One last thing on this topic, and I promise I am done with it for a while.
Just in case you have not seen it, Dr. Peter Kreeft tackles this subject over at CatholicVote.org.
Dr. Kreeft agrees with me, but he is able to use all the smarty-pants stuff at his disposal of which I am bereft. That said, I think I got the philosophy right, but Dr. Kreeft explains why.
Please go read the entire article, but for those who will not. Here is a little take-away.
Similarly, when we discuss Kant and the issue of lying, most of my students, even the moral absolutists, are quite certain that the Dutchmen were not wrong to deliberately deceive the Nazis about the locations of the Jews they had promised to hide. They do not know whether this is an example of lying or not. But they know that if it is, than lying is not always wrong, and if lying is always wrong, then this is not lying. Because they know, without any ifs or ands or buts, that such Dutch deception is good, not evil. If anyone is more certain of his philosophical principles than he is that this deception is good, I say he is not functioning as a human being but as a computer, an angel, a Gnostic, or a Kantian. He is a Laputan, like Swift’s absent-minded professors who live on an island in the sky in Gulliver’s Travels, and who make eye contact with abstractions but not with human beings.
But can’t we solve the problem of the Dutchmen and the Nazis by saying that all lying is wrong but the Dutchmen don’t have to lie to save the Jews because they could deceive the Nazis without lying by a clever verbal ploy? No, because effective deception by clever verbal ploys cannot usually be done by ordinary people, especially by clumsy Dutchmen. I know; I’m one of them. Our moral obligations depend on abilities that are common, not abilities that are rare
Besides, the Nazis are not fools. They would suspect clever prevarications and sniff out duplicitous ploys. They could be reliably deceived and deterred from searching every inch of the house only by an answer like “Jews? Those rats? None of them in my house, I hope. Please come in, and if you find any, please give them rat poison. I hate those vermin as much as you do.”
You promised the Jews to hide them from their murderers. To keep that promise, you have to deceive the Nazis. Physical hiding and verbal hiding are two sides of the same coin, whether you call it lying, or deception, or whatever you call it. What it is, is much more obvious than what it is to be called. It’s a good thing to do. If you don’t know that, you’re morally stupid, and moral stupidity comes in two opposite forms: relativism and legalism. Relativism sees no principles, only people; legalism sees no people, only principles.
Yeah, what he said.
February 20, 2011 at 9:47 pm
Hold on, here.
I admire Peter Kreeft a great deal… and I'm still looking forward to his attempt at building a logical argument about this issue; but for those who are dog-piling onto Tobias, I think you've gone far off-base.
First: I think I'm being accurate and morally sound when I say that everyone–even those whose opinions we reject–should be given the benefit of the doubt… at VERY least, with regard to sincerity of motive. Those commenters who snarlingly call Tobias (and Mark Shea, and others of like mind) "Pharisees" (and other epithets of contempt), are behaving disgracefully… and I do think Dr. Kreeft, himself, would agree with that point. Knock it off, ok? It's illogical, and it's hurtful, and it's helping no one. I know of no Gospel imperative to "spit on one's opponents, so long as they outrage you sufficiently". We're all adults, here, presumably? Then it's not unreasonable for us to comport ourselves accordingly. Besides: if logic and morality are truly on your side, then there's no reason to react so defensively.
2) Tobias makes a valid point about the risk of raw emotionalism, especially in firebrand topics such as this. The "I love Dr. Kreeft, and anyone who dares contradict him will face my wrath" impulse is… not helpful. (I'd say something far stronger, but I'm trying hard to be mild, here.) Did you not read that Dr. Kreeft, himself, did not intend to build a logical case, in this article? He said that. Honestly, he did. Go look. So I think it's a bit premature for anyone to crown this particular article of his as "victor in this battle"… especially since Dr. Kreeft hasn't even stepped into the ring, yet!
