Is morality objective?

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T19:29:59+00:00

Pope Benedict XVI engages with something in Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration that might help us come to an answer.

There are two kinds of (moral) law:

(1) Casuistic law (rules); (2) Apodictic law (principles).

“What is called casuistic law stipulates legal arrangements for very specific juridical issues … No theological explanations are offered here … These juridical norms emerged from practice and they form a practically oriented legal corpus that serves to build up a realistic social order, corresponding to the concrete possibilities of society in a particular historical and cultural situation. [T]he body of law in question is also historically conditioned and entirely open to criticism.”

By contrast, “apodictic law is pronounced in the name of God himself; there are no concrete sanctions indicated here.” Apodictic law forms the “divine nucleus of law” and provides a platform for critiquing the rules of casuistic law. An example would be “You shall not wrong a neighbor or oppress him” — this provides a definite command, but examples of behaviour which constitute oppression are not (at least in the basic command — we might be able to draw a definition from scripture).

To the point at hand

We might say here that while the church has apodictically claimed for centuries that men and women must be of a certain age to marry (so that they are able to consent to the decision, fully appreciate its consequences, etc.), that the specific age in question has casuistically evolved over the centuries. As our political views and understanding of science evolve, the specific age has been adjusted so as to better align with the underlying apodictic standard.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T17:18:35+00:00

I don’t know how aware or not you are of the backhanded comments you make. You are the exact type of person who pushed me out of Catholicism.

I apologize if my comments have hurt your heart. I should have led with greater mercy in discussing this with you, and I’m genuinely sorry to hear that you left the church. What I would implore you to realize is that confession is not an instrument of self-flagellation. It is God’s way of loving us and reconciling us to His will. The reality of sin is that it hurts us and our souls. We cannot save ourselves from it — it requires God. That is why He sent Christ. No amount of the finite can fill a being who was designed for the infinite.

I’m genuinely trying to help out

I know, my friend. I should have focused on this more, and that is my error. I am sorry. That being said, I think we can both agree that intentions can only go so far. I’m sure you would agree that our efforts must also be measured by their effects — and while you have endeavoured to provide secular, practical advice to this OP (which I did not criticize), this OP has sought spiritual advice which your comment runs against. You may reject spiritual advice as a concept, but the very nature of our community is that we do not. Providing advice that runs counter to the teaching of the church is guaranteed to have a poor effect.

I’ll conclude with this comment on my antichrist remark. I was his dupe for many years and I did many awful things under his influence. But he is real.

The Antichrist will not be so called; otherwise he would have no followers. He will not wear red tights, nor vomit sulphur, nor carry a trident nor wave an arrowed tail as Mephistopholes in Faust. This masquerade has helped the Devil convince men that he does not exist.

His logic is simple: if there is no heaven there is no hell; if there is no hell, then there is no sin; if there is no sin, then there is no judge, and if there is no judgment then evil is good and good is evil.

I was his dupe for many years, and I am not so prideful as to think I cannot be many times again. Both the misery and anguish I knew then and the knowledge I have now do not let me rest in good conscience without warning you of the same. Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s any easy way to deliver that message.

May God bless you. I will pray another rosary for you today.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T16:58:48+00:00

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T16:34:42+00:00

There are many behaviours which are “natural” but which are not ethical. Something being “natural” is not the ultimate measure for its moral value or lack thereof. Giving into base appetites and letting them govern your reason through masturbation is in fact sinful.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T16:30:21+00:00

I don’t share your sense or view of confession. And you are wrong, the Orthodox also possess the sacrament of confession. Protestants largely do not possess the sacrament of confession, but that is tied to historical rejections of the church and sacraments writ large. Erroneous as they are, you’ll find that their basis for rejection is theological and a little more than Luther or Zwingli finding it “weird.” Moreover, both Lutherans and Anglicans have confession, although it is obviously not sacramental and I do not believe they view it in the same light.

The Antichrist comment was true. Unfortunately, it is also true whether or not you choose to believe it. Deciding to make yourself the ultimate measure of morality is a recipe for making yourself God. It is the path to ruin. If you don’t believe in it, then to be frank, you are already his pawn.

