| Another illustration shows how many teens are affected. Imagine a high school football stadium filled with teenagers. Then start counting. One in five of the cheering kids have herpes. Herpes has no cure. Every third girl has the human papilloma virus (HPV). HPV causes 99.7% of cervical cancer cases that kills over 5000 women each year. One out of ten has chlamydia. Even if we pulled out the healthy kids, the stadium would still be nearly full. Consider these statistics: It gets worse. The Journal of the American Medical Association reported in a February 2002 editorial that the number of people with asymptomatic STDs (diseases with no outward symptoms like lesions or warts) probably exceeds those whose diseases are diagnosed. This means that the epidemic may be twice as large as we think. The STD epidemic is a catastrophe. Millions of teens have been hurt. Millions more are threatened. Diseases are tearing into the bodies of our children in ways that will cause irreparable harm or even kill them. The crisis exists because society has jettisoned the moral standards that direct sexual behavior. The shift began with the “sexual revolution” in the sixties when the effects of unbridled promiscuity were largely unknown. (Only two known STDs existed thirty years ago both treatable with penicillin.) As society adopted the values of the sixties the moral culture changed. Promiscuity ruled the day and STDs spread like wildfire. Big media is a big culprit because they target teens with the message that sex has no risks. They have sexualized almost every corner of the youth culture. They relentlessly sell promiscuity but make no mention of the harm that the promiscuity causes. They care for your child’s wallet but not for his welfare. Greed drives their moral recklessness. There are things that parents can do. Several years ago the Search Institute , a Minneapolis based think tank that studies the moral lives of children, isolated three factors in the lives of teens who successfully navigated the minefield of teen culture. The teens who developed sound morality and avoided non-marital sex and other enticements of the teen culture had three things working for them: 1) a relationship with a stable adult in addition to their parents; 2) friends who shared the same moral values; and 3) a religious grounding. Parents must cultivate this kind of environment. |
| The Anthropological Dimension of the Culture War The culture war is fundamentally a conflict about anthropology—how we value the human being, how we ought to define him, the purpose for his existence, what social arrangements society deems suitable for men and women, and so forth. And politics emerged as the prominent battlefield for the conflict. Complex conflicts tend to drift toward simplification, and the culture war was no exception. Cultural liberalism and cultural conservatism roughly followed political lines: Democrats were liberal and Republicans were conservative. It wasn’t a perfect fit, but even a big suit on a small man still covers his body. No one has really been comfortable with the arrangement, except perhaps the activists. Adding to the discomfort is our characteristically American way of adjudicating moral conflict. American culture has no institution of moral judgment. We have no national Church, no council of legislative elders, and no final court of arbitration that can definitively resolve the perplexing moral questions that face us. As a result, the debates and political maneuverings that follow are often raucous and chaotic affairs. There is wisdom in this system of apparent chaos, however. The Founding Fathers, in refusing to establish a central authority of moral judgment, ensured that these questions must be addressed by the culture itself, thereby affirming the precept, politics follows culture , in ways that inhibit any imposition of a final adjudication from the state. This precept is also drawn from the Christian tradition. It is grounded in the notion that the power of the state draws not only from the consent of the people, but from a people grounded in the Christian moral tradition. Solzhenitsyn, again stressing the anthropological dimension, himself acknowledged this point in the Harvard address: Yet in the early democracies, as in the American democracy at the time of its birth, all individual human rights were granted on the ground that man is God’s creature. That is, freedom was given to the individual conditionally, in the assumption of his constant religious responsibility. |
| Dac vorbim în ziua de azi despre dreptul internaional, despre organizaiile internaionale, dac spunem c civilizaia uman ar putea fi o oarecare comunitate, noi ne bazm pe faptul, poate chiar în mod incontient, c exist un consens de ordin moral între fiii i fiicele neamului omenesc i acest consens de ordin moral este determinat de contiina omeneasc. Pe aceast idee se bazeaz dreptul. A vrea s vorbesc în primul rând despre aceste valori morale de baz i despre legislaie. I Pe parcursul a sute de ani modelul unei dezvoltri stabile ale societii era conceput în baza principiilor i valorilor morale de baz, despre aceasta am vorbit mai sus. Noiunile de dreptate i demnitate, datorie i onoare, dragoste fa de Patrie i sacrificiu, solidaritate i milostenie sunt strâns incluse în sistemul relaiilor unei societi tradiionale. Anume valorile morale fundamentale asigur existena stabil a societii i perpetuarea experienei istorice a generaiilor. Unul din instrumentele cele mai eficiente în pstrarea stabilitii sociale este legea. Dreptul este, fr îndoial, o invenie omeneasc, dar bazele sale valorice se afl în moralitatea legii lui Dumnezeu. Încercai s rupei legea de moral, cum au fcut-o în Africa de Sud în timpul apartheidului sau în Germania nazist, când se elaborau legi pline de ur fa de oameni. A vrea s subliniez acest gând prin cuvintele lui