3) I agree with Dr. Kreeft's main point (that moral intuition is both good and helpful)… up to a point. The problem comes in when an audience that's accustomed to "following their heart" in moral matters decides that Dr. Kreeft has vindicated their position. To that, I say (and yes, I know it's wildly unpopular to say this, no matter what the topic is): "Not so fast!" Can our "moral intuition" be mis-calibrated? Yes, decidedly so (and examples abound: embryonic stem-cell research, in order to "save lives" [never mind that it doesn't!], has widespread support, even among erstwhile "pro-lifers", as does abortion in the case of rape and incest, as does contraception, and so on). So… when should we follow our moral intuition? Only when it's right. How do we know when it's right? By sane reason, by Divine Revelation, and by the teaching authority of the Church.
So… if we should only follow moral intuition when it's right, and we can only know it's right when it conforms to Divine Law and sane reason, then why are we tarring-and-feathering those who are sincerely trying to find out what the Church and sane reason tell us?
Nowhere did I see any of the "I'm not convinced Live Action's actions were morally licit" crowd condemning anyone who disagreed with them. (Go look!) Is it too much to ask for others to extend the same courtesy?
For my part, I'll wait and see what Dr. Kreeft says in his next pertinent article. I've seen the teaser trailer of his movie; now, I want to see the movie itself, before I give it a rating.
For anyone who's interested, there's some excellent discussion (and defenses of Tobias's position) at the blog of <a href="http://newtheologicalmovement.blogspot.com/2011/02/it-is-sin-to-lie-even-to-planned.html>Fr. Reginaldus [a pseudonym–horrors! 🙂 ]</a>. The issue isn't nearly so cut-and-dried as one might think.
February 20, 2011 at 9:48 pm
Phooey… the HTML link (to the New Theological Movement Blog) didn't take. Sorry about that! You can cut/paste it into the URL, though…
February 20, 2011 at 10:32 pm
1. A graded absolutist (Martin Luther was one) believes that there are many moral absolutes taught in the Bible and that they sometimes conflict. He believes there are higher moral laws taught in the Bible and when moral laws conflict, one is under obligation to follow the higher law. Therefore, according to those who hold this position, lying is sometimes right because showing mercy to the innocent is a greater moral duty than telling the truth to the guilty. For instance, while listening to a religious radio station, a denominational preacher teaching a lesson on the need to lie under certain circumstances. He used the story of Rahab the harlot to substantiate his teaching. This shows earthly wisdom on the part of these teachers, because even among those who know that the Bible condemns lying, the truth of what Rahab did (viz., she lied), and the fact she is mentioned in a positive manner in the New Testament, has caused some perplexity among God's people (cf. Hebrews 12:31 and James 2:25).
2.When one tries to take the Lord's teaching on "the weightier matters of the law" (cf. Matthew 23:23) to justify breaking any part of God's law, one is simply "wresting the Scriptures." Yes, Jesus spoke of the weightier matters of the law (e.g., "justice," "mercy" and "faith"). And what the Lord was teaching was that we ought to put first things first. But, He made it clear that the other less weightier things ought not to be left undone. In other words, one ought to keep all of God's commandments, not just the ones that are convenient. This position, which is, I am convinced, the only Biblically tenable position, the theologians would call "unqualified absolutism." The unqualified absolutist believes there are many absolute moral laws, and none of them should ever be broken. In other words, the unqualified absolutist believes one cannot justify lying even when such lying is for the sole purpose of saving the life of another. The one who holds this position believes that lying is always wrong! To many, this just seems too harsh.
3.Therefore, there is a third position called "Conflicting Absolutism." I first heard it articulated by a fellow Christian who I would otherwise consider to be a very careful Bible student. The one who takes this position believes that we inherently live in an evil world where absolute moral laws sometime run into inevitable conflict. In such cases, the conflicting absolutist believes it is his responsibility to do the "lesser evil." He will break what he considers to be the lesser law (viz., lying) to uphold the greater law (i.e., preserving life). Then, after doing so, he prays for mercy and asks God to forgive him for breaking a lesser commandment that circumstantially conflicted with the "greater good." In principle, this position is far removed from graded absolutism which says under certain circumstances lying is not a sin. On the contrary, and to his credit, the conflicting absolutist believes it is always wrong to break an absolute moral law of God. There are no exceptions or exemptions, he tells us. One's lying to save a life is always wrong (i.e., it is sinful), but it is truly the lesser evil and, therefore, must be done under the circumstances. But, just as it is wrong to lie, the conflicting absolutist believes it would be wrong (i.e., sinful) not to lie to save a life. Consequently, in practice, both the graded and conflicting absolutists would practice lying in order to do what they would consider to be the higher good.