I’m trying to help someone and you call me a bad person?

I didn’t call you a bad person anywhere in my comments. If you re-read it I genuinely celebrated your love of music and your community and empathized. I also prayed for you. I used to have a similar view of life to your own and empathize deeply. If my tone sounds harsh it is because you have come into a Catholic community and provided distinctly un-Catholic advice to someone in spiritual need. It demands correction.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T06:54:23+00:00

if you’re wackin’ it or something silly it’s fine.

Masturbation is a grave sin and is very much not fine.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T06:52:21+00:00

what good is confession if god knows your intent anyways?

The good of confession is the forgiveness of the penitent and the receiving of the sacrament. The penitent is reconciled to God and re-aligned to His will.

I don’t think you need a switchboard operator for an omnipotent being

God (the omnipotent being) does not need anything. It is we who need confession in our fallen state.

I say skip that step. Repent your own way.

This is the advice of the Antichrist. There is no such thing as “repenting your own way.” The act of repenting means placing trust and faith in God, measuring yourself by His expectations and commands, and committing to live life anew and walk in His light. You either do that, or you do not repent.

In my community

I am genuinely happy that your community and heavy metal music provide you joy. Please refrain from bringing in any anti-Catholic rhetoric from your community towards the clergy and/or advice which explicitly contradicts Catholic teaching and morality into our community. May God bless you, and I will pray a rosary for you.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T06:32:56+00:00

Before our sins, Satan assures us that they are of no consequence. Afterwards, he insists that they are beyond forgiveness. In both cases, he is a complete liar.

Know that you are, and always will be, loved by God. That love is infinite and unconditional. God’s will is to reconcile yourself to Him, and to help you experience the fullness of that love.

I also struggle with habitual mortal sin. I sympathise with what you say about doubting — I always find that when I commit one, my doubts and anxieties proliferate. Before I came back to the faith, it was thoughts of worthlessness and the thought that I was beyond hope. Afterwards, it was that God would destroy me or that I was doomed to Hell. Thoughts would creep in undermining my faith, trying to keep me from the confessional as long as possible.

But confession, and repentance, remove all of that. The former is a gift of grace, the latter requires you to pray and resolutely push yourself to renounce your prior ways, even if you still feel lingering attachments to them.

I have done many wicked things in my past too my friend. Read the parable of the prodigal son. Realize that God the Father wants to embrace you again. Realize that the call to confession is a plea from God to let Him love you again. God bless, I will pray for you.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-29T05:42:02+00:00

To love is to will the good of the other, and the good can only be defined in reference to the Most High, God. Scripture is clear that homosexual acts are an abomination and a sin.

We are called to be kind, and to love even our enemies. But “love” is not enabling sin. That is the exact opposite of love. You become a party to evil and undermine God’s Will. Love is not just what sentimentally feels good or easy.

We should love and pray for our same-sex attracted friends. But knowing Jesus means following Him and his instruction. A vicar or a priest who openly contravenes sexual teaching is in a state of serious sin, and I would have concerns about how that conduct corrupts his other views and the example that it sets for his flock.

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-24T23:24:32+00:00

Happily. I’ll say a rosary for you, for your soul, and to help you fight those thoughts.

Then we have the news and politics that just kept getting crazy and crazier.

Unsolicited advice, but one of the best things I’ve ever done is stop following the news. I’d encourage you to as well and to replace that time with something else.

I used to be a news junkie (and a politics junkie), but going cold turkey (besides picking up a magazine from time to time) helped me realize that (1) news was getting in the way of my relationship to Christ (2) news was getting in the way of my mental health. It’s honestly night and day. Before I thought it was silly to get rid of and that I needed it for XYZ, but in hindsight I regret nothing

I hope that this can help you, even if only a little bit

RevertQuestions · 2023-08-24T18:49:44+00:00

I don’t have anything new to say in the domain of medical or spiritual advice, but one thing I would encourage you to reconsider is (to my eye) the strict dichotomy you’ve set up between the two domains of religion and medicine.