Vladimir Sergheevici Soloviev, filozof rus, care a trit la finele secolului al XIX-lea. El scria: „Între buntatea ideal i realitatea rutcioas exist un domeniu intermediar al dreptului i al legii, care servete întruprii buntii, precum i limitrii i rectificrii rului. Justiia i statul au condiionat organizarea de facto a vieii morale a omenirii”. Cu toate acestea, îi continu gândul filozoful, dac justiia se înstrineaz de viaa bazat pe moral – acum urmeaz cea ce e cel mai important – ea îi pierde fundamentul i în nici un fel nu se mai deosebete de abuz („Justificarea binelui”). Rupei morala de la lege i legea înceteaz s mai fie lege, ea începe s serveasc stihiilor omeneti, dar nu s exprime acel principiu moral care a venit la noi de sus i care este baza existenei umane. Aadar, în mod ideal justiia trebuie s proiecteze norme ale legii morale în diverse domenii ale vieii oamenilor. Dar în viaa real, sub influena multor factori, inclusiv de natur politic, social, economic, cultural, justiia se deprteaz de acest ideal. |
| The weakness of the religious position is in the obvious fact that not everyone in the U.S. follows the same religious tradition. If a religious view is prevalent among the citizens of the Republic, then their wishes may enforced through a democratic process, barring judicial involvement. Yet, just as obviously this position cannot be held by all people in the U.S., unless all people were to convert to just one religious tradition. Since this is highly unlikely in the foreseeable future, any imposition of a particular stance through legislation is sure to be viewed as forcing others to conform. While violent enforcement has become a hallmark of Western Christianity—from the Spanish Inquisition in the Old World to the Protestant witch-hunts in the New—it has always created both a contemporary opposition and a lasting negative legacy. It is not surprising or unexpected then that even people who themselves would never consider an abortion as an acceptable option for themselves, choose to support the right to abortion as their personal opposition to the secular enforcement of religious beliefs. CONCLUSION In the secular moral system of the American society, no objective basis can exist to support the rights of the unborn. In fact, no absolute or objective moral basis can exist to support any human rights. Just as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is nothing but a convention, and, as such, is authoritative only to those who choose to subscribe to this convention, any local convention is relative, and can and will be challenged. A society may decide that it is beneficial to support or ban abortion rights, to allow or ban euthanasia, or to mandate or discourage eugenics, but all of the decisions are open to challenges as lacking any objective moral basis. This, however, does not necessarily present a problem to a society, as some have successfully existed with moral codes significantly different from ours. The Orthodox position, on the other hand, finds a solid and easily definable moral foundation in its religious texts and tradition. It gives the unborn children most of the rights that it affords to all humans, including the right to life independent of the mother’s wishes. The religious position also places the responsibility for the unborn child’s life upon both of the child’s parents, thus changing the question from whose rights are greater to that of whose responsibility is greater. |
| IV 28). По представлениям Г. В. ад, находящийся под землей, отстоит от нее на столько, на сколько земля - от неба (Ibid. IV 42). Наказания в аду производятся адским (геенским) огнем, созданным Божественной справедливостью от начала мира в предведении грехопадения и буд. Суда (Moral. XV 29. 35). Этот огонь материален (ignis corporeus - Dial. IV 29). Зажженный однажды, он остается неугасимым (inexstinguibilis), для него не нужно горючего материала, его «пищей» служат грешники; он жжет, но не сжигает, извергает пламя, но не дает света (Moral. XV 29. 35). Адский огонь, будучи единым по природе, не всех грешников жжет одинаковым образом, поскольку каждый грешник терпит наказание в зависимости от тяжести своей вины (Dial. IV 43). Г. В. достаточно подробно исследовал вопрос, каким образом нематериальные души могут гореть в этом материальном огне. Во-первых, он замечал, хотя душа живого человека бестелесна, она содержится в теле, поэтому она может содержаться и в материальном огне. Во-вторых, хотя диавол и др. демоны бестелесны, они также осуждены на наказания в материальном огне, поэтому и души грешников еще прежде соединения с телами могут чувствовать мучения. Дух страдает от того, что видит этот огонь, и сожигается от того, что видит себя сожигаемым (concremari se aspicit); так что из видимого огня извлекается невидимый жар и страдание, чтобы через телесный огонь бестелесный дух мучился нематериальным пламенем (Ibid. IV 29). Души грешников претерпевают вечную смерть, т. е. потерю блаженной жизни, но не утрачивают при этом своего сущностного бытия (Ibid. IV 45); они мучаются, но не уничтожаются, умирают, но продолжают жить (Moral. XV 17. 21). После воскресения и всеобщего Суда мучения грешников еще более возрастут, поскольку к духовным страданиям добавятся и физические (Dial. IV 29; Moral. XV 29. 35). Когда настанет великий и страшный День Господень , Христос вместе со всеми небесными силами явится на землю во второй раз, но уже как Судия, и поразит Своих врагов духом уст Своих (Moral. |