allan turner
February 20, 2011 at 11:31 pm
Patrick –
Talk about a timely topic! No sooner had I finished reading your post, and the Kreeft article you linked, and cleared out my cupboard (just in case) – when my doorbell rang and I found a family on my doorstep seeking refuge from the Nazis who were hot on their trail. Needless to say, I had just enough time to tuck that whole family inside my cupboard before the doorbell rang again… who could that be? I wondered…
Get real! these ridiculous hypotheticals are just a smoke screen. The basic flaw in Professor Kreeft's logic is the assumption that bad actions always have bad consequences. Some times they have good consequences. That does not make them good actions. The old "hate the sin/love the sinner" dichotomy needs to be maintained. Basically I would seek to "hate the lie/love the liar" in this situation.
February 20, 2011 at 11:32 pm
"Relativism sees no principles, only people; legalism sees no people, only principles."
Beautiful, and correct.
If it were not for the covert operations… the "lying" of a dear friend of mine, we would have no idea of the hell and manipulation women go through at Planned Parenthood. For her lies, her little buttonhole camera, and her bravery I say THANK YOU. Moral cowards who sit at home in comfort typing their bitter little writs against her, calling her a sinner, make me sick. She has saved your wives, your daughters, your friends.
February 20, 2011 at 11:33 pm
I prefer Zimrak and Kreeft thank you very much.
http://www.insidecatholic.com/feature/cancel-my-mental-reservations.html
At least they dont try to decieve us with their fake names like Tobias and Reginaldus at NTM. Interesting that the name for his blog is a ripoff of the New Liturgical Movement… Talk about mental reservations…
-John Church
February 21, 2011 at 12:11 am
Hey Ed
If Nazi's did not really show up at your door, I guess that makes you a liar, huh?
February 21, 2011 at 12:37 am
Talk about a timely topic! No sooner had I finished reading your post, and the Kreeft article you linked, and cleared out my cupboard (just in case) – when my doorbell rang and I found a family on my doorstep seeking refuge from the Nazis who were hot on their trail. Needless to say, I had just enough time to tuck that whole family inside my cupboard before the doorbell rang again… who could that be? I wondered…
Because there's nobody on earth that actually wants to murder someone else.
Amirite?
February 21, 2011 at 2:42 am
I just read the entire Kreeft article. Now, I should state from the outset that I'm on the "LiveAction's tactics are wrong" side of this debate. But in observing the back-and-forth over the last few days and occasionally contributing to it in a combox here and there, I have tried to be very charitable to the other side. Now, I may not have succeeded, but its been my earnest desire to do so. Because while I think LiveAction is in the wrong, I, like Mark Shea, am not especially happy about that conclusion. I want to see PP defunded and driven out of existance, and I suspect that LiveAction's stings are an effective tool in that fight. So I sympathize deeply with the people who disagree with me about the morality of LiveAction's methods.
But whoa boy did I find Kreeft's piece to be horribly wrong, dishonest and downright destuctive to dialog about Cathyolic moral teaching.
There are probably a dozen heinous lines of arguments in Kreeft's piece, but to hit a few highlights:
1) He argues that the consciences of his (20 year old Boston College?) students are a reliable guide to morality – but of course except for matters related to sex. The later caveat is there because of course its likely that the vast majority of his student (being college students in modern American after all) don't agree with the Church on matters of sexual ethics. But, Kreeft assures us, their instinctive, poorly thought out, in many cases LITERALLY sophmoric opinions, contain some sort of deep wisdom that should cause us to disregard the clearest meaning of the CCC. Please.
