Traumatizing events can break a person. However, a series of small but inevitable pinpricks, lovelessness and ambivalent relationships can also ruin a person. A traumatic event touches and invades a person unspeakably deeply. This book attempts to put into words the psychic abyss of trauma, which the victim experiences, and helps to detect and understand possible traumatization. It wants to encourage traumatized people and their counsellors to choose the path of small steps out of the trauma. In this way, previously traumatized people can rediscover their dignity. The path leads from an existence dictated by the outside world to a self-determined life.

Traumatizing events can break a person. However, a series of small but inevitable pinpricks, lovelessness and ambivalent relationships can also ruin a person. A traumatic event touches and invades a person unspeakably deeply. This book attempts to put into words the psychic abyss of trauma, which the victim experiences, and helps to detect and understand possible traumatization. It wants to encourage traumatized people and their counsellors to choose the path of small steps out of the trauma. In this way, previously traumatized people can rediscover their dignity. The path leads from an existence dictated by the outside world to a self-determined life. Claudia Mariéle Wulf studied educational science, psychology, philosophy and theology. She is the Chair of Moral Theology and Christian Ethics at the School of Catholic Theology of Tilburg University in the Netherlands and works as a pastoral-therapeutic caregiver in St. Gallen, Switzerland.

It is a challenge to talk about values and a provocation to call them "valid". But it is necessary when human dignity is at stake. Freedom, love, truth and life determine and protect this dignity. The highest value is life; when it is threatened, one loses the experience of dignity. Mere autonomy going beyond value-oriented freedom can threaten life, physically and psychologically. If we do not respect our livelihoods, we threaten them. Genuine love of one's neighbour prevents tolerance from turning into populist, intolerant ideologies. Dignity as the standard for our coexistence gives rise to hope. Therefore, this book invites us to think, feel and act responsibly for a life ‘in fullness’ (John 10:10).

Christian ethics, also called moral theology in the tradition, is one of the most controversial topics within theology, as well as outside it. Yet the goal of these ethics is `a life in fullness and freedom'. Without ethical guidelines and personal responsibility, a life cannot succeed. Norms and laws aim to create space for life and protect it. To fill this freedom, people are responsible for that. And being responsible means: owing an answer to someone. Ethics therefore always takes place in relation: to one's own conscience, to the good that can be accomplished, and in relation to other living beings and nature. Christian ethics, moreover, places this responsibility in relation to God. People are free, but also limited; they hurt each other and need forgiveness and reconciliation. Often people can reconcile with each other, but sometimes accounts remain open: the evil was too great or the reconciliation failed. Christian theology can refer to redemption here. It is just not easy to reconcile its content with the everyday reality of modern people. This systematic introduction to moral theology offers an explanation in understandable anthropological terms. It shows how the Christian message provides a meaningful answer to the open question of how a human life can succeed. Anyone who tries to mediate meaningfully between tradition and modernity in the pastoral practice of the church will find this book a guide.

Talking About Love on the Edge of a Precipiceis a book filled with hope. All of us suffer from trauma in our lives, whether it be a difficult childhood, the end of a love affair, or a violent experience. Yet rather than be controlled by our pain, it is possible for us to grow in the face of our problems and create a new life for ourselves. In his groundbreaking work on the healing power of resilience, Boris Cyrulnik has created a new way for us to understand ourselves and our pasts. He shows how we are all changed by trauma, but that we can choose either to submit to it as if it were our destiny, or break free and come back to life. The answer lies in making use of our pain and giving it meaning. Whether it occurs during adolescence, meeting a partner or having children ourselves, resilience comes from modifying our personal histories and how we see ourselves inside - literally remaking our life story. By translating trauma into words, we choose to live again. Ultimately, this book is a celebration of the healing, transforming power of love.