None of us would rationally decide to turn our personal decisions over to novelists, the desire for instruction still remains one of the most powerful motives for reading novels.(18) More than merely involving us in a story which may help us to transcend a seemingly mundane existence, reading can provide a microcosm of a world in which we can view ourselves making decisions and performing tasks quite different from our normal habitude. This distance allows us opportunity to gain another perspective, it has allowed us to gain a needed understanding of another dimension of the world that God created and those blessed creatures that inhabit it. It is from these characters with whom we keep company for a time that Booth suggests we have much to learn. Values observed and questioned from an involvement in the thoughts and actions of these characters are of utmost value to our moral development.

…we must both open ourselves to others that look initially dangerous or worthless and yet prepare ourselves to cast them off whenever, after keeping company with them, we must conclude that they are potentially harmful. Which of these opposing practices will serve us best at a given moment will depend on who "we" are and what the "moment" is. The only fully general advice inherent in all this is that by taking thought about who and where we are, and about when it is, we may improve our chances of finding and dwelling with others who are in fact our true friends.(19)

Patricia Ward believes that the ethical/theological perspective may also foster the formation of character of readers who are on their way to developing a consistent basis for their choices and actions.(20) She would further prescribe, along with Booth and others, that if we are to truly integrate the spirit of literature into the hearts of our students, we must [page 44] emphasize the ethical nature of the piece and its application, rather than merely give a textual analysis. Both authors would agree that, as students identify with the characters in their various dilemmas, they begin to bring their values into contact with those of the implied author and of the fictional world of the text. The astute reader, working her way through a text can focus on the ethical moment or moments when she can construct the import of values, choices, and actions, and make judgments about them.(21)

Whenever I work my way into a narrative, the "I," that "me," becomes increasingly like my picture of the implied author. I succumb; I begin to see as he sees or she sees, to feel as she feels, to love what he loves, or to mock what she mocks. Booth strengthens his stance when he asserts that once we lose our capacity to succumb, when we reach a point at which no other character can manage to enter our imagination or emotional or intellectual territory and take over for the moment, then we are dead on our feet.(22)

Experiencing literature in this way, forces one to begin to scrutinize one's own intentions and motivations. What are the things that matter, the things that are of value – those things that one cares about so deeply that they can change the immediate path of this journey? In noting the special importance of narrative for use in moral education, psychologists Robinson and Haupe insist that where practical choice and action are concerned, stories are better guides than rules and maxims. Rules and maxims state significant generalizations about experience, but stories illustrate what those summaries mean.(23)

If a student is to chart a course with some degree of security and assurance, it is essential that he be given the opportunity to investigate the whys of the system, to make the system work for him, and not have the maxims arbitrarily imposed upon him. Atmosphere must be created for introspection and exploration of his beliefs and subsequent actions. This must be encouraged. Moral reflection is often an internalized conversation among various voices of one's conscience.

[page 45] Booth repeats the "Byronic/Faustian" notion that it is better to be damned for a sincere, passionately individual embrace of a falsehood, than to be saved through submission to someone else's truth.(24) One can certainly take this to the logical extreme and live out the consequences as did Faust, but one does indeed need to continually examine her journey and adjust her path and expectations accordingly.

This examination of self and exploration of individuality involves necessarily the risk-taking abilities so sought after but so infrequently followed. Unfortunately, in the evangelical subculture this action is often supported with lip service only. This risk requires that one fully personalize his faith and leads ultimately to a freedom in Christ and life. This can be done with assurance, knowing that we are in a context that will not fail. God's grace is made perfect in this experience. It is freedom in Christ that allows us to tackle the tough questions of character and moral development in literature and to explore it in depth in theater. Theater gives a student the opportunity to do this in a context that is more forgiving than the real world. The lonely, bravely honest battler for freedom, breaking the fetters of a hostile past, does so by seeking what is truly new – seeking finally to "learn in my own life and away from home and friends what the heart is and what is feels."(25)

III. Theater: A Laboratory for Character

Teaching ethics requires more than informative lectures and stimulating discussions; it must include an activity which permits the student to involve himself in the decision-making process in order to stretch his thinking out of the present mold. The mimetic nature of theater requires this involvement in the preparation of truthful and believable characterization.

