encounter with the transcendent in search of what is good in relation to what he want to achieve. The prayer for discernment is some form of contemplative exercise which takes a long loving look into ones own experiences, both internal and external in order to see God there[9].

            To sum up, the theological foundations of discernment come out with the role they play in the process of discernment.

---

[1] BENEDICTA WARD, Discernment: a rare bird, in The way, Supplement  64, (London, The way Publication, 1989) p, 10.

[2][2] R. GULA, Reason informed by faith. Foundations of catholic morality.  (New York: Pualist press, 1989) p, 303.

[3] Ibid., p, 304.

[4] Ibid, p. 317.

[5] Ibid., p. 319.

[6] Ibid.,  p,320.

[7] Ibid., p. 568.

[8] BENEDICTA WARD, Discernment: a rare bird, in The way, Supplement 64, p. 131

[9]  GULA, Reason informed by faith. Foundations of catholic morality, p. 322.