Thursday, June 23, 2011
Does the Law Educate and Does Knowledge Transform Lives?
(My reply to a Facebook thread just now) - It is odd that the European Union is indifferent to #abortion but is appalled at #capital punishment whereas the blood-thirsty "Christians" of America (ESPECIALLY Texas) revel in capital punishment. Kurt #Vonnegut wryly observed that Americans clamor to erect monuments to Moses's Ten #Commandments yet no one ever things to put up a plaque for Jesus's #Beatitudes of the #Sermon on the Mount. It took me a lifetime to realize how terribly destructive alcohol and tobacco are. Yet #PROHIBITION was not the answer to criminalize alcohol and for the same reasons one will achieve nothing good by criminalizing tobacco or abortion. Somehow the answer lies in educating people to find such things loathsome and abhorrent.
John - Islam (Mohammad) was of the opinion that chopping off a hand would discourage thieves. Do you feel such corporal punishment has been effective? It is my understanding that prior to Rowe v. Wade abortion WAS criminalized and it did not seem that there were LESS abortions. Switzerland has had great success by legalizing heroin. Each addict registers with the government and reports every day to receive ONLY TWO INJECTIONS (junkies in Manhattan shoot up 5 or 6 times a day because it is not pure heroin).. but NOW the government is their pusher and they must do what the government says and the government makes them go to counseling to stop alcohol and prostitution etc. Now if we look at Plato's Republic then we see the suggestion that the state can be an instrument to produce citizens possessing virtue. I find it odd that one of the few things Jesus explicitly prohibits is DIVORCE except in the case of adultery and Jesus makes no mention of the possibility of remarriage. Isn't it strange that Bible-loving Christian American never gives a thought to criminalizing divorce or adultery or fornication? We have our "HONORABLE" Newt Gingrich who is on his third wife and had an affair during the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. But Newt appeared in an interview and explained that he has "asked God for forgiveness" and so everything is honky dory. Perhaps since God finds homosexuality such an abomination therefore gays and lesbians should take a lesson from Honorable Newt and have their same sex marriage but then simply ask God for forgiveness. That should work? No?
John: Are you of the opinion that law can never have an educative effect on people? William:
John, consider the MANY congressmen, senators and even presidents who have fallen pray to their temptations. There are probably fewer judges guilty of misconduct (I would have to Google) BUT given that it is congress which frames legislation and the senate which passes it (and the president signs it into law or vetoes)…. all those folks play a role in writing, interpreting and enforcing the law. So, John, YOU feel that even though the body of people who author the law are often guilty of dishonest conduct, yet they will produce a body of law which will educate the general populace. As I remember it Moses brought the laws down to the people from Sinai and for 40 years they wandered in the wilderness and yet often they did wrong things. God CHOSE Saul and even gave Saul a new heart and yet it is written that God regretted having chosen Saul. And David had his share of iniquity and Solomon and finally the temple was destroyed and the Jews were scattered to the diaspora.
John, consider the MANY congressmen, senators and even presidents who have fallen pray to their temptations. There are probably fewer judges guilty of misconduct (I would have to Google) BUT given that it is congress which frames legislation and the senate which passes it (and the president signs it into law or vetoes)…. all those folks play a role in writing, interpreting and enforcing the law. So, John, YOU feel that even though the body of people who author the law are often guilty of dishonest conduct, yet they will produce a body of law which will educate the general populace. As I remember it Moses brought the laws down to the people from Sinai and for 40 years they wandered in the wilderness and yet often they did wrong things. God CHOSE Saul and even gave Saul a new heart and yet it is written that God regretted having chosen Saul. And David had his share of iniquity and Solomon and finally the temple was destroyed and the Jews were scattered to the diaspora.
