Monday, September 26, 2016

Michael Rea owes Richard Swinburne an apology


Richard Swinburne, emeritus professor of philosophy at Oxford University, author of many highly influential books, and among the most eminent of contemporary Christian thinkers, recently gave the keynote address at a meeting of the Society of Christian Philosophers (SCP).  In his talk, which was on the theme of sexual morality, he defended the view that homosexual acts are disordered – a view that has historically been commonly held within Christianity and the other major world religions, has been defended by philosophers like Plato, Aquinas, and Kant, and is defended to this day by various natural law theorists.  So, it would seem a perfectly suitable topic of discussion and debate for a meeting of Christian philosophers of religion.  Of course, that view is highly controversial today.  Even some contemporary Christian philosophers disagree with Swinburne.  I wasn’t there, but apparently his talk generated some criticism.   Fair enough.  That’s what meetings of philosophers are about – the free and vigorous exchange of ideas and arguments.
 
Yet for some reason, Michael Rea, president of the SCP, posted the following statement on his Facebook page over the weekend:

I want to express my regret regarding the hurt caused by the recent Midwest meeting of the Society for Christian Philosophers. The views expressed in Professor Swinburne's keynote are not those of the SCP itself. Though our membership is broadly united by way of religious faith, the views of our members are otherwise diverse. As President of the SCP, I am committed to promoting the intellectual life of our philosophical community. Consequently (among other reasons), I am committed to the values of diversity and inclusion. As an organization, we have fallen short of those ideals before, and surely we will again. Nonetheless, I will strive for them going forward. If you have thoughts or feedback you would like to share with me, I would welcome hearing from you via email or private message.

End quote.  Rea’s statement has received a lot of feedback on Facebook – both positive and negative – and has gotten attention elsewhere online as well (such as at Rod Dreher’s column at The American Conservative).

There are several odd things about Rea’s statement.  First, Swinburne was invited to present the keynote address, and SCP members, including the society’s leaders, know his work well.  But no one who knows that work could possibly be surprised that Swinburne holds traditional views about homosexuality.  Indeed, he defended the position he expressed in his keynote talk in the second edition of his book Revelation: From Metaphor to Analogy.  If Swinburne had given a talk defending a dualist view of human nature, or the resurrection of Christ, or the possibility of eternal damnation -- views also all standard in Christian theology historically even if highly controversial today – no one would have been surprised, and Rea would not have seen fit to issue any statement. 

So why issue a statement in this case?  If you invite someone well-known for his traditional views to give a talk, don’t be surprised if he expresses traditional views during the talk.  If you don’t like the views he’s likely to express, don’t invite him in the first place.  But it is rude and unfair to invite him, let him give the talk, and then disavow him after the fact.

Second, why the frantic assurance that Swinburne’s views “are not those of the SCP”?  Who would have supposed that they are the views of the SCP?  The SCP is an organization of academic philosophers, and everyone knows that academic philosophers disagree about all sorts of things.  If Swinburne had defended Cartesian dualism in his talk, or Kantian ethics, or scientific realism, no one would think “Hmm, the SCP must be officially endorsing Cartesian dualism [or Kantian ethics, or scientific realism].”  Nor would Rea have issued any disclaimer.  Everyone would know that Swinburne was speaking only for himself, just as any philosopher does when he gives a talk.  How are things any different in this case?

Third, what is this business about the “hurt” Swinburne’s views allegedly caused?  Philosophers discuss and defend all sorts of ideas that some people are bound to find offensive.  So what?  If, to take just one example, a philosopher defends the moral legitimacy of abortion, he may well offend those who regard abortion as a species of murder; whereas if he argues instead that abortion is a species of murder, he may well offend those who have had abortions.  Still, philosophers discuss and debate abortion all the time, and no one regards this as noteworthy or in need of some disclaimer.  So why are things different in the case of Swinburne’s chosen topic?

Perhaps Rea is worried that some will be offended by Swinburne’s specific way of arguing.  Swinburne holds that a homosexual orientation is a kind of “disability” (a view he put forward in the Revelation book).  No doubt some will be offended by such language.  But again, people are bound to be offended by all sorts of things philosophers say.  Again, an argument for either side of the abortion debate is bound to be offensive to some people who come down on the other side.  So what?  If the arguments for the side you disagree with in the abortion debate are not good arguments, then that is what you should be trying to show.  Going on about hurt feelings doesn’t add anything at all to the philosophical critique.  On the other hand, if the arguments for the side you disagree with are good arguments, then you should stop disagreeing with them and stop being offended by them.  In either case, hurt feelings are neither here nor there.  And every philosopher knows this where other topics are concerned.  Why are things any different in Swinburne’s case?

Fourth, Rea says that because he is “committed to promoting the intellectual life of our philosophical community,” he is “consequently… committed to the values of diversity and inclusion.”  Well, fine.  So what’s the problem, exactly?  “Diversity and inclusion” in the context of “the intellectual life of [a] philosophical community” surely entails that a “diversity” of opinions and arguments be “included” in the discussion.  Now, Swinburne’s view is unpopular these days.  It is often not “included” in philosophical discussions of sexual morality, discussions which tend not to be “diverse” but instead are dominated by liberal views.  Hence having Swinburne present the views he did is precisely a way of advancing the cause of “diversity and inclusion.”  Yet Rea treats it as if it were the opposite.  Why? 

Fifth, Rea speaks about the SCP having “fallen short” of the ideals of diversity and inclusion and of his resolve to “strive for them going forward.”  Well, what does that entail exactly?  Evidently he thinks that letting Swinburne say what he did amounts to having “fallen short.”  So is Rea saying that, “going forward,” he will work to make sure that views like Swinburne’s are no longer expressed at SCP meetings, or at least in SCP keynote addresses?  How would preventing views from being expressed amount to the furthering of “diversity and inclusion”?  And how would that square with the free and open debate that philosophy is supposed to be all about? 

So, there doesn’t seem to be any good reason for Rea to have made the statement he did.  There are, moreover, very good reasons why someone in his position should not have made such a statement.  One of them I have already mentioned.  If you don’t like what someone is going to say, don’t invite him to present the keynote address at your meeting.  It is unfair to invite him and then sandbag him after the fact.

But it’s worse than just being unfair to Swinburne.  Civil and reasonable discussion about questions of sexual morality is increasingly difficult today, and it is precisely those who are most prone loudly to express their “hurt” feelings who make it so.  Even the most polite, reasoned, and carefully qualified objections to homosexual acts, transgenderism, etc. are routinely dismissed a priori as “bigotry,” fit only to be ridiculed and shouted down rather than rationally engaged.  In extreme cases those who express such views face cyberbullying, loss of employment, and the like.  As Justice Scalia pointed out in his dissenting opinion in United States v. Windsor, such views are now widely treated as “beyond the pale of reasoned disagreement” and their proponents shunned as if they were “enemies of the human race.” 