2) He name drops plenty of (mostly pagan) philosophers and even relies on the judgment of a few of them. Now, there's nothing wrong with that. The Church has found pagan philosophy useful as a guide for developing lines of reasoned argument for many centuries. But here's the thing – non-Christian luminaries are always to be read through the lens of divinely revealed truth as contained in the Scriptures and the Tradition of the Church. But Kreeft doesn't seem to find it useful to refer to what the Church teaches on this matter at all.
3) Kreeft is absolutely correct that the "common sense" moral intuition of most people would say that there's nothing wrong with a little deception if its employed in ther service of a greater good, especially savings lives. But the "common sense" moral intuition of most most people would say that procured abortions to save the life of pregnant women are always OK and that there's nothing wrong at all with distributing condoms in AIDS-ravaged countries. Kreeft care to defend those things too?
4) Given that he's directing his argument against other pro-lifers who are trying to reason through what the Holy Roman Catholic Church has to teach about a difficult moral issue he has no problem comparing his ideological opponents to Peter Singer and suggesting that they'd be OK with someone raping their children. What a classy guy!
In short – this was actually one of the shabbiest, least convincing "arguments" I've read on either side of this debate. And I put the word "arguments" in quotes because there's a helliuva lot more sophistry and salesmanship in the piece than actual reasoning about the facts of the issue under discussion.
February 21, 2011 at 2:54 am
Kreeft's arguments, I think, are sound on the level of practical morality. The reality is, few of us are clever enough to come up with a spot on verbal mental reservation response to the Nazi's at the door. So, we deceive. Sometimes we intentionally deceive, using words. In my book, this is not a lie.
There are two conflicting moral obligations here. One is our moral obligation to the truth. The other is our moral obligation to keep a confidence. The answer cannot be to tell the truth without discrimination, because then we would be breaking our obligation to keep a confidence. The only morally practical answer is to deceive. In my book, and in the book of the brilliant Jesuit priest/philosopher who taught me at Boston College, this would not be a lie. It would be a deception, but even Reginaldus at NTM agrees that not all deception is lying.
In the case of the Live Action stings, I have a hard time seeing a moral difference between what Live Action does and what the police do on a regular basis when they do undercover work. If police undercover work can be justified within the bounds of moral reservation, than what Live Action is doing can likewise be justified. I frankly think Reginaldus is wrong when he limits undercover work to the police because they're the one's given responsibility to guard civil order. When the police refuse to do so, as in the case of Planned Parenthood, then the citizenry have every right to breach the gap.
February 21, 2011 at 3:02 am
Lila Rose and Live Action were role playing the characters who actually do do human trafficing. Their characterizations of pimp and prostitute minor child were true. There is not and was not any selfish reason, no vested interest, it is an altruistic behavior. Actors playing Shakespeare take on the charaters of the play and play true to the characters. Are the actors lying or role playing to seek truth, understanding and Justice?
February 21, 2011 at 3:13 am
The devil had a vested interest in lying to Eve and that being he convinced Eve to do his bidding and disobey God. The devil entered the world through his lie. Eve gained the whole world and lost her soul to the devil until God sent a Redeemer, Jesus Christ, His Son. The devil lies. Lila Rose (and Rahab)enabled the truth and by doing God's will can expect mercy for their charity. It is charity, the greatest of virtues.
February 21, 2011 at 3:54 am
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February 21, 2011 at 3:58 am
Sorry. eventually I hope to learn how to type.
@paladin: "embryonic stem-cell research, in order to "save lives" [never mind that it doesn't!], has widespread support, even among erstwhile "pro-lifers", as does abortion in the case of rape and incest, as does contraception, and so on). So… when should we follow our moral intuition? Only when it's right. How do we know when it's right? By sane reason, by Divine Revelation, and by the teaching authority of the Church.