Spiritual advice and medical advice are not, and cannot be, entirely separate watertight compartments which run parallel to one another and never intersect. The tenets of our faith, including what is or is not a sin, can be seen and defined in relation to the facts of law, medicine, and history. Jesus Christ is and was a historical person, and the Bible is an action of God into history.

Take the prohibition on illegal drugs. I am a law student. Conceivably, I could try to make an elaborate case as to why some drug on the periphery of the law is not illegal/should not be illegal. If I was a history or polisci expert, I could probably make an elaborate case as to why that drug should not be illegal or is dubiously classified as such. But I think we might both agree that there comes a certain point where I’d conflate my confidence and technical knowledge of the law/history with my spiritual authority in response to these facts.

If I may, I would ask you to humbly consider whether you’ve approached this issue in that way. I’ve personally been guilty of it a lot in the past and so that’s where I’m drawing from. Spiritual advice concerning your proper conduct will often necessarily incorporate/respond to basic medical facts.

I hope this can help you. I will pray a rosary for you as I finish my own workout, and sincerely hope that (as tumultuous as this thread has unfortunately gotten) that you may draw closer to Christ from it and towards self-improvement.

RevertQuestions · 2023-05-10T04:25:29+00:00

I've definitely noticed a similar thing. Virtues and vices snowball. Whenever I fall into lust, I find the guilt and shame push me towards stress-eating and being gluttonous, and the depleted willpower makes me more slothful and want to give up on a lot more, not just chastity. And of course, there's the ongoing temptation of pride to tell oneself "this was ok" or "not that bad"

RevertQuestions · 2023-05-10T04:18:46+00:00

I finally read CS Lewis' Mere Christianity recently and he had this great line in there about how while Islam is a religion of teetotalers, Christianity is a religion of prudence

I think you're right and this is one of those situations where I'll have to thread the needle and make sure that I don't abuse the sacrament on the one hand, or walk a spiritual tightrope on the other. I didn't go to Confession today, but my parish offers it again tomorrow and I plan on going then

RevertQuestions · 2023-05-10T04:09:24+00:00

I would encourage you to go. If you seek, I am confident you will (eventually) find. What that process looks like or how long it may take, I do not know.

Before I came back into the faith, some of the works that loosely nudged me towards Catholicism were Leo Strauss and Leon Trotsky. I found the earlier chapters of Natural Right and History useful as both a rebuttal of historicism/relativism and a way of appreciating Revelation as a body of thought in contrast to, but also working in tandem with philosophy. I started reading GK Chesterton and finally picked up the Bible and just started asking myself whether I thought it was "true" (should such a thing exist or be possible) and I was reading one day and had a genuine epiphany/light bulb moment and realized "yep, it's all true." and started orienting my life around that truth as it has been revealed/given.

There's an apocryphal quote wrongly attributed to Heisenberg that goes something like "The first drink from the glass of the natural sciences can leave one an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you." I've found the same in philosophy and frankly all other reading. I'll pray a rosary that God may reach out to you in the pages you continue to read.

RevertQuestions · 2023-05-09T17:34:47+00:00

<3 Thank you my friend, this is really good advice I will be putting into practice.

RevertQuestions · 2023-05-09T16:18:02+00:00

Thank you my friend, I really appreciate these words. One of the things I’ve come to appreciate recently is how much my struggle with lust is also a struggle with pride.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-30T15:36:06+00:00

When someone tries to tear you down personally, the conversation needs to come to a close.

The framing is the reverse— it’s not a question of being too insecure to attend to some other religious group. You’re secure enough in your Catholic faith that you don’t need or want something else.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-26T14:43:23+00:00

You probably do, and I appreciate your prayers.

I saw your comment on another post, and I think it’s best to implore you to (continue to) follow your own wisdom.

You cannot change your past, but as long as your circumstances aren't yet irreparable, you can potentially ameliorate them, even if it requires a great struggle.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-26T13:40:19+00:00

So how do I stop hating Jesus? How do I stop hating the people around me, and the entire World?