To pretend (as some Christian philosophers I know do) that this sort of thing is essentially just a regrettable but understandable overreaction on the part of wounded souls who have had some bad experiences with obnoxious religious people is naiveté.  It is often rather a calculated political tactic aimed at making public dissent from liberal conventional wisdom on sexuality practically difficult or impossible.  Some activists admit this.  For example, in their 1989 book After the Ball, Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen called for a long-term propaganda campaign to change attitudes about homosexuality by shaming, social ostracization, and other tactics deliberately aimed at manipulating emotions rather than appealing to reason.  They write:

The trick is to get the bigot into the position of feeling a conflicting twinge of shame… This can be accomplished in a variety of ways, all making use of repeated exposure to pictorial images or verbal statements that are incompatible with his self-image as a well-liked person, one who fits in with the rest of the crowd. Thus, propagandistic advertisement can depict homophobic and homohating bigots as crude loudmouths and assholes… who are 'not Christian.'  It can show them being criticized, hated, shunned… It can, in short, link homohating bigotry with all sorts of attributes the bigot would be ashamed to possess, and with social consequences he would find unpleasant and scary…

When [the bigot] sees someone like himself being disapproved of and disliked by ordinary Joes… he will feel just what they feel -- and transfer it to himself. This wrinkle effectively elicits shame and doubt…

Note that the bigot need not actually be made to believe that he is such a heinous creature, that others will now despise him... Rather, our effect is achieved without reference to facts, logic, or proof…  [but] through repeated infralogical emotional conditioning… (pp. 151-53)

[P]ropaganda relies more upon emotional manipulation than upon logic, since its goal is, in fact, to bring about a change in the public’s feelings. (p. 162)

The objective is to make homohating beliefs and actions look so nasty that average Americans will want to dissociate themselves from them… We also intend, by this tactic, to make the very expression of homohatred so discreditable that even Intransigents will eventually be silenced in public… (p. 189)

End quote.  In an earlier 1987 Guide magazine article “The Overhauling of Straight America,” these same authors described their strategy this way:

At a later stage of the media campaign for gay rights… it will be time to get tough with remaining opponents.  To be blunt, they must be vilified... [W]e intend to make the antigays look so nasty that average Americans will want to dissociate themselves from such types.

End quote.  Now, “homohatred” is indeed wrong, because hatred is wrong.  But of course, disapproval of homosexual acts simply does not entail hatred of homosexuals themselves, any more than a vegetarian’s or vegan’s disapproval of eating meat entails hatred of meat-eaters.  But Marshall and Kirk and like-minded activists believe that this follows (or pretend to believe it, anyway), so that what they intend is that those who merely disapprove of the acts in question, and not just those who literally hate others, be vilified, hated, shunned, silenced, etc.  The situation Scalia described in his dissent is thus exactly what such activists have tried to engineer. 

So pervasive have tactics of this sort become in recent years that one sometimes finds even professional philosophers resorting to them, at least in online contexts (blog posts, comboxes, Facebook posts, etc.).  Common examples are:

• preemptively dismissing any argument in defense of conservative views vis-à-vis homosexuality, transgenderism, etc. as a “cloak for bigotry” – a blatant example of an ad hominem fallacy of poisoning the well, or rejecting an argument based on a purportedly disreputable motive on the part of the person giving it, rather than fairly addressing the merits of the argument itself

• matter-of-factly characterizing such arguments as comparable to a defense of racism -- a blatant fallacy of begging the question, since whether the views in question really are comparable to racism is, of course, precisely part of what is at issue in the dispute between defenders of traditional sexual morality and their critics

• mocking such arguments as “obviously” terrible, too stupid for words, not worth anyone’s attention, etc. – a blatant appeal to ridicule fallacy

• matter-of-factly dismissing all such arguments as something which few in “the profession” of academic philosophy take seriously anymore, etc. – a manifest appeal to majority fallacy

• casually insinuating that anyone who presents such arguments really isn’t a serious philosopher, is therefore bound to lose standing in “the profession,” may have difficulty getting a tenured positon, etc. – an argumentum ad baculum

• objecting even to the civil and dispassionate discussion of such arguments on the grounds that some will find them “hurtful,” “offensive,” etc. – a fallacy of appeal to emotion, since what ultimately matters are the logical and evidential merits of a claim or an argument, not how we “feel” about it

Now, as every philosopher knows, tactics like these are textbook examples of sophistry and thus entirely antithetical to genuine philosophy.  They are exactly the sorts of rhetorical tricks that every philosopher teaches students in logic and critical thinking classes not to employ.  For a philosopher deliberately to employ or approve of such tactics is gross malpractice, comparable to a physician violating the Hippocratic oath.  For a philosopher not to condemn such tactics when employed by others is comparable to a physician refusing to treat his patients or to warn them away from dangers to their health.  For a philosopher not to condemn them especially when they are employed by other philosophers is comparable to a physician who turns a blind eye to the malpractice of other physicians.

What does all this have to do with Rea and Swinburne?  Just this.  Sophistries and ruthless political pressure tactics of the sort just described succeed only when people let them succeed – when they let themselves be intimidated, when they acquiesce in the shaming and shunning of those who express unpopular views, when they enable the delegitimization of such views by treating them as something embarrassing, something to apologize for, something “hurtful,” etc. 

This, it seems to me, is what Rea has done in the case of Swinburne.  Given current cultural circumstances, Rea’s statement amounts to what philosophers call a Gricean implicature – it “sends a message,” as it were -- to the effect that the SCP agrees that views like Swinburne’s really are disreputable and deserving of special censure, something to be quarantined and set apart from the ideas and arguments that respectable philosophers, including Christian philosophers, should normally be discussing. 

That is unjust and damaging to philosophy itself, not merely to Swinburne.  It is especially unjust and damaging to younger academic philosophers – grad students, untenured professors, and so forth – who are bound to be deterred from the free and scholarly investigation of unpopular ideas and arguments.  If even the Society of Christian Philosophers is willing to participate in the public humiliation even of someone of the eminence, scholarly achievement, and gentlemanly temperament of Richard Swinburne, then why should any young and vulnerable scholar trust his fellow academic philosophers to “have his back” when questions of academic freedom arise?  Why should he believe they are sincere in their purported commitment to reason over sophistry?

Rea is an excellent philosopher from whose work I, like many others, have profited.  But in this recent statement he has in my opinion done a disservice to his fellow philosophers and an injustice to Swinburne.  He owes Swinburne an apology. 

232 comments:

  1. @ Glenn

    “Stopping oneself from committing a sin and repenting of that sin are horses of a different color. Thus, even though one may no longer commit a sin after having repented of it, merely getting oneself to stop committing a sin is not equivalent to repenting of it. So, insofar as repenting of a sin goes, merely not committing it is insufficient, and one can remain impenitent even though he no longer commits the sin.”

    I completely agree with what you write above (I assume “impenitent” is an exact synonym of “unrepentant”).

    Here is my understanding: Sin is a state of the soul, namely the state of being far from Christ. Hence we say that all humans are born in sin. Sin is a multidimensional state, and in this sense we speak of many sins (e.g. the seven cardinal sins, etc). Each specific sin necessarily produces the respective sinful desire, but not necessarily the respective evil behavior. Repentance is the change of the soul from a sinful to a less sinful state, i.e. the movement of the soul towards Christ. Through repentance the sinful desire is always lessened, and thus the probability of sinful behavior also. The final stage of reaching atonement in Christ is called sanctification.

    Perhaps there are various paths towards repentance and ultimate sanctification. Given Christ's message in the gospels an important one is to have faith and through that faith to abstain from evil actions and to do good works, in short to follow Christ's commands. Doing this will lighten the soul and bring it closer to Christ. Failing to do so will weight down on the soul and move it further from Christ.

    Now about your criticism:

    >>> "Or perhaps his words functioned as a rationalization for impenitent sinners"

    >> I wonder where people read this in the story. Paisios advices that *if* somebody tries but cannot repent a sin *then* instead of lamenting she should go and go a great good deed instead.

    > But that isn't what you had Paisios saying in the story -- this is: "If you cannot stop yourself from committing this sin then instead of lamenting go and do some great good somewhere else."

    Right, I see the difference you point out. Now Paisios in the story is responding to a sinner who is desperately anxious about his sinful behavior, and the actual words of his response refer to the same. But in my understanding the purpose of the advice is to help the sinner repent. Repent somewhere else by doing a great good will bring him closer to Christ, which will then help him find the strength to repent of the initial sin he is so anxious about.

