Articles by James Caccamo
Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, 2022
Despite the moral aspirations of their mission statements, universities often base technology dec... more Despite the moral aspirations of their mission statements, universities often base technology decisions on technical and financial considerations. This paper will explore what it would be like to prioritize ethical considerations in the selection and deployment of technology in higher education. Using the example of a mission grounded in the principles of integral human development and justice (drawing on sources in the Catholic tradition), it will sketch out a six-point framework for considering technologies: enhancement of access to educational opportunities; implementation of structures to support teaching and learning; persistence of embodied corporate interaction; upholding the dignity of work and workers (students, faculty, administrators, and staff); transparency; and maintaining free spaces for exploration and innovation.
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Posthumanism: The Future of Homo sapiens, 2018
A look at post-humanism from the lens of the Catholic social ethical tradition, noting basic prin... more A look at post-humanism from the lens of the Catholic social ethical tradition, noting basic principles, framing concepts, and the opportunities and liabilities that lie ahead.
In _Posthumanism: The Future of Homo Sapiens_, eds. Michael Bess and Diana Walsh Pasulka, 201-211. Part of the Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks. Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2018.
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This article offers a framework for considering the morality of contemporary information and comm... more This article offers a framework for considering the morality of contemporary information and communication technologies and new media from the perspective of Catholic moral theology. It begins by considering the three models that are frequently used to conceptualize technology’s influence on human life—instrumentalism, determinism, and cultural materialism—identifying their limitations as well as their central insights. (While these approaches originated and developed primarily within the fields of philosophy and history of technology, they serve as the methodological underpinnings of a great deal of scholarly and popular work on technology ethics, including the eighty year body of work of Catholic social teaching on social communication.) Using the traditional Catholic notion of the three fonts of moral wisdom as a guide, this essay will argue that alone, none of these approaches is adequate to the task of understanding the moral implications of contemporary information and communication technologies and digital media, but that together, they function to provide sufficient information to assess the central elements necessary for a moral evaluation of action. The essay will close with some examples of how utilizing the approach recommended by the three fonts frame can help us include a much broader range of considerations in a determination of digital media’s effects on moral and theological reflection, and thus increase our ability to understand the new realities before us, offer a more insightful witness into civic society, and more effectively meet the moral and pastoral needs of people living in today’s hyper-mediated, connected world.
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A history of the first 70 years of Vatican teaching on media and communications, tracing major th... more A history of the first 70 years of Vatican teaching on media and communications, tracing major themes and tensions through the four major periods of its life.
¶ For further reading, you might consider also reading the brief "“Two Things to Know about Laudato Si‘ and Technology,” which explains two key ways that Pope Francis has changed teaching on technology in his work after the period covered in this article in Laudato Si'.
¶ For an even deeper dive, read “What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices,” which is a critical assessment of the work done in the first 70 years that was published before Laudato Si', but anticipates some directions that Pope Frances takes in the encyclical.
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Liturgy, Apr 2013
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Journal of Business Ethics, 2009
Branding has long been seen as an effective means of marketing products. The use of brand-based m... more Branding has long been seen as an effective means of marketing products. The use of brand-based marketing campaigns, however, has come under intense scrutiny over the past 10 years for its power to facilitate deception and emotional manipulation. As a way of proceeding through the many differing moral assessments, this paper turns for insight to the tradition of writing on social ethical issues within the Roman Catholic Church. The author suggests that Catholic Social Teaching offers a distinctive approach to advertising ethics that charts a middle course between the two poles of the debate on branding. This article introduces readers to the approach to advertising developed within Vatican documents on media, highlighting the basic values at stake and the particular moral norms for advertising that are articulated. The article then applies these values and norms to the case of brand-based advertising, ultimately suggesting that advertisers approach their work through the virtue of solidarity.
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With Patricia Jiménez. "Hispanic Ministry, Digital Technology, and New Media." In Hispanic Minist... more With Patricia Jiménez. "Hispanic Ministry, Digital Technology, and New Media." In Hispanic Ministry in the 21st Century: Urgent Matters, Hosffman Ospino, Elsie Miranda, and Brett Hoover, eds. Hispania Series. Miami: Convivium Press, 2016.
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Religious and Ethical Perspectives for the Twenty-First Century, 2013
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Children of a Better God: Technology and the Next Humanity, 2013
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National Catholic Reporter, Apr 13, 2012
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God’s Grandeur: The Arts and Imagination in Theology, 2006
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Liturgy, 2007
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This dissertation develops a theory for the relationship between ritual song and indi- vidual mor... more This dissertation develops a theory for the relationship between ritual song and indi- vidual moral practice. The author contends that the connection between ritual song activity and moral action is based upon three primary aspects of ritual song activity: 1) ritual song is an event of symbolism, in which significant symbols and ideas are communi- cated to individuals and are reshaped for the community through their use, 2) ritual song provides an opportunity for divine meeting, in which individual community members participate in a powerful means of transcendent experience, and 3) ritual singing itself is a set of particular and regular religiously responsive performances that shape the ways in which individuals respond to God and neighbor outside of the ritual event. These three aspects of the ritual song experience—symbolism, divine meeting, and performance—work together to create what the author terms the Responsorial Self: the person who responds to the call of God in the world in ways that are informed by ideas and values experienced in ritual song and which have been rehearsed in the performance of ritual song.
