Where's the moral consistency in America? Saturday, April 09, 2005 by Kyle Williams
In an ironic time in America, "Sin City" is atop the box office while cable news channels broadcast wall-to-wall coverage of mourning Pope John Paul II's death. Is this a contradiction, or merely ignorance? Maybe it is insincerity. This pope was ...
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Kyle,
Your article about the contradictions in American society was interesting. Your observation that there is a contradiction between what people say and what they do is quite correct. I worked in Washington for three years for the GOP and for the US Senate and my experience was that more often than not those "republicans" who always talked about morality often were outright hypocrites. Very few of them were living what they preached. However, I think there is a distinction to be made, some people know what is right, and yet are not virtuous enough to do it, while others do not know what is right and so they do whatever is pleasurable. Most
Christians--who know what is right because it is written in Sacred Scripture, and handed down to them by their parents and the Church through tradition--live with a certain degree of this hypocracy and contradiction in their lives. This is the reality of original sin, for you it might be that you are occasionally uncharitable to a brother or sister, a friend, to your parents, etc, despite the fact that you know that your were called by Christ Jesus to love one another as he loved you. For others who grew up in varying situations, such as those who were forced to endure the ludeness of public schools or whose parents deposited them in front of the TV since they were three years old, this may involve watching "pornographic" films and shows (i.e. prime time TV) while being staunchly against pornography. We are learning creatures, and while not excusing sin, we must be aware that sin and evil become easier as we become habituated to it, as we become addicted to it. Someone who knows that premarital intercourse is wrong, intellectually, may champion abstinence, but if they have engaged in it once it becomes infinitely more difficult to not do it again simply because at the biological level your body is designed to become chemically addicted to your wife (or husband). This is why governments must legislate morality. I am not suggesting that we force people to be good Judeo-Christians, but that we help people to be good men, and women. A good Christian man is first and foremost a good man, because Jesus, who we model our life after was the perfect man.
"The problem with the theology of Christian reconstructionism is not its morality, but rather its desire to impose morality on others – and this is an important distinction. I'm not saying there isn't right and wrong – there is – but I am saying it is wrong to impose moralism on others."
You know this is the same arguement that Sen. Kerry used to defend why he is "personally against" abortion, but votes to protect it. If something is wrong for a good Christian then it is equally wrong for any person because God does not give Christians a unique law but restates the natural law clearly. Thus in the duty of charity that we owe our neighbor, it is our duty as an individual and as a society to help people be good men and women. What is essential to being a good man is following the natural law--a law that is available to all, but is clearly restated in Revelation because man so often claims ignorance of it. Following the same schema as the Decalogue natural law teaches us: respect for our parents (i.e. the rights and duties associated with raising a family); the dignity of Human life (i.e. no murder, abortion, suicide, or euthanasia, and a preferential option for the poor); the dignity of marriage as a means for procreation and unity (i.e. no divorce or interference with the marital act such as contraception); respect for the duties and rights associated with property (i.e. no theft and share means with the poor); the primacy of truth (i.e. no perjury); the danger of lust (i.e. no pornography); and the danger of jealousy. As you see some of these proscriptions are easier to put into law than others, but they all must find some place in law because beyond being punitive law ought to be educational. In your article you say that its wrong to enforce morality--but you don't mean this because I am sure that you are ok with morality being enforced as regards murder and theft. "In a free society, the standards of protection are based upon the ability of citizens to secure their property. " What you mean is that you have bought into the libertarian
(utilitarian) notion that matters of sexuality harm no one and so you can't legislate against them. In reality however, sexuality is the most powerful human drive, and a disordered sexuality leads to an undermining of the whole natural law. When sexuality, and intercourse, become about pleasure and not about love, true Christian love, agape in the greek and caritas in latin, then anything goes because other people become things to be enjoyed and used. Historically, pornography led to infidelity, which led to a break down in trust between men and women, this in turn led to divorce, contraception, and entually abortion, it also often led to murder based in lust and jealousy, abortion led to a culture of murder, which in turn leads to euthanasia and eugenics. Today there are "scholars" in the United States who argue that parents should have the right to kill their child for two years AFTER they are born and in the Neitherlands doctors are able to murder children under twelve who they deem undesirable because of defects or illness. Lets not forget also that the breakdown of the family leads to poverty and therefore the greater likelyhood of crimes against persons and property, disrespect for parents, disrespect for parental duties, and the erosion of parental rights. JRR Tolken in his writtings about "Middle Earth" prior to his famous novel "The Hobit" wrote that in the begining the world was sung into existence, this is of course an analogy for creation, whether he admits it or not. Similar to Tolken's "sub-creation," as he called it, real Creation was accomplished by God's Word which "sung" all of existence into being and ordered everything in perfect diversity. Just as in a Opera if one instrument plays a wrong note or one voice sings off tune the whole is distorted, if you pull at (break) one of the commandments you do damage to them all.
"However, standards of morality can only be based on a sense of religious worldview." Here you are wrong. Just because the majority of people who talk about morality today are Christians doesn't mean that Christians are the only people interested in morality. Morality is not primarly based on a religious worldview, but rather on a human worldview. Aristotle, who did not believe in the Greek gods and was not exposed to Christainity or (most likely) Judaism, in his works promoted all of the commandments. Aristotle was able to see the commandments in nature because he lived the truely human life, the life that was focus on the search for truth the search for God. Does this mean his ethics were error free, no, without recourse to Revelation he made some mistakes, but his example and the example of other virtuous pagans demonstrate that morality is a fundamentally human endeavor. Not forgetting the most important commandments, the first three commandments about God are also natural laws, which were the first to be dispatched, they demonstrate mans natural capacity and yearning for God. You shall have only one God points us to the fact that we ought not make ourselves, material things, or ideologies our god, but rather search for the True God. True for the Jew or Christian this command identifies the True God, but even for an unbeliever like Aristotle this natural law is important because logically speaking there can be only one god, which can't be a created thing. You shall not take His name in vain shows us that we ought not use the term God frivolously as the pagans and atheists do, because the quest for god is so central to what it means to be human. Finally keep holy the sabbath shows us that we ought not be consumed by work, but rather that each man need leisure time in which to seek out God, as Aristolte also notes.
It is not surprising that in the late 1900s in intellectual circles God was being forgotten, and that soon thereafter other gods were appearing in his place: i.e. atheistic rationalism, materialism in its communist, socialist, fascist, and capitalist forms, as well as hedonism, scientism, etc. The result is, I fear that each of the commandments have been violate more often in the past century than in the 19 that preceded since the birth of Christ.
When I was your age I toyed with the libertarianism that I sensed in your article. If you will take a bit of advise that road leads no-where except to sin, vice, and error. I believe that in the world we live in, more so than ever, we need to have a limited government, but we can not give up on the promotion of basic morality through the law. If we do the law will eventually become a farce, a farce used against Christians. You are dead on that we need to teach people how to be more authentic in their Christian faith. As a Catholic I see that quite clearly, we have 1.1 billion faithful, 60 million in the States, including the Kennedy and Kerry families, but at least half of these do not know their faith well or do not live it. However, don't buy this nonsense about it being wrong to impose your morality on others--there is no such thing as YOUR morality, things are either moral or not, for all people at all times. It may be wrong to impose your customs on others, since custom changes, but morality does not and that is the big difference. Ultimately in the most gray cases people must make their own decisions based on their own consciences but the law should provide them with a certain measuring stick.
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