| The latest humanistic moral, and with it the Protestant moral of the rationalistic direction came to mutual agreement that for the strengthening of the principle of love it is necessary to renounce «the scholastic» notions about the personality, free will, retribution, and instead of these notions, protecting egoism, to establish the opposite view onto existence, as onto council Divine life, which is distributed between creatures, who long to be the parts of one gracious unity. Here, spiritualism is changed into pantheism, the main leading principle of the modern philosophy and rationalistic theology. Let us add that not mainly humanism, but the Protestant predestination, (which denies the significance of the exploits of will) and the common drop of morals that was concealed behind the shield of humanism serve as the main basis for the development of such a world-view. But let us discuss only the positive aspect of the latter, without penetrating into its concealed meaning. The connection between personalities is destroyed here, the opposition between «I» and «not me» is exterminated; there is no place for haughty self-praise of nonentity, which bears the name of a human. But everyone knows that with the extermination of the freedom of will the difference between the good and the evil and any moral responsibility of man fades, and the same happens to the moral attraction of the exploit of love and its moral necessity. That is why the contradiction between haughty sensuous egoism and known to our heart element of love cannot be solved within the philosophic thought, till it originates from this or that principle of natural life – the principle of a free personality or of natural humanism: in the first case there rules legal formalism, in the second – pantheism. Obviously, both the thought and real life are based on the initial notion, due to which there will happen the reconciliation between the free self-esteem of personality and the principle of self-denial and life for the sake of others. Here, these others, this «not me,» would not be anything opposite to me, to my «ego,» and the freedom of each personality would be combined with the metaphysical council of their existence, not like it is in pantheism. |
| Kant’s desire to elaborate a unified system of morality was also dictated by his search for ways to overcome the conflict between Catholicism and Protestantism, at least in the area of moral teaching. Since the Reformation, Europe was shaken by continued religious wars between Catholics and Protestants. A Christian ethics separated from doctrine and acceptable for both the Catholics and the Protestants should have become a bridge to unite the two antagonistic groups and help them learn to co-exist in peace. Thus, the need to find a minimal mutual understanding between Catholicism and Protestantism, on one hand, and between Christianity and the Enlightenment, on the other, singled out ethics as a separate independent discipline which was to become an area free from conflicts on religious or philosophical grounds. The problem of the justification of ethics However, ethics once removed from its philosophical and religious roots proved to be instable, deprived of the foundations it used to have within faith systems and religious practices. Kant himself could not find anything better than to assert ethical norms as a ‘categorical imperative’ which actually was given the nature of law constituting a particular norm without giving an exhaustive explanation why it was a norm. For this reason, along with de-ontological justification of ethics suggested by Kant, there emerged new theories explaining the nature of ethics and moral laws. One of them, the theory of consequentialism (from the word ‘consequence’) suggests that a particular action become either morally positive or negative depending on its consequences. According to another theory called aretaic from the Greek αρετ meaning ‘virtue’, what makes an action moral is not so much its consequences as its nature as well as the moral qualities of the actor himself. Finally, some thinkers developed a teleological ethics, from the Greek τλος meaning ‘end’. According to this theory, whether an action is right or wrong is determined by its final goal, which can be, for instance, the formation of man as a moral being with sustainable virtues including Christian ones. Interesting in this respect are the thoughts of Max Weber who believed a person should be guided in his actions by an ‘ethics of the ultimate end’, while acting on the basis of not only reason but also faith |
| that human beings are created in the image and likeness of God. Christianity has always stressed that if human being lives a moral live he or she may become God’s friend (cf. John 15.15) and achieve freedom (cf. John 8.32). Every honest specialist in European history may witness that the Christian attitude to human person destroyed and condemned slavery, formed means of fair judgment, created high social and political standards of life, shaped ethical relations between persons, and developed science and culture. The very conception of human rights, Europe’s main political idea, has developed not without some influence of Christian teaching of dignity, freedom, and moral character of human being. From the very beginning human rights developed in the context of Christian morality forming with it a kind of tandem. Yet today there occurs a break between human rights and morality, and this break threatens the European civilization. We can see it in a new generation of rights that contradict morality, and in how human rights are used to justify immoral behavior. In this connection, I may note that morality, with which any human right advocacy has to count, is mentioned in the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. I am convinced that the makers of the European Convention on Human Rights included therein morality not as something ambiguous but rather as an integral element of the whole human rights system. If we ignore moral norms, we ultimately ignore freedom too. Morality is freedom in action. It is a freedom brought into reality as a result of responsible choice, in which human person restricts his or her self for the good of that very person and broader society. Moral principles secure societal vitality and growth, as well as unity of society, which is one of primary objectives of the European Convention on Human Rights. And whenever moral norms are trespassed and declared to be relative, it may undermine the whole worldview of the Europeans. They |