    Now I don't think it's the case that the good he'll do somewhere else will balance out the initial sin on some kind of salvific ledger. And certainly the good he'll do somewhere else will not lessen the initial sin or the spiritual harm the respective behavior produces to the sinner (never mind to the welfare of other people). I understand some people here have gotten the impression that the story implied the latter. I wish to say the idea never passed my mind when I first heard it. On the contrary I found the advise useful and of wide application: If one in fact cannot stop a particular evil behavior (never mind repent the respective sin) then one shouldn't waste one's life in lamentations but follow Christ somewhere else.

    If you disagree about my understanding I stated above of sin, sinful desire, evil behavior, and repentance – and if you have the time – I'd be thankful if you pointed out that disagreement.

    On the other hand I feel there is little profit in discussing the Paisios story any further. It may contain some wisdom, but if the story as told fails not transmit that wisdom then it's useless.

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  2. Dianelos,

    If you disagree about my understanding I stated above of sin, sinful desire, evil behavior, and repentance – and if you have the time – I'd be thankful if you pointed out that disagreement.

    I had already decided my prior comment would be my last comment under the OP, but, since you ask, I will make this my last comment.

    Each specific sin necessarily produces the respective sinful desire, but not necessarily the respective evil behavior.

    While I agree that a sinful desire won't necessarily consummate in an evil act, I don't quite understand how a "specific sin necessarily produces the respective sinful desire". If you mean to say that one instance of a sin can lead to some other instance of a sinful desire, then that makes sense. But if you mean, e.g., that greed causes me to be greedy, then that doesn't quite make sense to me. If I become greedy, then, yes, I'm guilty of the sin of greed. But I don't see how the actual sin of greed, which is the effect of my having become greedy, can serve double-duty by also being that which caused me to become greedy. Since there isn't an actual sin until there is something actually inordinate, to say that a "specific sin necessarily produce[d] the respective sinful desire" is to say, or seems to me to be saying, that the inordinate something caused itself.

    Repentance is the change of the soul from a sinful to a less sinful state, i.e. the movement of the soul towards Christ.

    I would say that the movement of the soul towards Christ is an effect or consequence of repentance, and not that any movement of the soul towards Christ is itself an act of (non-metaphorical) repentance.

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  3. @ Anonymous 5:50 PM

    “No, because if you're doing all those things and, say, looking at p*rnography, then you're in a state of mortal sin.”

    Do you believe it's possible to be freely following Christ's greatest commands as given in the Sermon on the Mount, and at the same time to be looking at pornography? To me this seems patently impossible, since it is not possible for the human soul to be sanctified in almost everything and fail in a trivial matter.

    But suppose it is possible. Even then if some advice helps you follow Christ's greatest commands then the good fruit is there, no matter your failings somewhere else. Remember, the question was how we recognize the good fruit, and my answer was that we recognize it from how it helps us follow Christ's commands.

    Finally a word about being in a state of “mortal sin”. It was because of this thread that I came across the list of the seven cardinal sins, and it was like reading the story of my life. I am guilty of several of them. In fact I am having trouble detecting one which I don't possess to a significant degree.

    One cardinal sin is that of gluttony, which includes the desire of eating only for pleasure's sake. Above I claimed that since 30% of Americans are obese the same number are committing this “mortal sin”. Some participants in our discussion objected to this, correctly observing that there are conditions where one may be obese without being guilty of gluttony. But surely the reverse is much more probable. For example I am not obese. I don't know of any scientific studies in the matter, but I bet that more than 50% of Americans have an unnatural desire for food and thus are guilty of this “mortal sin”.

    What I mean by the above is that in my judgment it is hypocritical, when we ourselves are probably swamped in sin and when certainly our society is swamped in sin, to focus so much on a particular and demonstrably rare condition of homosexual desire and behavior in a loving relationship – even though it is the case church and tradition hold to be a case of the “mortal sin” of lust. To this argument I understand some respond that we are in the midst of cultural war the other side started and fanned, that the other side insults us, displays shocking pride, dominates the airwaves, has politicians kowtow to them, and so on. But all of this is clearly irrelevant – it's not like “it's the other side's fault that I am behaving in a hypocritical way”. It seems to me that if there is case of seeing the speck in our neighbor's eye and not the plank in our own eye – this is it. And as usual, anger begets anger, evil begets evil, and so we see even fine Christian philosophers on both sides sinking to the level of mudslingers.

    [continues below]

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  4. [continues from above]

    A final observation. The words we choose to use have power, including the power to confuse minds and to bring forth sin. So it's important to choose the right words. (I saw this in my recounting the Paisios story.) In my judgment to speak of “mortal sin” (instead of “cardinal sin”, or “serious sin”, or “especially injurious sin”) does not profit us. In our spiritual struggle there is also the sin of excessive fear. When reading the gospels we see that Christ focused much more on the positive implications of repentance than on the negative implications of sin. Personally I find it is a million times more conducive to repentance to focus on the love of Christ and the bliss of the Kingdom, than on the horrible alternative of moving towards the deceiver in hell. I don't have any important quotes to support my claim, but I think that fear of perdition alone will never help us one bit to repent. Repentance obtains when we desire Christ. It is good that the Christian should know the implications of sin (even in this life by the way, since the evil in our heart mortifies our life even now). But the focus and the motivation should always be in the bright beauty of Christ. And we should always trust in His power. It doesn't seem reasonable to me to believe that Christ came to the world to save us, but will fail in 99% of the cases. “Mortal sin” moves us towards death, but it's not like it will ultimately succeed.

    “It's a good piece of advice for genuine Christians.”

    I think you are mistaken here. Christ did not come to speak to the good, but to the evil, not to those who have faith, but to those desperately lost. His advice is not for those who are on the good path, but for those who are on the path of perdition. In our particular case the advice “by their fruits you will know them” is directed to those who are confused about the truth, not to those who see it clearly.

    “Just stick with the 'male' theme.”

    Why do you think I should do that?

    It is true that for the last three thousand years we chose to use the male pronoun when a general pronoun was needed. My love for half of humanity moves me to judge that it would be good if for the next three thousand years we used the female pronoun instead. In our cultural development there has been an advancement from considering women inferior to men towards equality in value, and surely that was a good thing. Indeed in the gospels one sees Christ behave to women in ways that were shocking for his time, and how divine Grace especially favored women since it was them who first knew of Christ's resurrection. So, in my judgment, we should keep up the path of transcending our traditional misgivings towards women – no matter any excesses we observe sometimes in the movement of feminism. Or in our traditions.

    Given my first experience with telling a story about a monk in Athos it is in fear and trembling I venture to tell another one. This one I witnessed myself. So the one time I visited the Mountain for a few days walking from one monastery to the other, I had the strange and perhaps imaginary experience that some monasteries had “good vibrations” and some others didn't. Anyway while leaving one, in the yard just outside the monastery's entrance, a monk started a conversation with me and asked me if I knew the difference between the woman and the devil. When I failed to give any answer to that strange question, he told me this: “One can escape from the devil, but not from the woman”.

    "It's the right thing to do, according to whom?”

    Something is right not because somebody says so, but because it moves us towards Christ.

    “100 years ago you'd be writing with 'he' and 'himself' all the way through without batting an eye.”

    True. And if I lived 300 years ago in the American South I might own slaves without any worry. And should I have any ethical doubts I might listen in the church to the clergyman quoting from the Bible to justify that socially and legally accepted norm.

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  5. Personally I find it is a million times more conducive to repentance to focus on the love of Christ and the bliss of the Kingdom, than on the horrible alternative of moving towards the deceiver in hell.

