Caritas and Communitas: A Caring Science Ethical View of Self and Community

Abstract

This paper will explore a model of Caring Science (Watson, J. 2004 Caring Science as Sacred Science, in print) that offers a moral and philosophical foundation of Caring for Self and Community. An expanded world-view and broad theoretical and philosophical context will be offered in which to understand the ethical and moral significance of caring for self and community. The concepts of Caritas and Communitas infuse Love into our life and work. This view will be developed through an ethical lens based upon the philosophy of Levinas (2000). "Ethics of Face" is used to convey an ethic of Other, as an obligatory ethical relationship one human to another. In "facing" our broader humanity, and ourselves we sustain and help to evolve our humanity and the deeply human dimensions of our Being and Becoming. Such a philosophical view acknowledges our human-infinity oneness and connectedness, across time, space, physicality, and culture. Within this way of understanding caring at multiple levels, Logstrup's philosophy (1997) helps us to gain an appreciation of perennial truths and wisdom traditions that remind us that we literally, morally, and metaphorically "hold another's life in our hands" (Logstrup, 1997). Our caring in a given moment in time never leaves another unaffected. In this view we explore how the nurse is not only in the environmental field of other, but becomes the energetic vibrational environmental field for Caring for Self and Other (Quinn, 1992). This Caring Science model of self and community arises from deep ethical truths related to Caritas/Love and Communitas/Connectedness, as a relational moral way of Being and Becoming more human and humane. This abstract was translated into English by the publisher or author.