Previous attempts to understand the relationship between ritual song and moral practice utilizing theological and ethical approaches have been hampered by the interdisciplinary nature of the question. In order to develop a theory that is both appropriately informed about ritual musical behavior and theologically grounded, the dissertation draws upon work done in social anthropology, musicology, ethnomusicology, and liturgical studies as well as systematic theology and theological ethics.
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Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Dec 2012
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Contents:
1. Natural Law in a Digital Age – Nadia Delicata
2. Faith in the Church of Facebook ... more Contents:
1. Natural Law in a Digital Age – Nadia Delicata
2. Faith in the Church of Facebook – Matthew John Paul Tan
3. Progress and Progressio: Technology, Self-Betterment, and Integral Human Development – Joseph G. Wolyniak
4. Containing a “Pandora’s” Box: The Importance of Labor Unions in the Digital Age – Patrick Flanagan
5. We Do Not Know How to Love: Observations on Theology, Technology, and Disability – Jana M. Bennett
6. Unmanned: Autonomous Drones as a Problem of Theological Anthropology – Kara N. Slade
7. Learning With Digital Technologies: Privileging Persons Over Machines – Mary E. Hess
8. What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices – James F. Caccamo
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Digital Content by James Caccamo
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Popular Publications by James Caccamo
Prism: The Magazine of Evangelicals for Social Action
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Religious Studies News, 2001
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Articles by James Caccamo
In _Posthumanism: The Future of Homo Sapiens_, eds. Michael Bess and Diana Walsh Pasulka, 201-211. Part of the Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks. Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2018.
¶ For further reading, you might consider also reading the brief "“Two Things to Know about Laudato Si‘ and Technology,” which explains two key ways that Pope Francis has changed teaching on technology in his work after the period covered in this article in Laudato Si'.
¶ For an even deeper dive, read “What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices,” which is a critical assessment of the work done in the first 70 years that was published before Laudato Si', but anticipates some directions that Pope Frances takes in the encyclical.
Previous attempts to understand the relationship between ritual song and moral practice utilizing theological and ethical approaches have been hampered by the interdisciplinary nature of the question. In order to develop a theory that is both appropriately informed about ritual musical behavior and theologically grounded, the dissertation draws upon work done in social anthropology, musicology, ethnomusicology, and liturgical studies as well as systematic theology and theological ethics.
1. Natural Law in a Digital Age – Nadia Delicata
2. Faith in the Church of Facebook – Matthew John Paul Tan
3. Progress and Progressio: Technology, Self-Betterment, and Integral Human Development – Joseph G. Wolyniak
4. Containing a “Pandora’s” Box: The Importance of Labor Unions in the Digital Age – Patrick Flanagan
5. We Do Not Know How to Love: Observations on Theology, Technology, and Disability – Jana M. Bennett
6. Unmanned: Autonomous Drones as a Problem of Theological Anthropology – Kara N. Slade
7. Learning With Digital Technologies: Privileging Persons Over Machines – Mary E. Hess
8. What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices – James F. Caccamo
Digital Content by James Caccamo
Popular Publications by James Caccamo
In _Posthumanism: The Future of Homo Sapiens_, eds. Michael Bess and Diana Walsh Pasulka, 201-211. Part of the Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks. Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2018.
¶ For further reading, you might consider also reading the brief "“Two Things to Know about Laudato Si‘ and Technology,” which explains two key ways that Pope Francis has changed teaching on technology in his work after the period covered in this article in Laudato Si'.
¶ For an even deeper dive, read “What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices,” which is a critical assessment of the work done in the first 70 years that was published before Laudato Si', but anticipates some directions that Pope Frances takes in the encyclical.
Previous attempts to understand the relationship between ritual song and moral practice utilizing theological and ethical approaches have been hampered by the interdisciplinary nature of the question. In order to develop a theory that is both appropriately informed about ritual musical behavior and theologically grounded, the dissertation draws upon work done in social anthropology, musicology, ethnomusicology, and liturgical studies as well as systematic theology and theological ethics.
1. Natural Law in a Digital Age – Nadia Delicata
2. Faith in the Church of Facebook – Matthew John Paul Tan
3. Progress and Progressio: Technology, Self-Betterment, and Integral Human Development – Joseph G. Wolyniak
4. Containing a “Pandora’s” Box: The Importance of Labor Unions in the Digital Age – Patrick Flanagan
5. We Do Not Know How to Love: Observations on Theology, Technology, and Disability – Jana M. Bennett
6. Unmanned: Autonomous Drones as a Problem of Theological Anthropology – Kara N. Slade
7. Learning With Digital Technologies: Privileging Persons Over Machines – Mary E. Hess
8. What’s in a Tech? Factors in Evaluating the Morality of Our Information and Communication Practices – James F. Caccamo