John: Do you think a bad man can make a good law? Can you separate (to any degree) a man from his office? William: John, I have the feeling that you are playing games. Do you feel that you are Socrates and you can lead me with dialectic questions out of the cave and into the light of day? I tell you what. In MY book, smart people don't ask questions, they give answers, good answers, GREAT ANSWERS that boggle the mind. Furthermore I suspect that your questions are not genuine, sincere questions for which you seek some answer. I suspect that you ALREADY have your mind set regarding what the real truth is and you are playing this little Socratic game with me. Now for a Christian (if there are any of those around, I am not certain) I would think they would turn to the parable of Christ about the woman caught in the act of adultery, about to be stoned. Jesus invited anyone without sin to cast the first stone. Now Jesus is believed by some to be the only SINLESS one and Jesus said "I give you a NEW law" which must mean that Jesus is a law giver. SO, John would you still like to ask if bad men can make good laws? Then there are some more verses about how all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and there is no one good, not one. So from that Biblical perspective there is no such thing as a good person and therefore all laws are framed, interpreted and enforced by people who are not good in any sense of the word. PERHAPS they are forgiven but they are not good. But then of course anyone who feels that the Bible is a pile of rubbish will simply laugh at my post and say "Who cares?"
John: Well, I try to think about these things instead of feeling about them, but maybe that's beside the point. I think that if we ask the right questions, regardless of what you or I may think the answer may be, we will eventually come to the truth. I don't claim to be "smart" enough to compose answers that boggle the mind, I would rather see if I or anyone else actually understand what we are talking about. It seems to me that to give an answer without first clarifying what the question is is the real intellectual dishonesty. Anyone can simply give an answer that people find interesting, but only the intellectually honest can ask questions that may or may not work out to the answer he is expecting. Now as to your invocation of Scripture, it seems to me that what follows from this statement: "Then there are some more verses about how all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and there is no one good, not one. So from that Biblical perspective there is no such thing as a good person and therefore all laws are framed, interpreted and enforced by people who are not good in any sense of the word" is that either there are no good laws or that good laws can be made by bad, sinful men. Is my logic wrong?
William: In fact, let's take a look at the Bible on three issues: 1.) World Peace 2.) Elimination of Poverty and 3.) The question in this thread of somehow eliminating serious crimes and murders and abortions. Now it is interesting that people speak of abortion as "murder of innocents" and yet one billion Roman Catholics in the world believe firmly in "original sin" and so in what sense may we say that those fetuses are "innocent." But aren't we somehow conflating notions of guilt with notions of murder? If killing is wrong then is it not wrong regardless of the guilt or innocence of the victim? OK - World Peace - The New Testament says somewhere that until the end, the final judgment, there will always be wars and rumors of war. So if we take the Bible seriously we know that in is not possible to achieve world peace. OK next "elimination of poverty" - both Moses and Jesus say that "the poor shall always be with you. Moses says it right after the verse which forbids gleaning your fields during harvest, .. leave the gleanings for the poor humans AND the hungry animals. So the Bible suggests that the poor will always be with us until the end of time, until the judgment. Finally, we may consider Jesus question "when I return SHALL I EVEN FIND ANY FAITH." From a Biblical perspective it does not seem practical to expect law and government to stop wrong doing. IN FACT, IF it were possible for law to stop people from wrongdoing then why was the incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection necessary? Hans Kung asks this on page one of "On Being Christian" - namely, why do we need Christ? Why can't we just live good, moral, humanist lives?
The Magisterium and the Catechism and Encyclicals are "law" in a sense and I think that the law of the RC Church has done a lot of good over the past 2000 years BUT has it eradicated sin and wrong doing? Obviously it has diminished wickedness but it has not eliminated it. Did Prohibition stop people from consuming alcohol? No and furthermore Prohibition created a black market for the Mafia. Does Islamic Sharia law in the theocratic states of Iran or Pakistan or U.A.E. eliminate theft, murders, prostitution, drug and alcohol abuse? Obviously not. I do not think it is possible to legislate morality. Some laws are better than other laws and statistical studies can demonstrate periods where certain crimes are in a decline and other times when such crimes are on an increase. In my opinion when abortion is criminalized then wealthy women travel to countries where they can get what they want while poor women die in back alley abortions and a black market is created.