    I think I'll listen to Christ, who did in fact focus on hell, rather than to a demonstrable and sanctimonious fake.

    Given my first experience with telling a story about a monk in Athos it is in fear and trembling I venture to tell another one.

    You got told off on the internet, you freaking drama queen. Man up.

    True. And if I lived 300 years ago in the American South I might own slaves without any worry.

    Dianelos, you and the slave owner have something in common. You both reject the Bible when it's inconvenient to you, and jump through a thousand hoops to twist straightforward teaching, argument and tradition in order to get the conclusion you want. The slave owner reasoning that chattel slavery and whipping the hell out of their property had to do exactly what you're doing: twist passages, ignore context and tradition, completely turn a blind eye to straightforward interpretation, and blow a whole lot of smoke.

    Your writing manages to be increasingly voluminous to cover up the fact that you've been routed on every point. All you've got left is feels, dishonesty, and quivering-lip theatrics.

    I leave you to continue to show your "love" for 'the other half of humanity' by being a man hellbent on embodying the worst and most stereotypically female traits. However, I will say this: given your repeatedly bleating to focus not on homosexuality, but obesity, I will make it my goal today to tell some lesbians to lose some weight, since - even more than most Americans - they are statistically incredibly likely to be obese.

    And I will say that this was the command of one Dianelos Georgoudis, who expressed concern for their mortal souls because of how gluttonous they were.

    I'll start with a blog post and move on from there. Keep on truckin', fake.

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  6. @ ficino

    “Is it correct to call the salvific order a "natural" order? I would think it's supernatural in the literal sense of above or beyond nature.”

    The answer to this depends on the definition of the words. The important thing is the theological picture: On theism the whole of creation has natural order (actually natural orders) according to God's purpose in creation. One such order is the physical order, which in modern parlance is called “nature”. I think to avoid confusion the theist should use that word in the modern sense, while making clear that the adjective “natural” pertains not only to the physical order (aka nature) but to all orders of creation, including the salvific or spiritual order.

    By salvific order I understand the natural orientation of our soul towards the good – despite being born in a state of sin. Thus by nature we have a sense of what is good, we value it, we find it beautiful, we admire those who are good, we desire ourselves to be good. Further, by nature we sense the presence (and by reason deduce the existence) of that which is perfect in goodness, and therefore is the measure and source of all that is good - and call it God. Incidentally this natural response did not only take root in the ancient tribe of the Jews, but also, say, in ancient Greece where (even though its religion was wildly disorderly and colorfully polytheistic) later philosophers often spoke of “god” in the singular and Aristotle famously thought about what we still consider to be true attributes of God such as being the first mover, being simple, etc. But in other ancient religious too, say, in the idea of Brahman in Hinduism. In the same manner it is striking how all great religions and philosophies gravitate towards the same core of ethical values. For example five centuries before the gospels we find Socrates in a Platonic dialogue arguing that we should not return evil. Were we to learn about the ethical life of particular saint without knowing her religion (whether Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist) I doubt we could deduce what her religion was. Similarly indistinguishable are the experiences of mysticism we find in all great religions and in all historical times. It is finally by that natural order that those who read or hear the gospel with an open mind and thus see the image of Christ will recognize in Him the incarnation of perfection.

    Interestingly enough the atheist (or more precisely the scientific naturalist) might well agree with the above, but will interpret what the theist calls salvific or spiritual order as an effect (probably a necessary effect) of sociobiological evolution, i.e. as an experiential order that emerges naturally from the physical order. Which it actually is, since God created the world in a way that all orders – physical, salvific, whatever – fit with each other. Creation is internally coherent. For example it is not like God made the world in such a way that belief in God would be an unnatural thing :-) Thus on theism one might say that creation is an order of natural orders. Incidentally, the existence of these fitting together orders does not imply that there is an equal number of metaphysical substances or realms; for example on subjective idealism there is only one substance. Now so far we've been talking about God's general providence – the basic architecture of creation.

    [follows below]

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  7. [follows from above]

    But these natural orders do not, not by far, describe creation. God is not only the metaphysical ground of creation and thus of all its natural order, but is also an active participant in it. It is this divine participation in the world, also called special providence, which I think should properly be called “supernatural” as in “beyond the natural order”. On Christianity the supernatural action of God includes the incarnation, message, and resurrection of Christ. It also includes the revelation of knowledge, and any other fruits of grace bestowed by God directly to individuals, whether by fiat or in the context of personal interaction in prayer or mystical experience. It also includes the mysteries of the church. Significantly supernaturalism also includes the fit between the various natural orders I mentioned above. Indeed it's here that much of God's participation in creation is realized (that fit is not a limitation but on the contrary opens a space for special action). It is also here that human freedom too fits the physical order. In this sense then the human condition has a strong supernatural dimension. I think it was Leibniz who said that freedom of will makes of us “little gods” - and while Plantinga didn't in fact he might have said the same because of our capacity of reason. The general idea here is that we are created in the *image* of God. Actually it may be correct to say that in the human condition the natural order and the supernatural are fused. Finally, to the degree they exist, miracles too are of course cases of supernatural divine action.

    I'd say that by its very nature we can't possibly know all the extent of God's special providence – plainly this lies far beyond our limited cognitive capacity. A case in point is the question about the apparent randomness in the notable events in our life, whether evil or good (which is not always clear), and whether they are really random (and thus pertaining to general providence) or else the result of God's special action (and thus pertaining to special providence). At least in my personal case I find it more useful to consider them as random. It is not impossible that God's special action is behind each one of them, but very probably it isn't, and it's best to assume it never is. (Why do I think that very probably it isn't? First because on theism there is a solution to the problem of evil and reason tells me that this problem might be unsolvable if God's special action is behind every event in our lives, and secondly and perhaps more significantly because I came to realize that this picture is more beautiful, makes more sense on soteriology, and comports better with faith in God.) In conclusion for me the most fruitful picture is to think of creation as an ongoing process in God's direct care – without having to assume anything else in detail, or trying to see things from God's point of view beyond what God by nature or revelation finds good to let me see. It more than suffices to see the truth in the mystic's pronouncement that “all manner of thing shall be well”.

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  8. In conclusion for me the most fruitful picture is to think of creation as an ongoing process in God's direct care – without having to assume anything else in detail, or trying to see things from God's point of view beyond what God by nature or revelation finds good to let me see. It more than suffices to see the truth in the mystic's pronouncement that “all manner of thing shall be well”.

    Silly man. Think ye that all manner of thing can be well whilst some manner of thing remain unwell? To advocate in favor of the perpetuation of what is not well, or in favor of the perpetuation of disordered expressions of what might otherwise be well, is to advocate in favor of the delay of all manner of thing being well.

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  9. @ Glenn

    “to say that a "specific sin necessarily produce[d] the respective sinful desire" is to say, or seems to me to be saying, that the inordinate something caused itself'"”

    It seems to me you identify the sin with the respective sinful desire. So, for example, I understand you think that the sin of gluttony *is* the desire for food beyond what's natural; the inordinate desire as you say.

    I prefer to think of sin as a state of the soul that necessarily produces the respective sinful desire. So it seems to me natural to say “we are born in sin” but not “we are born with sinful desires”. The word “repentance” in the original literally means “change of mind” and thus refers to a change in our being, and not merely to a change in our desires. Also should one artificially remove a desire (say by chemical means) it wouldn't mean one has repented of the sin. Christ in the gospels asks us to become as perfect as the Father, not to desire what the Father desires. So I find it more natural to think of sinful desire as something distinct from the sin itself.

