Timothy Floyd

Becoming a lawyer is about much more than acquiring knowledge and technique. As law students learn the law and acquire some basic skills, they are also inevitably forming a deep sense of themselves in their new roles as lawyers. That sense of self - the student's nascent professional identity - needs to take a particular form if the students are to fullfil the public purposes of lawyers and find deep meaning and satisfaction in their work. In this book, the authors combine what they have learned in many years of teaching and research concerning the lawyer's professional identity with lessons derived from legal ethics, moral psychology, and moral philosophy. They describe in depth the six virtues that every lawyer needs as part of his or her professional identity, and they explore both the obstacles to acquiring and deploying those virtues and strategies for overcoming those impediments.

Law professors Thomas E. Baker and Timothy W. Floyd asked some of their legal colleagues to respond to this provocative question: "Can a good Christian be a good lawyer?" Here are twenty-one highly personal narratives that answer the question of how each writer tries, sometimes but not always successfully, to be both a good Christian and a good lawyer. How does a lawyer called to live the Gospel of Jesus Christ reconcile his or her faith with the secular calling to the legal profession? The editors did not set out to provide some kind of final resolution or unified consensus. Instead, they have compiled a remarkable collection of reflections by lawyers, judges, and academics who represent many different branches of Christianity.