John: First, what is, as you present it, my agenda? Second, I think you are equivocating all over the place about "law". Didn't you, not 45 minutes ago, claim that Christ is a lawgiver, and now you accuse me of schizophrenia for asking whether laws can be good whileprofessing to be a Christian? You have to have some more honesty and clarity if you want to actually converse with other people. Otherwise you're just talking to yourself about your own "agenda". You still have not answered a single question I've asked. You have only jumped to conclusions about what my opinion probably is based on the questions that I ask and attacked those straw men with dubious concrete examples. I want real arguments please.
William: I think it is obvious from an overview of 10,000 years of recorded history that 1.) laws do not prevent crime and it is also (I should hope from my above posts) obvious that a believing Roman Catholic is not free to speculate but must seek answers from the Church. A Protestant (depending upon which of the 2,000 denominations) has far more latitude that the Roman Catholic but is still going to bump into problems posted by various verses in the Bible. I personally do not believe that any single president in an 8 year two term office will fix the problems of the nation or the world. I side more with Locke who sees humans as capable of both good and evil than I do with Hobbes who sees people as totally rotten (and I suppose we could throw John Calvin in this on the totally rotten and depraved aspect.) So, my dear fellow, the real answer is that there is no real answer in the sense of some final ultimate solution which will right all the wrongs of human existence. I don't think criminalizing drugs or abortion or any number of other things solves problems. I think a better solution is to TRY to educate people from childhood to make better choices BUT here again we like to pay garbage collectors more than we pay school teachers. I was a Greek Orthodox Christian for 20 years, converting from nothingness in my 20s and drifting away in my forties for the simple reason that I could not live up to what was expected of me so I accepted the fact that I am probably eternally damned, and I don't believe in Protestant notions of forgiveness by confessing Christ, etc. I dont think Martin Luther could live up to what he had vowed as an Augustinian and so his solution was to re-write Christianity.
John: I don't remember anyone asking whether laws prevented crime, all that was asked was whether law had an educative effect on the governed. I asked that question, no one answered it. I simply don't agree with you about Roman Catholicism, but that's another issue entirely. I suppose I agree that there will be no "final ultimate solution" to the miseries of humanity (before the Lord comes again). I do not, however, think that excuses us from perfecting ourselves and our communities to the best of our ability. It seems to me that what really matters in the final analysis is the purity of the heart rather than the success or failure of our efforts. Why did you accept that you are probably eternally damned, unless you mean that facetiously? What I guess I mean is, are you a Christian (in the sense that you believe some Christian creed to be true) or not? And if not, why do you think you are damned? Or are you not being honest?
Susan: Mr. Buell, as far as anyone can tell there were far far fewer abortions before abortion became legal. There are no stats about how many there were, and the figures usually thrown around were admitted to be utter fabrications by those who made them up. But it was shameful, difficult, dangerous, and painful to get an illegal abortion, and that fact deterred a lot of women from taking the risk of getting pregnant in the first place. I lived in the very end of those times and know what it was like when I was in high school. After abortion became legal I saw women have abortions who would never have considered it before, such as a married woman whose second child was coming too close after the first, after a fight with her husband, for instance. The law is a teacher, and it has taught people that the once almost unthinkable is just a routine matter, no big deal. Something like a fourth of pregnancies in this country now end in abortion. There is no way that many abortions were happening before it was legalized, (starting somewhat before 1973 with liberalized laws in a few states.) Whether what the law has now taught can be untaught, I don't know. William: Most criminals, I would imagine, KNOW that they are doing wrong and know it because it is the law which made them aware so YES in a sense the law EDUCATES us. St. Paul writes about this…. That which I will I do not, that which I will not I do, the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak…. and we may toss in Socrates excellent point that all people by nature desire the good, but then we must throw in Solomon's wisdom that "there are ways which seem good unto a man but the end thereof is death."