    “I would say that the movement of the soul towards Christ is an effect or consequence of repentance, and not that any movement of the soul towards Christ is itself an act of (non-metaphorical) repentance.”

    So in your view repentance causes the soul to move towards Christ, but should not be identified with that movement. Perhaps you mean that a change in our mind is the repentance that causes the change in the soul. For me “soul” encompasses the whole of the human spirit including the mind, how we experience, the will, etc, so perhaps our disagreement in in terminology.

    Anyway these are difficult issues and we've moved far from the OP. Thank you for the conversation.

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  10. @ Crude,

    I am sorry you think so badly of me. There are conservative Christians who judge that the safest choice is to put their full trust in the official church and its pronouncements. As I wrote above, given the difficulty and importance of the matters we discuss, I think this is a reasonable choice. But I imagine that once one has made that choice anything that is contrary to the official teaching, or even only fails to sound like the official teaching, might strike one as surely wrong, probably dangerous, and possibly deceitful.

    Incidentally, the danger of giving heed to false teaching is real, as was recognized from the very beginning. But Christ Himself has given us an extremely practical advise for how we can distinguish the true from the false teaching: In short the truth is that which as a matter of fact helps us follow Christ's commands, the error is that makes it more difficult for us to do so.

    “I think I'll listen to Christ, who did in fact focus on hell”

    Are you sure about that? I have the clear impression that Christ in the gospels speaks much more of the Kingdom, salvation, and in general of images that have to do with heaven - than of perdition, death, and in general of images that have to do with hell. But this is a factual matter; one could open the gospels and check. Incidentally the meaning of “gospel” is “good message”, or perhaps more precisely “beautiful message”.

    “given your repeatedly bleating to focus not on homosexuality, but obesity, I will make it my goal today to tell some lesbians to lose some weight”

    Gluttony is a cardinal sin, and thus one that seriously hinders one from salvation. As any cardinal sin it should not be trivialized or joked about, especially when it demonstrably affects many more Christians than homosexual lust.

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  11. @ Dianelos:

    I'm done with you. You are a fool who refuses to listen to reason and revels in pseudo-reason.

    As Crude pointed out, you hide behind verbiage.

    Your photo is apt. Vacant expression with tears streaming down your face; warm and cool colors signifying how you change like a chameleon based on your emotions.

    I believe you can change, but only YOU can do it.

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  12. "Gluttony is a cardinal sin, and thus one that seriously hinders one from salvation. As any cardinal sin it should not be trivialized or joked about, especially when it demonstrably affects many more Christians than homosexual lust."

    Says the guy that trivializes lustful acts.

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  13. Gluttony is a cardinal sin, and thus one that seriously hinders one from salvation. As any cardinal sin it should not be trivialized or joked about, especially when it demonstrably affects many more Christians than homosexual lust.

    And as I pointed out before, this kind of argument muddles together vices and sins. Gluttony and lust are both capital vices; the typical acts of these are always mortal sins, but whether other acts of capital vices are so depends on circumstances -- sometimes acts of capital vices are venial under the circumstances. ('Cardinal sin' is a colloquial expression; it has no standard meaning in moral theology. Cardinal virtues are called 'cardinal' for a very different reason than capital vices are called 'capital', and neither term applies to acts of any kind except by a figure of speech. For someone who started out criticizing Swinburne for lack of clarity, you are remarkably loose with terminology.) Lust just has different kinds of acts expressing its character in different ways; that's the only way 'homosexual' interacts with it. Thus if you want to compare homosexual acts of lust to something to do with gluttony, you must pick out specific acts of gluttony to compare, not compare a vicious act to a different vice, which is a category mistake.

    But you have not established any such comparison between acts, either; your previous obesity argument, as was pointed out by multiple people, makes absurd assumptions, and does not distinguish out the vice of gluttony itself, much less any specific kind of gluttonous sin. (Nor is it the case that severity or importance is determined by widespreadness. Boorish behavior is vastly more widespread than murder, but acts of the vice of boorishness are rarely given more than a paragraph, if that, in works of moral theology, whereas moral theologians talk at immense length about the relatively uncommon sin of murder.)

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  14. @ Anonymous 1:04 PM

    “Your photo is apt.”

    The avatar picture is not of me. As it happens I paint, and this is a portrait I made of God. I figured if I think I know God by acquaintance I might as well make a picture of Him. (I'd have written “Her” but never mind :-) I chose this as my avatar because it is colorful picture I find beautiful, and I think one should try one's best to fill one's surroundings with beauty. And secondly as a reminder in my online discussions to focus on the truth. And to not forget the Christian virtues when dealing with others.

    “Vacant expression with tears streaming down your face; warm and cool colors signifying how you change like a chameleon based on your emotions.”

    Thanks for the criticism of the picture; that's a first. The lines around the eyes are not tears (observe that they extend to all directions) but signify the brightness in one's personal experience of God. The contrastful colors are common in my expressionist paintings, but in this case their strength and purity also signify God's delight in creation – as per Saint Augustine. Your observation of the “vacant expression” gave me pause. I think you're right, but then again one's experience of God is that of a person, but not of a human person. It would perhaps be misleading and therefore diminishing to paint a face of God with a human expression in it, even a positive one. Anyway, in expressionist painting one does not think of these matters; rather it's a Zen like behind the normal cognitive processes kind of action. So the observations I make above are really after the fact.

    Since, whether for good or evil, one can't appreciate a painting in an avatar, here's a link to a higher res image: https://sites.google.com/site/dimxa2012/pics/28okcompr.jpg

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  15. I think to avoid confusion the theist should use that word in the modern sense, while making clear that the adjective “natural” pertains not only to the physical order (aka nature) but to all orders of creation, including the salvific or spiritual order.

    By salvific order I understand the natural orientation of our soul towards the good – despite being born in a state of sin. Thus by nature we have a sense of what is good, we value it, we find it beautiful, we admire those who are good, we desire ourselves to be good. Further, by nature we sense the presence (and by reason deduce the existence) of that which is perfect in goodness, and therefore is the measure and source of all that is good - and call it God.


    Interestingly enough the atheist (or more precisely the scientific naturalist) might well agree with the above, but will interpret what the theist calls salvific or spiritual order as an effect (probably a necessary effect) of sociobiological evolution, i.e. as an experiential order that emerges naturally from the physical order. Which it actually is, since God created the world in a way that all orders – physical, salvific, whatever – fit with each other.

    Dianelos, although I would agree with you that the spiritual order is in one sense one of the natural orders - the natural ordering that pertains to moral creatures that have a spiritual dimension and free will - I would also point out that the salvific order presents something else added to the spiritual order.

    By nature, all men are ordered to know and love God. Our highest good according to our nature is to contemplate God and love him wholly. This is the (natural) spiritual order which we inhabit.

    However, it is by grace and only by grace that we are raised up above the capacity we have by nature, and can know (and see) God as face to face, i.e. knowing him as he is in himself rather than through intermediary realities. It is in this raising up above what is possible to us by our unaided nature that we are called "sons of God" in a special way, a way more fullsome than is said of all humans merely by being human. This grace happens only by special Divine act distinct from that of his making and continuing our sheer existence as humans. Not all have this grace, this favor, as is clear from St. Paul, though all have human nature. The presence of this grace is understood to be an active participation in God's own divine life, which (being divine) is the only thing that can make us capable of being friends of God, (c.f. John: "I call you friends, for that is what you are...") for friendship requires a sort of equality. This salvific dimension of good is inherently supernatural, is inherently beyond the natural, for it is impossible that God could create a created being (i.e. a being dependent on God) who then BY NATURE is equal to God, who by nature has God's own being and nature. Creatures can only receive union with the Godhead by participation added unto their natures, and so it is always a special act of the divine distinct from any natural order.

