For William C. Spohn, Presidential Professor of Ethics and the Common Good at Santa Clara University, the Christian practices of baptism, Eucharist, intercessory prayer, biblical meditation and discernment, forgiveness, and solidarity are the links between Jesus and ethics. Spirituality, in turn, is forged in Christian community. Here also is the place where virtue is cultivated and nourished. Believers reconfigure their interior dispositions and habits of the heart to move closer to the attitudes of Christ.
In his study of the scriptures, Spohn finds several keys to Christian identity including compassion ("the virtue that sees others in the way that God does"), service (the practice of footwashing), and participation in the inbreaking of the Kingdom of God. Christian formation is further enhanced by "the gradual sanctification that comes from God's grace through a faithful community." Spohn provides a cogent explanation of just what the process of equipping the saints is all about.