Paladin is correct with the teaching authority of the Catholic Church. The consent of the sovereign person whose stem cells are being cannibalized to produce a cure or to experiment for a cure must be secured. The whole legal process depends on the free will and consent of the sovereign person, who constitutes the state, consent to marriage, corporate and international law, the whole structure of civilization depends upon the consent of the person. Abortion in rape and incest punishes an innocent person, an innocent sovereign person in the womb, for the sins of the fathers. The death penalty for the sin and crime done by another person is injustice. And contraception is a lie, as is pornography about human sexuality and love in marriage. Love begets love in a son and daughter, in children. Love begets mothers and fathers as parents. Love is fruitful. Love is not void nor vacant. Love begets the one who loves.
February 21, 2011 at 4:08 pm
I don't know that what Live Action does is necessary for the pro-life movement, or particularly effective. The horrors and bullying that occur in places like planned parenthood are revealed by former patients and workers.
February 21, 2011 at 4:10 pm
I have to disagree with Kreeft here and frankly I'm surprised he resorts to insults. The Church is clear: lying is intrinsically evil just like stealing.
The Church does recognize intent, context and conditions as mitigating. That does make it relativistic, just proportionate. What would be a mortal sin in one context can be a venial one in another. For example stealing bread to survive can be venial rather than mortal. So lying in court to convict your enemy is mortal, while lying in a video to tempt your enemy to expose themselves is likely venial, depending on intent.
There are important question to ask: are there better means to oppose abortion? How will this kind of method play out over time etc?
Jesus told us to love our enemies and turn the other cheek (per readings from yesterday). Not easy to do , at all. It runs directly counter my own gut instincts, which another reason not to rely on my own imperfect conscience. So maybe we can not rise up to loving our enemies all in one step, we can at least try to show them respect as human beings. Not because we want to, but because Jesus said to try. Surely trusting in Him and His Church is more fruitful in the long run than trusting in our own devices.
February 21, 2011 at 4:11 pm
oops I meant its does NOT make it relativistic
February 21, 2011 at 5:24 pm
@anonymous at 11:08 AM Since Roe v. Wade is a court order and a court requires two witnesses to establish a judicial fact, Lila Rose is gathering evidence for a court of law. The civil rights of the sovereign person in the womb who is being aborted warrants the camera and microphone. The patients and workers may not be able to perform this kind of search warrants. Obviously, Lila Rose is being guided by the Holy Spirit. But before Lila Rose is burned at the stake as a criminal, let us look at the good St. Joan of Arc did for France, saved the country for Frenchmen. Lila Rose is saving America for Americans.
February 21, 2011 at 5:39 pm
FWIW, I answer Dr. Kreeft (and Dr. Zmirak) here.
February 21, 2011 at 6:20 pm
How's this for a real life hypothetical. In a just war I am a soldier. I use deception to confuse the enemy and then kill him. (Ex. Normandy invasion. We fake Pas de Calis, but land Omaha, Utah etc. Why? to kill.)
At the micro level – happens constantly in war: I am in a stand-off with the enemy. 200 yards away. They shoot at me, I shoot at them. They are going to kill me as I am outnumbered so I move often. When I move I run as fast as I can to cover. When I get there I dive behind it.
When I get up again I roll to the right side. The next time I begin to get up, I start a right-hand roll and "peek out" but then roll to my left and boogie out of there. In other words, I "fake them out". It works; bullets land where I am not. I deceived them and they missed me.
So I am a deceiver. So am I evil? Was that an evil act? This is not some hypothetical example and it was my life on the line.
Seems to me that maybe it was an evil, as so much evil permeates all things war, but then again, it surely was a lesser one.
Another one: I'm being mugged by armed jittery man. Mr, Mugger demands my money. But based on the way he's acting I think he may just pull the trigger either way. "Oh yes, yes, I have a bunch of money right here in my wallet." I reach back with my hand then punch him in the throat so hard it knocks him out and he drops his gun. Deception, yes, but again, I may have saved my life.
Evil? Should I have just been shot instead? If not, then where does the obligation for self defense weigh in against the evil of the lie. You make the call…