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  16. @ Brandon

    Clarity is useful in one's use of language, and as language is a major tool of our thinking it's useful in one's thought too. Lack of clarity by nature leads to confusion. So your criticism is well taken.

    Now there is often no "best" choice of word. Certainly one factor is how words are in fact used by the people, i.e. the colloquial use. When the learned and the folk use a word differently I think in general less confusion arises when one sticks with the folk usage. On the other hand words carry associations. Given that the goal here is clarity, when the associations a particular word carries go against one's meaning then one should avoid it even if it is the word that is more commonly used.

    I consider that the problem of choosing words is quite serious, indeed I believe it is a major reason for the disagreements even among professional philosophers. And it seems to me that is precisely the key words (for example “explanation”) that are left vague and used in different ways. Sometimes this appears to be done on purpose, i.e. philosophers like politicians bending the meaning of a word in order to make an argument more convincing (an in the end fooling themselves). A major example I've already mentioned concerns “contabilist freedom”; it's like disliking the fact that the word “bachelor” refers only to unmarried men, and arguing that there are two kinds of bachelors and one of them refers to married men. Nonetheless the insistent use the expression “contabilist freedom” leads many to think that there actually is such a kind of freedom. It's a mess.

    Now given the difficult and the general messy environment, I think a good idea is not to assume anything and describe in detail what one wants to say. In our context in several occasions I tried to make plain that “sin”, that which keeps us from salvation, is a state if the soul. (Later I added that “soul” is the spiritual dimension of the human condition and includes the thinking mind, our cognitive faculties beyond thinking such as knowing good from evil, our free will, the quality of our experience of life, and in general all in one's personal condition that is one own's). In the context of the sin in that primary sense we have also the sinful desire and the sinful behavior, which are bound with it. Colloquially we often use “sin” to describe actions, but even though sinful actions are a very grave matter in that they worsen they sin (as well as making it visible and thus making the world an uglier place, and typically of course hurting others directly) – the sin itself, that which hinders us from following Christ, is inside of us, is part of our identity as persons, is a state of our soul. What state? Very simply the state of imperfection, the state of being far from Christ. And it is in this sense that the otherwise difficult “we are all born in sin” suddenly becomes obvious. Finally, thinking of sin mainly as referring to actions is a grave error since it can lead people to think that repentance is about changing one's behavior, when repentance is about perfecting our soul. Changing one's behavior affects the state of the soul, but many people think that if they come to feel sorry about having committed some sinful action then *this* is repentance, which is not only grossly false but a harmful error in one's salvidic life. Indeed it is probably the case that many people do not even inch their way towards Christ because they think that being genuinely sorry for their sinful acts and confessing them is what constitutes repentance. Feeling sorry and confessing are good things that help one repent, but are not the repentance itself. They are means towards the goal, but not the goal.

    [continues below]

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  17. [continues from above]

    Now the above is what I believe and what I believe is also the orthodox position of the church. But I may be wrong in my use of the word “repentance”. For example Glenn above says that repentance is the cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ but does not refer to the movement itself. If he is right then we are left with no word to describe that movement, and are thus left with no word to refer to what is the actual everyday goal in life. So I think I'd rather stick with my meaning of “repentance” while taking care to clarify what I mean by that word when I speak with others. (In the original Greek “metanoia” literally means “change of mind”, and mind, or nous” in ancient Greek, had a deeper meaning then merely the thinking processes – and it still has that deeper meaning in modern philosophy as when for example we speak of the “mind-body problem” which is clearly not the problem about how the body manages to think.)

    After trying to clarify my language let me finally comment on some points you raise:

    “Gluttony and lust are both capital vices; the typical acts of these are always mortal sins, but whether other acts of capital vices are so depends on circumstances -- sometimes acts of capital vices are venial under the circumstances.”

    I agree that acts of capital vices (or “cardinal sins” in my language) are often venial to others. But that makes them no less harmful to the sinner.

    “'Cardinal sin' is a colloquial expression; it has no standard meaning in moral theology”

    Thanks to the internet we can actually measure how colloquial an expression is. Here are the number of the respective hits:

    cardinal sin 472.000
    capital sin 391.000
    mortal sin 545.000
    deadly sin 494.000

    cardinal vice 9.000
    capital vice 65.000
    mortal vice 4.000
    deadly vice 6.000

    So, you're quite right. “Cardinal sin” is the colloquial expression (and “mortal sin” + “deadly sin” even more so, but for reasons I describe above I think their use is harmful). I would also agree that “vice” is closer associated to one's character than “sin”, and thus closer to the my understanding of what “cardinal sin” refers to.

    “if you want to compare homosexual acts of lust to something to do with gluttony, you must pick out specific acts of gluttony to compare, not compare a vicious act to a different vice, which is a category mistake.”

    No, I am comparing the one cardinal sin – one literal illness of the soul – to another cardinal sin, and pointing out that they are both cardinal sins and thus major obstacles in our path towards Christ. I am not discussing or comparing the acts themselves, since one may suffer gravely from the sin of lust and equally gravely from the sin of gluttony, even if one doesn't act on these sins. Incidentally one knows the sin is still there when the sinful desire is there. In our path towards salvation all desires are substituted, or perhaps colored, by one's desire for Christ alone. By “colored” I mean for example that in one's path towards sanctification one will still desire what's good for one's family, but not in contrast to one's desire for Christ but as a function or dimension or part of one's desire for Christ. That is the wonderful state where one's desire for Christ finds expression in one's desire for the wellbeing of one's family, and makes that desire more fruitful and just.

    [continues below]

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  18. [continues from above]

    Now in the context of comparing the cardinal sins, perhaps the idea is that gluttony is a much smaller illness of the soul than, say, lust. I don't think that all cardinal sins are equally harmful, but I think that each one of them is extremely harmful. Thus I would like to explain why gluttony, a sin that is very common and which doesn't normally hurt others in any direct or grave way, is in fact a grave sin. The essential issue here is the desire for pleasure for pleasure's sake (that's why I wrote above that gluttony is not only about food, but about the inordinate consumption of any material good, a choice which can only be the result of desiring pleasure for its own sake). That to desire pleasure for its own sake is contemptible is known since far before Christ not only in other ancient religions but also, say, in ancient Greek philosophy where we read that to desire pleasure is a virtue of cows but not of humans. Speaking of myself, I spend my life thinking about what I might do that will give me pleasure the next hour, and planning how I might have a pleasurable life until I die. It is obvious why that state of mind is a huge obstacle in my following Christ's commands, and here I think lies the deeper meaning and danger of the sin of gluttony.

    “Nor is it the case that severity or importance is determined by widespreadness”

    True. What I meant in the beginning of this thread is that when probably more than 50% of Americans suffer from the cardinal sin of gluttony while probably less than 4% suffer from the cardinal sin of homosexual lust – those who wish to save other peoples' souls should care more about the former than the latter sin. And when the opposite is observed to be the case, one is justified in thinking that the operating principle here is hypocrisy – an especially insidious dimension of the cardinal sin of pride.

    “moral theologians talk at immense length about the relatively uncommon sin of murder”

    That's understandable, but on soteriology it's also a grave error. When one reads about the seven cardinal sins it is striking that the by far worse sins (murder, rape, cheating - and in general using our neighbor as a means which is to say not in love) are not to be found there. But on second thoughts the reason becomes crystal clear. The act of murder is the end result of a gravely sinful state of the soul. It is because of greed, wrath, gluttony, pride, envy – that some people sink into such a sinful state that they are moved to murder a neighbor. We are not naturally born killers, but we are by nature born with the seven sins. If we do not want to sink to the level of murderous rage, we'd better focus on the teaching about the seven cardinal sins and do something about them.