William: We all know there is one SURE FIRE method of birth control and HIV prevention: abstinence and celibacy. As one wise physician of Mennonite background tells young patients "BEFORE you consider the sin of fornication, consider the sin of birth control so that you will not have to consider the sin of abortion." Pascal said "the heart has reasons of which Reason knows nothing." Woody Allen, with regard to marrying his adopted daughter said "the heart wants what it wants." The Old Testament says in several places that the wickedness of the hearts imaginings knows no bounds. We all know that tobacco causes cancer and emphysema but that knowledge (or education if you will ) is , well, necessary but not sufficient to cause people to quit smoking.
Susan: Mr. Buell, forget about abortion for a minute, since you aren't about to have one, and think about your soul. Of course you couldn't live up to everything asked of us as Christians! That's why we say "Lord have mercy" so many times in the liturgy! That is why we have the Sacrament of Penance. You just need to say, "I did this, I am sorry, Lord, help me to do better." And to say it over and over again. I know that can be embarrassing, but the person you are saying it to, or who is witnessing you say it to Christ, has experienced the same thing after all. I am afraid that it is pride not to want to face that we have done that same stupid or embarrassing thing yet again. We don't want to face that we are that person who is so weak as we face it when we say it to someone else. But with grace, at some point, it doesn't matter so much what "I" am. Let go of it, be willing to be a sinner coming to the foot of the cross, again and again. There is never a time when the offer of mercy is withdrawn…. until death. I heard you say on FB the other day that "Life disgusts me" and that you always have to be doing something , engaged in some discussion, to distract yourself. Life disgusts you because you have turned away from the Source of Joy. Please, turn back before it is too late, and say "Lord have mercy" again. For He is gracious, and loves mankind!
William: Susan, I know how you feel, but I believe what I believe because of my lifetime of experiences. Hallaj, the first Sufi martyr, executed by Orthodox Sunni Muslims, as he was being led to the gallows, said "If I had had your experiences I would have no choice but to execute me and if you had had MY experiences you would have no choice but to exclaim as I did that I am in unity with Allah."
William: It is my understanding that any Roman Catholic who is acting in good conscience will vote for abortion laws and vote for anything else that the Church endorses and vote against anything that the Church condemns. Therefore, why argue about the wisdom of pro life legislation or play games with statistics to say that there are fewer abortions when it is criminalized than when it is legal. If some precision military strike happened to kill one civilian it would be hailed as a tremendous victory. If a military action kills several thousand then it is lamentable but necessary. If a military action kills 300,000 million people then it is genocide. I dont know WHEN the world first began to worry about genocide. They didnt seem to worry about it during the Indian wars or the march of tears. But its like Stalin said, one death is a tragedy but 10,000,000 deaths is a statistic. Only they way I just described it, one death is splendid military leadership and planning but 300 million deaths is a hideous abomination. And yet, when the jury was grilling Oppenheimer, insisting that he was unpatriotic for opposing development of the H-Bomb it was clear that America contemplated bombing its way across Russia and continuing on through China to make the world safe for Democracy by exterminating 300 million people. So its all a numbers game. If you pass anti-abortion legislation and the statistics drop to 1000 abortions a year then you will feel that you have achieved some moral victory BUT if abortions increase then you will feel you have failed. To me it is as silly as the Pharisees who strained at the gnat and swallowed the camel, counting their tithes of anise and cumin and saying CORBAN it is a gift… Mark 7:11 … otherwise have received from me is Corban' (that is, a gift devoted to God), … THAT IS quite frankly how I see your statistics … as something Pharisaical … So if you could stop all abortions then what would you do about all the killing in wars… oh, but they are JUST wars… and if you could stop all murders on earth then there would still be your backbiting and gossiping and bearing false witness and coveting and anger…