Far too often the value of a theater program is based on the professionalism of the final performances and the emotional response of the audiences. While this is certainly an important part of the evaluation, one can hardly validate the time spent during the weeks of preparation, especially in the divergent and busy life of a college student, with merely an observation of several nights of performance. I am in no way attempting to minimize the value of performance, and involvement of the audience and its emotional growth, as justifiable [page 46] objectives, but prime emphasis must be placed on the growth of the students through their involvement in the character study necessary to prepare these penetrating and illuminating performances. The participation in the lives of these characters, and the students' involvement in the process of decision-making and action-taking, is the experience that can change their lives.

Taking the narrative example a step further and actually involving the student in the action of decision-making forces her to question the intentions, the whys, of the action, in the context of the world created by the playwright. Developing this sense of moral imagination in the student helps to expand her understanding of the diversity of existence in the world in which she lives, and encourages her to consider carefully creative and alternative problem solving.

Criticism of the acting style of much of the 18th and 19th centuries rests in the rather superficial and elocutionary manner used in the depiction of character. Although some of this larger-than-life style of acting was necessary in order to read over the murky footlights and gas lamps of the theater houses of that period, much depth of understanding, the sense of honesty and truth that we demand today, was sacrificed.

The representational actor deliberately chooses to imitate or illustrate the character's behavior. It is as though the actor were merely putting on a costume and moving through prescribed choreography, albeit with much emotion. The presentational actor attempts to reveal human behavior through the use of him or herself, through an understanding of the inner motivations of the character he is portraying.(26) Uta Hagen believes that the presentational actor trusts that a form will result from identification with the character and discovery of this character's action. To create this moment she believes that character and ethics, a point of view about the world in which the actor lives, must be developed.(27) This perspective, this sensitive consciousness and moral identity to which Holmes refers as well, is certainly the basis for the fully faceted, ethically astute student that faith-based educators would like to see as the product of their efforts.

[page 47] "I am I, but what IF?" This "magic If", developed by Stanislavski as a stimulus for character development, gives the student an opportunity to explore a character and her situation, based on the student's own experience, what she believes to be true. This "what if" greatly expands the possibilities of choice, and enhances potential for the development of the moral imagination that Holmes and Hauerwas see as essential to the process of developing a moral identity. One's journey of character is dependent upon his experience.

Remember that the character in a play is a potential always awaiting realization. The aim of he actor is to bring as much of herself as possible to the role, and to take as much of the character as possible back with her when finished. This actualization requires penetrating and, at times, painful introspection to arrive at this point of self-knowledge. Improvisational exercises must be developed sensitively in preparation for this task, to assist the student on the quest of contacting herself, and ultimately making final connection with the character. Emphasis must be placed on the fact that it is a process. Nothing happens suddenly but death. The characterization accepted quickly will be clichéd, glib, and easy. The essence of presentational acting, the believable and electrifying characters with whom we can identify, indicates a presentation in truth and honesty. It arises from a study that is continually developing, never stagnating, as new perspective is gained in the search for and ultimate application of truth. This model seems the perfect metaphor for a life lived in a Christian ethic: one that is lived in truth and honesty, sensitively aware, with a depth of self-knowledge, fully faceted, never superficial or two-dimensional.

The more an actor develops a full sense of his own identity, the more his scope and capacity for identification with other characters than his own will be made.

If I compare myself to a large meaty, round apple, I discover that my inner and outer cliché image of myself is only a wedge of it – possibly the wedge with the rosy cheek on the skin. But I have to become aware or myself as the total apple – the firm inner flesh as well as the brown rotten spot, the stem, the seeds, the core. All of the apple is me. The more I discover, the more I realized that I have endless sources within myself to put to use in illumination of endless characters in dramatic literature; that I am compounded of endless human beings [page 48] depending on the events moving in on me, my surrounding circumstances, relationships with a variety of people, what I want and what's in my way at a given moment: all within the context of my unique identity.(28)

The potential sense of interconnectedness with these characters and their lives is fully explored by Booth as well. But interesting perspective is gained as he suggests that as creatures made in the image of God, we are hence essentially affiliated and joined to others more like us than different.

If I think of myself not as an atomic unit bumping other atoms but as a character – as someone doing my best to enact the various roles assigned to me – I discover that there are no clear boundaries between the others who are somehow both outside and inside me and the 'me' that the others are 'in'…I am not bounded by my skin.(29)

One's response may likely be "I'm not like that!" But it is more likely that it will be a recognition: "I am like that more than I know. What am I going to do about it? How will this investigation and subsequent discoveries alter the way I think about myself and my interaction with others?"