    I was thinking that one reason it is foolish not to take Christian tradition seriously is that we are not the first to encounter these important issues about salvation. Many other people, much better than we, have encountered them too. It has therefore immense practical value to study what came out of this historical process. And do it in the safety that we have thanks to Christ's teaching that by their fruits we will know them.

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  19. All of this is simply useless verbiage of no value. As I already noted, what is relevant for the point at hand is standard usages in moral theology, because the topic at hand is moral theology. Words get standard usages in particular fields for reasons of needed precision, and your argument is such that you cannot forego the use of such precision, for precisely the reasons I have already noted. How colloquial a colloquial expression is, is irrelevant; the point was explicitly that it is a colloquial expression, not a technical expression of moral theology -- when it gets used, it has no single precise meaning.

    No, I am comparing the one cardinal sin – one literal illness of the soul – to another cardinal sin, and pointing out that they are both cardinal sins and thus major obstacles in our path towards Christ.

    This makes exactly the same errors I just noted. 'Illness of soul' is something usually reserved for vices, not sins; the distinction between vices and sins matters in discussing questions of moral theology. Sins are particular kinds of actions, or else actions of a kind; vices are (like sickness) states of a person. You claim that by 'cardinal sin' you meant something more like vice, but in fact, as I already pointed out, your gluttony argument treats it as covering both actions of a certain kind and vices. You continue to do so throughout your explanation, and this is, again, a category mistake facilitated by your sloppy use of terms. Gluttony is a vice. 'Homosexual lust' is a kind of act associated with the vice of lust. They are not the same kind of thing and thus not directly comparable as if they were.

    That's understandable, but on soteriology it's also a grave error.

    On the entire paragraph beginning with this: I already pointed out, explicitly, that the list of seven was not based on the seriousness of each in itself, way back at the beginning. I already noted that there was a specific reason for the seven. The seven deadly sins are called such because they are the typical mortal acts associated with the seven capital vices, which is why they share names with their vices. The seven capital vices are called such because they are vices that lead to other vices with unusual ease; the phrase is due to St. Gregory the Great, who depicted them each as the head vice in an army of vices, so as soon as the head vice breaches one's defenses they start bringing in other vices behind them. This is why the list is useless for comparing seriousness, whether of vices or sins. Gluttony is not on the list of seven deadly sins because it is a horrible sin; it is because it can be either a partial cause or a full symptom of the vice of gluttony, which leads to other vices with unusual ease.

    We are not born with the seven deadly sins; as sins, they have to be committed. We are not born with the seven capital vices, either; as vices, they have to be acquired. Murder is an act, like any sin, that can be done in any state of soul, although certain vices make it much more likely; it can be the end result of a long deterioration, yes, but it can also be the first step in a plummet. This is because sins do not require vices but are only facilitated by them.

    The claim that spending more time talking about the relatively rare sin of murder is soteriologically a 'grave error' is nonsense. Murder is explicitly treated as important throughout the entirety of Holy Scripture. Murder is an attack on a human being, who is in the image of God; it is a double strike against God and neighbor. It is important for understanding sins of wrath and sins of envy. And -- what is actually the only thing to the point, because it was what I was specifically talking about and what you shifted the topic from -- murder is a very, very grave sin. Gravity is not measured by commonness.

    Your claim about the importance of taking Christian tradition seriously would be easier to take seriously itself if you did take Christian tradition seriously rather than just making things up as you go along.

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  20. Dianelos,

    ...Glenn above says that repentance is the cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ but does not refer to the movement itself.

    As a matter of fact, I did not say that. Also as a matter of fact, I did not say anything which may be rightly construed as my having said that.

    Let's clarify:

    1. You said, "Repentance is the change of the soul from a sinful to a less sinful state, i.e. the movement of the soul towards Christ."

    2. I responded with, "I would say that the movement of the soul towards Christ is an effect or consequence of repentance, and not that any movement of the soul towards Christ is itself an act of (non-metaphorical) repentance."

    3. Thus, given what I had actually said, the not-inaccurate thing to say, i.e., the accurate thing to say, is: "Glenn above says that repentance is a cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ."

    - - - - -

    4. The distinction between 'repentance is the cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ' and 'repentance is a cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ' is an important distinction -- it makes clear that not every movement of the soul towards Christ is necessarily a (non-metaphorical) act of repentance.

    5. Since repentance is an act of repenting, and I cannot repent unless I actually do something, it follows that any (non-metaphorical) repentance in which I am involved necessarily involves my doing something.

    6. Have we any examples of the soul moving towards Christ -- God; Godhead; etc. -- where said movement does not involve some doing by me which would be part of an act of (non-metaphorical) repentance? Yes, we do. To wit: a) Augustine said, "By charity I mean the movement of the soul towards the enjoyment of God for His own sake"; and, b) Tony has pointed out above both that "it is by grace and only by grace that we are raised up above the capacity we have by nature, and can know (and see) God as face to face, i.e. knowing him as he is in himself rather than through intermediary realities", and that "Creatures can only receive union with the Godhead by participation added unto their natures, and so it is always a special act of the divine distinct from any natural order."

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  21. @ Tony

    “it is by grace and only by grace that we are raised up above the capacity we have by nature”

    That “salvation is possible only by grace”, is in one sense obviously true. After all, for us to move a finger is possible only by grace too. I understand the concept of “grace” has a wide applicability, since it it may refer to God's being, or to God's desire, or to God's action – in relation to us. When we use grace in relationship to God's action I understand we mean God's special providence, i.e. the way that God directly and supernaturally participates in creation in every instance. One such supernatural action makes it possible for humans to have free will, and thus ultimately to have the capacity to move a finger.

    Surely by grace God has a direct influence in the salvation of humanity as a whole as well as in the salvific life of individuals. The incarnation of Christ is an obvious example. The continuous revelation of truth is another. There may be uncountable other examples. I don't myself know and I don't think it is in our nature to know the extent of God's special providence. Given faith, I don't see any profit in knowing much or even only being curious about it. Grace is something to receive, not to know about. So beyond this basic level my understanding about grace fairly stops. I know there are various complicated doctrines about the role that grace plays in salvation. But I have not studied them, and what little I have heard of them makes little sense to me.

    In my mind the way to salvation is very clear, because Christ's call to us is very clear. He basically says: “Be like Me”. And just to make certain we understand, He tells us over and over again what this entails: “Love one another as I love for you. Do not return evil but forgive even your enemies, if you neighbor wants to take your shirt offer your coat too, be simple like children. Consider the lilies and put your trust in God and not in material goods.” I mean how much clearer could He possibly speak?

    So why the whole body of soteriology in Christian tradition and in church life? Because it's one thing to know the way and another to actually walk it. That's a problem we all face. So through the centuries Christian tradition collected much practical wisdom to help us solve this personal problem. For me, for example, the teaching about the seven cardinal sins (or the seven capital vices, as Brandon thinks is better to call them) has been a revelation since these are clear stumbling blogs. This teaching produces good fruit in me already. But there is a lot of other teachings, for example about the importance of prayer, the importance of taking part in church life, the importance of spiritual exercise, and so on.

    [continues below]

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  22. [continues from above]

    “This salvific dimension of good is inherently supernatural, is inherently beyond the natural, for it is impossible that God could create a created being (i.e. a being dependent on God) who then BY NATURE is equal to God, who by nature has God's own being and nature. Creatures can only receive union with the Godhead by participation added unto their natures, and so it is always a special act of the divine distinct from any natural order.”