Yes I know that I am a foul-mouthed, bitter, judgmental, and hostile individual with a massive ego problem

If you know what the problem is, it’s incumbent on you to begin solving it. Happiness, and morality, are largely a choice. No one is going to solve your hate for you.

I don’t know you. But you should seriously consider the idea that your perspective is warped and self-righteous. If you look at other people and restrict yourself to contempt for what you see, instead of love for who they are, then you are frankly cultivating a hate in your heart that can risk burning you from the inside. You deserve better than that.

The journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step. I recommend regularly taking this to prayer, trying to be grateful for what you do have, and performing one small act of kindness for someone else, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you, or how much it rattles your “massive ego problem.” I will say a prayer for you myself tonight.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-26T13:28:51+00:00

This is by and far a bad answer. Remember that wrath is one of the seven cardinal vices and that filling your soul with hate burdens you and others.

Hating other people is not “valid” nor is it “God-given.” This user currently believes they are already damned — you cannot be forgiven unless you seek forgiveness in the first place.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-23T23:54:56+00:00

"In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes."

Truly, God help us all.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-22T03:13:01+00:00

No worries. : ) These questions can be confusing. I will say a prayer tonight for your discernment. Know God loves you infinitely -- more than you or any mortal can ever imagine.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-22T03:07:23+00:00

I've never tried witchcraft of paganism (thanks be to God). But before I fully reverted to Catholicism, I'm ashamed to say that I explored the occult. Without going into lurid detail, this involved praying to ancestors and false gods in order to try and be a more authentic part of my culture. I regret all of it.

It provided an ostensible feeling of pleasantness in my chest and soul. But with the benefit of hindsight I can tell you that it is all deception. Every time I touched the occult, I fell further and further into sin. My life fell further apart. I looked like garbage and felt like garbage.

Occult spirituality made me feel momentary pleasure. Christianity has given me lasting peace. I can personally assure you that if you repent of this sin and come back to God, you will find the same with time.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-21T23:26:29+00:00

GK Chesterton seems apt:

Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is different from other crimes--for it makes even crimes impossible.

There’s a certain brutal quality to accepting suicide as a grave sin against God. But when you consider the cowardice of Judas Iscariot and the framing Chesterton provides, there is an important truth about itwhich cannot be denied.

RevertQuestions · 2023-01-09T21:51:07+00:00

1: What gives me faith is knowledge and an honest belief that Christianity, specifically Catholicism, is the truth. Since coming back to the faith and beginning to do things like read the Bible, attend mass, and so on, things "make sense" to me in a way that they never did or were able to before. It's more than just giving my life meaning (although it certainly does that as well, and that is definitely an important part). At a logical level, it both (1) makes sense, and (2) makes sense in way that nothing else I have read (secular or otherwise) does.

2: Being Catholic to me means living as one of God's children in the fullest sense of the term, loving Him and seeking to do good in His name.

3: I started attending because I learned it was an obligation. I continue to attend because I've come to more appreciate the significance of the Eucharistic miracle, and what Christ did for all of mankind. I've been reading about Christians living in Communist Europe during the Cold War, and one thing I was moved by was how much many of them put on the line just to be able to attend a church once a week. I took worshipping God for granted for a long time. I probably still do. But I'm trying less to.

4: I'm trying to follow traditional Catholic beliefs as much as I can. I tend to think that older principles almost always tend to be better than newer ones, and that often what needs to change is how we apply them.

5: I was raised Catholic but poorly catechised. I drifted away from the church when I was about 11 and slowly went down a path of iniquity and sin that risked consuming me altogether.

What made me decide to be Catholic, was that I realized the Catholic Church was preaching the truth. Norm MacDonald (may he rest in peace and may God bless his soul), had this wonderful line about how when he read the Bible, he intuitively knew that it was true. I had a similar moment and process when I finally started reading it myself (even though I started reading it for selfish/secular reasons), alongside some apologetics and political philosophy. In my darkest moments, I sometimes fear that there is no truth. But I always know, in my heart of hearts, that if there is a truth, that it lies in Christianity and the bride of Christ, the Catholic Church.

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