A student's own identity and self-knowledge are the main sources for any character he may want to play. But as Booth and Hagen suggest, an understanding and respect for his connection with other potential characters, both without and within himself, as discovered on the journey, is also essential to a fully dimensional characterization.

The journey toward this self-knowledge forces a student to deal very specifically with a number of the objectives Holmes lists as essential for developing virtues and values, for establishing a moral identity. These objectives for an effective integration of faith and learning include:

[page 49] 1. consciousness raising

2. consciousness sensitizing

3. values analysis

4. values clarification

5. values criticism

6. moral imagination

7. moral reasoning

8. moral decision making

9. responsible agents

10. virtue development

11. moral identity(30)

Each of these objectives must follow in specific sequence. It is impossible to stimulate moral imagination or practice moral reasoning without first developing a knowledge of, and sensitivity to, the social dilemma. Only then can one begin to analyze and clarify the values at work and evaluate ethical decision-making. Theater allows both the depth of understanding and involvement of the characters in the situation, and the distance to observe the action that can lead the student through the journey and subsequently contribute to his moral clarity.

To fully understand and appreciate the context of her life, to become truly sensitive to what gives real meaning to her life – to what she really cares deeply about – and how this will in time affect her decision-making process and subsequent actions, certainly does require a student to become a responsible agent in developing virtues and a sense of moral identity. Holmes' objectives are a basis for the questions posed by any actor as she attempts to understand and identify with her character. It is essential that she crack the representational façade and delve into the whys of the character's intentions and motivations. The greater facility the actor has for bringing herself to the character, as well as finding the character in herself, the more honest and believable the final portrayal will be. The sensitivity and awareness, the sense of self-truth gained by the actor through this journey, will certainly validate the time spent, and the possible pain incurred in the process.

[page 50] Developing a believable character depends on choices and the viability of these choices for an actor and his audience. Understanding why the character made the choice he did must be based on a personalization of the character, on developing an in-depth character biography. This personalization is the process through which the actor makes the dramatic situation meaningful, so he can believe in what is happening and respond with truth and sincerity. It enables him to find that essential inner connection to this character's objectives. This biography will be more helpful to the actor if it is based on Stanislavski's "magic If." Creating this inner essence of a character supersedes the externals. These external traits and mannerisms will be more believable as they grow from the development of the inner soul of the character. It is the external approach to character definition that illustrates the very worst abuses of representational acting often practiced by the well-intentioned novice.

A student's discovery of the psychology of her character is a journey into the mind, heart, body, and soul of another being.(31) Psychology explains behavior. The psychological portrait a student designs for her character must justify her character's action and dramatic function in the world of the play. Every choice the student makes from the first time she reads the play, brings her closer to a definition of the character. Through formulating a super objective and scene objectives, and choosing and performing action within the given circumstances, the student creates a pattern of behavior that reveals character.

The director will assist the student in rehearsals as she searches for the answers to the penetrating questions of motivation: "What do I want? What must I have at this moment? Why? What am I willing to do to get it? What are the obstacles, physical, emotional and ethical that must be confronted to reach this goal?"

Answering these questions in depth gives the student the understanding necessary for the internal justification of actions to follow. During rehearsal the student is able to make the necessary adjustments. This process is greatly enhanced when the student keeps a journal of her discoveries. This journaling experience further gives the student the opportunity to pull from her own life experiences in an attempt to identify with the character and make an honest connection with that character in their dilemma of life. The student is also encouraged to [page 51] apply helpful insights from her character study to the development of her own moral identity. These insights are gained by the student in his own individual preparation for each rehearsal as well as within the community of actors interacting during the rehearsal procedure itself. The rehearsal then becomes the laboratory experience necessary for the student to validate action choices as the logical extension of a developing inner dimension. Through repetition of these actions in rehearsal they become fully and truthfully integrated into the character and the play. All that the student says and does to further her through line of action and her dramatic function defines who she is. A student must never be judgmental or fearful of her character. She must penetrate the soul of the villain as she would the victim.(32) As she constantly justifies action choices, she actually begins to think as her character would.