Virtue and Character Formation
As taught in the Anglican / Episcopal tradition
Developing the habits of the heart: the Cardinal and Theological virtues in the Anglican life.
The question at the heart of the Anglican tradition’s approach to Christian ethics is not merely "What should I do?" but "What kind of person am I becoming in Christ?" Within the Anglican "via media," character formation is understood as the organic outworking of a life lived in the tension between the radical priority of God’s grace and the necessary human response of disciplined holiness. For the Anglican, the moral life is not a series of isolated choices governed by a legal code, but a transformative journey of "ordered love" where the Holy Spirit aligns the human will with the divine will.
By the end of this lesson
- **Identify** the distinctively Anglican synthesis of virtue ethics and the Reformation theology of grace.
- **Distinguish** between "moralism" (salvation by works) and "character formation" (transformation by the Spirit through discipline).
- **Explain** the role of the "moral imagination" in the process of sanctification according to Philippians 4:8.
- **Articulate** the relationship between the life of Christ as an "exemplar" and the believer’s personal growth in holiness.
- **Trace** the movement from justification to sanctification through the "Scripture Anchors" provided.
- **Defend** the necessity of community and liturgy in the formation of individual Christian character.
- **Apply** the concept of "putting on the new self" (Colossians 3) to contemporary ethical challenges.
- **Compare** the Anglican view of "synergistic grace" in character formation with other Protestant and Catholic perspectives.
Scripture
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