| He then moves to criticize the religious leaders who are “particularly susceptible to the ideology:” He notes that clergymen were in the movement to appease Germany before World War II; liberal Protestant churches were apologists for the North Vietnamese, and Soviet Russia manipulated the World Council of Churches: “‘A Plea for Peace’ continues in this tradition.” Quoting from the OPF Iraq Appeal, Jacobse asserts that moral equivalency shaped its conclusion that there was no difference between the American soldier and murder. “The facts prove otherwise,” he continues, “American military action in Iraq was conducted to avoid the deaths of innocent people… but facts don’t matter here.” He suggests that peace movements themselves contribute to the instability that creates war because “their moral equivocation blinds them to real evil in the world,” and in fact they kill more innocent people than otherwise would die during wartime: “Their ideology has contributed to the death of millions. Iraqi civilians cheered the American soldiers because they brought real liberation from real terror. American soldiers emptied the Iraqi jails, not the peace activists. Let these Iraqi’s be their judge, not OPF.” Jacobse states that the OPF’s most serious error is their assertion that the Orthodox Church has never regarded any war as just or good: drawing on St. Basil’s canon (see above), he asserts that their assertion that the Orthodox Church does not accept a just war is “a transparent attempt to join the ideology of the peace movement to the Orthodox moral tradition.” Thus, he concludes suggesting that the Orthodox leaders who signed the OPF Iraq Appeal substituted ideology in the place of moral reason, thereby equating the two: “They should remove their signatures to clear the confusion they have created.” Jacobse’ article contains many problems that warranted numerous responses from OPF members. His logic is flawed when he accuses the OPF of using “moral equivalency,” because his response against such a phenomenon is to repeat the mistake. Rather than rectify the OPF’s use of moral equivalency, he proceeds to equate the recent peace movement with terrorism. His statement that the ideology of the peace movement has contributed to the death of millions is simply unrealistic, and in presenting such an assertion, he paints peace activists as murders in much the same way that he accuses the OPF of painting American soldiers. In addition, one must note that Jacobse does not quote from the second half of St. Basil’s canon, which asserts that soldiers’ hands are not clean and suggests that they abstain form communion; rather, he simply quotes the first half in such a way that it appears St. Basil’s canon merely states that soldiers did nothing wrong in war. Jacobse shapes the Orthodox tradition in the same way that he censures the OPF for doing. |
| The purpose of the way is to achieve simplicity, and the means is purification. Purification, katharsis, is a fundamental and much developed idea in Plotinus’ thought. 53 It includes, as we would expect, the pursuit of the moral virtues. Plotinus, however, is anxious to point out how the pursuit of morality can actually hinder the soul’s ascent. For morality is concerned with the soul’s activity in the realm of sensible reality and can thus bind the soul the more firmly to that realm (V.9.5). For Plotinus the pursuit of virtue is only right if virtue is seen as purificatory; and to that end he draws a distinction between civic virtues, which are essentially concerned with the conduct of life here on earth, and purificatory virtues, which help the soul to detach itself from the world and prepare it for contemplation (see I.2.3). The aim of moral purification is tranquility – then ‘there will be no battling in the soul’ (I.2.5) – a tranquillity that will help the soul to achieve inwardness. But more important than moral purification is intellectual purification. This includes dialectic and mental training such as we would expect. But it is best characterized rather differently. In one place, speaking of the soul’s ascent, Plotinus says: ‘The guiding thought is this: that beauty perceived in material things is borrowed’ (V.9.2). It is real enough – Plotinus has nothing but contempt for those who vilify the cosmos – but it is borrowed, it is lent to the material order, it does not inhere in it. And, as we read on, we find that this is generally true: the beauty we perceive is borrowed. Even when we reach the realm of Intelligence, the realm of the Idea, which is ‘veritably intellectual, wise without intermission and therefore beautiful in itself’, we must look beyond: ‘we must look still inward beyond the Intellectual, which, from our point of approach, stands before the Supreme Beginning, in whose forecourt, as it were, it announces in its own being the entire content of the Good, that prior of all, locked in unity, of which this is the expression already touched by multiplicity’ (ibid.). This ability to let go and pass beyond, an activity learnt by exercise at lower levels: this is the fruit of intellectual purification. Trouillard calls this générosité intellectuelle, a rarer gift than moral generosity, and he characterizes it as disposition d’audace, de souplesse et de dépouillement noétiques. 54 As moral generosity liberates us from the passions, so intellectual generosity frees us from what is partial and fragmentary, or from what is borrowed, and takes us on to the true source of all reality. |
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