Christian Ethics

Christian Ethics

1. Natural Law

   • St Thomas Aquinas
     • Believed the perfect fulfilment was God
     • 1225-1274
     • Put forward the Cosmological Arguement
     • Absolutist and Deontological
       • Interior/Exterior acts: Both must be good.
     • Four cardinal virtues (necessary for moral life)
       • 4) Temperance: temperance is the restraint of our desires or passions
       • 3) Fortitude: Courage to carry out Prudence and Justice, a gift of the Holy Spirit
       • 1) Prudence: allows us to judge correctly what is right and what is wrong in any given situation
       • 2) Justice: concerned with the will, justice is blind.
   • Aristotle
     • Stoics
     • Believed Eudaimonia was the Teleos of Man
       • Meaning happiness and content were mans goal.
         • All Humans have a purpose
     • We all have a purpose and supreme goodness is found when you fulfil it.
     • There was a law written in nature for humans to know how to act morally
       • Saw reason as the highest form of human activities
   • "Natural Law is the sharing in the eternal law by intelligent beings" - St Aquinas
   • There is a natural order determined my a supernatural power.
     • Rooted in our human nature (not a "duty" or imposed law) and out search for happiness and fulfilment
     • Must use reason to understand these laws
   • Human Law: What we create
     • Natural Law: What we observe
       • Divine Law: A manual sent to us (The Bibile
         • Precepts
           • Secondary
             • Doctrine of the Double Effect
           • Primary
             • Preservation of Life
             • Worship God
             • Live peacefully in society
             • Educate the young
             • Reproduction
           • Synderesis: "Do good and avoid evil"
             • Real Goods: Using reason to correctly choose the right thing to do
             • Apparent Goods: Is perceived as good but does not fit the perfect human ideal
         • Eternal Law: The Designer's Plan
   • Literal - Catholics - Orthodox
   • Standard of morality independant from Gods will
   • Strengths And Weaknesses.
     • Strengths
       • Clear Cut + Common Rules
       • Made flexible by Secondary precepts
       • Basic principles are reasonable
       • Focuses on human character- not right or wrong
     • Weaknesses
       • Based on assumptions of the world
       • Too Simplistic
       • Cultural Relativism - morals are different around the world
       • Too Optimistic

2. Situation Ethics

   • Joseph Fletcher (1905-1991)
   • 6 Fundamental Principles
     • Love is the only absolute
     • Love is Self-giving
     • Justice will follow from love, justice is love distributed
     • Love has no faviourites
     • Love must be the final end
     • The loving thing to do will always depend on the situation.
   • Four Working principles
     • Relativism - Words like 'always' are banned
     • Positivism - Make sure the outcome is positive
     • Pragmatism - What you propose must work in practice
     • Personalism - People are put first
   • Strengths
     • Easy to uderstand
     • Easy to update to new science and situations
     • Flexible and takes into consideration the situation
     • Focuses on humans and concerns for others
     • Allows people to take responsibility for their actions
   • Weaknesses
     • Wrong to make decisions that could potentially go against the teachings of the church and bible
     • We can never fully determine outcomes

3. Divine Command Theory

   • Meta-ethical theory
   • And action is moral only if
   • St Augustine (354-430)
   • St Thomas Aquinas (1224-1275)
   • Robert Adam (1905-1991)
     • Modified Divine Command
       • "It is wrong to do X" is the same as "It is contrary to God's command to do X"
   • The Euthyphro Dilema
     • Dialogue between Scorates and Euuthyphro
     • 1. Is it good because God ordained it?
     • 2. Or does Go ordain it because it is good?
     • Peter Singers objection
       • "If God happened to approve torture and disapproved of helping others, torture would be good and helping others bad."
   • Fits into Natural Law
   • Strengths
     • Absolutist as the commands are given and can't be changed
   • Weaknesses
     • Because of Epistemic Distance we can never know what his commands are
       • Conscience breaks this distance
     • As society has progressed, the Bible hasn't
     • If there is no standard of moral behaviour independant of God, how can we judge his actions?

4. The Bible

   • Old Testament
     • 10 Commandments
       • Exodus 20
     • Deontological
     • Absolutist
   • The Church
     • Catholics
       • Pope
       • Bishops
       • Priests
     • Protestants
       • Vicars
   • New Testament
     • WWJD?
     • St Paul
       • Love - Agape
     • Two Greatest Commandments Matthew 22:36-40
       • "Love your Lord God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind"
       • "Love your neighbour as yourself"
     • Sermon on the Mount Matthew 5-7

5. Strenghts

   • Easy to follow - clear guidelines in certain sections
   • Takes into account emotion
   • Focused on doing Good, not duty

6. Weaknesses

   • Not everyone can access it.
   • May not progress with society
   • It's very subjective
   • Conscience can be used to justify anything
   • Epistemic Distance
   • Contradictions
   • Focused on good - subjective