    As I understand what you are saying here, I agree. Indeed we are not made by nature equal to God, but only in the image of God. (Incidentally “nature like God” might be the better expression, since “nature equal to God” is true only for God). The salvific movement of the soul then should be understood not merely as a change of state but as a transformation, and it is reasonable to consider this transformation as divine grace being *added* to human nature. An analogy I have heard of this comes from considering the seed becoming a tree. The seed is made in the image of the tree, but is dry and dead (literally, such a 2.000 years old seed was found in Herod's palace on Masada). But when water is added to it then it transforms itself into the likeness of a tree. From small and inert it now is mighty and fruitful. Its very nature changes from dead to alive.

    So if that's what you mean then I am with you a 100%. Still I don't want to walk away from this bit that troubles me:

    "Not all have this grace, this favor, as is clear from St. Paul”

    It is not clear what St. Paul had in mind, and indeed St. Paul appears in places to speak of universal salvation. It's not even certain that St. Paul had the same idea in mind throughout his ministry. So any meaning one might extract from St. Paul's writings comes after a heavy dose of interpretation, which perhaps reveals more about the one who is doing the interpreting than about Paul. And any case if St. Paul meant what you think he meant, he might have been wrong. Some hold the belief that by God's grace St. Paul couldn't possibly be wrong, but I wonder if they also believe that by God's grace they themselves can't be wrong about that belief.

    What I am saying is that I see no need for certainty in these matters. Christ's call to salvation is clear enough, isn't it? So what more do we need? To have some faith in God entails trust that God will do the best for all creatures from the beginning to the end of days.

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  23. @ Brandon

    “How colloquial a colloquial expression is, is irrelevant”

    In my judgment it's not irrelevant. Anyway as I agreed your terminology is clearer I'll make the effort to use it below.

    Incidentally I looked up the page about sin in Catholic catechism ( http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s1c1a8.htm ) and found it rather confusing. I wonder isn't the catechism meant to be read by common people? The text does distinguish between vice and sin, and here are some examples of what I mean:

    Consider item #1866 which is exactly about what we've been discussing: “Vices can be classified according to the virtues they oppose, or also be linked to the capital sins which Christian experience has distinguished, following St. John Cassian and St. Gregory the Great. They are called "capital" because they engender other sins, other vices. They are pride, avarice, envy, wrath, lust, gluttony, and sloth or acedia.”

    This text is saying that pride etc are capital sins, not capital vices.

    Or consider the last item #1876 “The repetition of sins - even venial ones - engenders vices, among which are the capital sins”

    Among the vices are the capital sins?

    You write: “the distinction between vices and sins matters in discussing questions of moral theology”

    Agreed. That's why I repeatedly distinguished between vice (the state of the soul), sinful desire, and sin (the sinful action). [In my terminology I used respectively “sin”, “sinful desire”, and “sinful behavior”.]

    “your gluttony argument treats it as covering both actions of a certain kind and vices”

    I meant that gluttony is the vice, desiring food only for the pleasure is the sinful desire, and overeating is the sin. (Incidentally from what you write below I deduce that by “gluttony” you mean both the vice and the respective sin).

    Now I did mention that about 30% of Americans are obese and argued that therefore gluttony is a very common capital vice in the US. Later I explained that it is possible and indeed common to suffer the vice of gluttony but not be obese, and it is possible albeit rare not to suffer the vice of gluttony but be obese. From which follows that at least 30% (and probably more than 50%) of Americans suffer from the capital vice of gluttony.

    “'Homosexual lust' is a kind of act associated with the vice of lust.”

    I take it we agree that both heterotexuals and homosexuals may suffer from the capital vice of lust. I call “homosexual lust” the vice the latter suffer from. The corresponding sin might better be called homosexual sex, or homosexual intercourse.

    “The seven capital vices are called such because they are vices that lead to other vices with unusual ease; the phrase is due to St. Gregory the Great, who depicted them each as the head vice in an army of vices, so as soon as the head vice breaches one's defenses they start bringing in other vices behind them.”

    Interesting. Before reading your post I didn't know that. I quite agree. St. Gregory the Great promises to be a great read.

    “This is why the list is useless for comparing seriousness, whether of vices or sins.”

    So each capital vice in the list of seven is necessarily very harmful, since as you explained it leads to the other vices with unusual ease.

    “Gluttony is not on the list of seven deadly sins because it is a horrible sin; it is because it can be either a partial cause or a full symptom of the vice of gluttony, which leads to other vices with unusual ease.”

    Here I have the impression that by “gluttony” you mean both the vice and the respective sin of overeating.

    Even so I am not sure I get your meaning. Are you saying that the vice of gluttony is horrible (for the reasons you explain), but the sin of gluttony isn't?

    Even if that's your meaning, don't you agree that salvation is about the state of our soul, and thus about being free of capital vices such a gluttony? And therefore that it is relatively irrelevant whether the sin of gluttony itself is horrible or not?

    [continues below]

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  24. [continues from above]

    “We are not born with the seven deadly sins; as sins, they have to be committed.”

    Right.

    “We are not born with the seven capital vices, either; as vices, they have to be acquired.”

    Here you lost me. I thought it is a universally accepted understanding in Christianity that we are born in a state of vice. To me it seems obvious that we are all born with souls in a state of grave imperfection. Indeed it seems quite obvious that we are born suffering from the seven capital vices. After all even very small children display the respective actions. We say that they are innocent because they don't yet have the cognitive ability to know what they are doing or the maturity of will that entails responsibility for keeping one's vices in check. But the vices are already there.

    “This is because sins do not require vices but are only facilitated by them.”

    Can you imagine a person whose soul is healed of all seven capital vices, and who nevertheless commits a sin? I don't say it's impossible but I cannot imagine what would drive a person who does not at all suffer from pride, greed, envy, wrath, lust, gluttony, and laziness - to commit a sin. Can you suggest an example? (Perhaps I am also ignorant of the range of sins there are :- )

    “The claim that spending more time talking about the relatively rare sin of murder is soteriologically a 'grave error' is nonsense. Murder is explicitly treated as important throughout the entirety of Holy Scripture.”

    I didn't mean that it is an error to focus on the sin of murder because it is relatively uncommon. And I explicitly characterized murder as one of the “by far worse sins”. What I meant is that it is because of the growth of the seven capital vices that people sink so low as to be able to commit some extremely evil sins such as murder or rape. And that therefore it is pragmatically speaking of critical importance to focus, both in the practice of life and in the theory of soteriology, on one's liberation from the capital vices. The fact that as you pointed out the growth of one of the vices tends to increase all the others makes this issue even more critical.

    “It is important for understanding sins of wrath and sins of envy.”

    Right. So instead of focusing on the very grave sin of murder we'd be better off focusing on the vices of wrath and envy which often move people to commit murder. The murder is the horrible fruit, but wrath and envy are the tree that produces it. If one abhors the bad fruit one should cuts down the bad tree. And incidentally I'd say that also greed and pride are often behind the sin of murder. Come to think of it the worse sins appear to come from all vices working together.

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  25. @ Glenn

    “the accurate thing to say, is: "Glenn above says that repentance is a cause of the movement of our soul towards Christ"”

    True. My mistake.

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  26. In my judgment it's not irrelevant. Anyway as I agreed your terminology is clearer I'll make the effort to use it below.

    Your judgment is irrelevant; your response about internet searches did not address anything in my point, and this is not a matter of "your judgment" but of the structure of the point.

    I wonder isn't the catechism meant to be read by common people?

    It's primarily for catechists and other teachers who would already have background in the topics, to serve as a norm for catechesis.

    This text is saying that pride etc are capital sins, not capital vices.

    Yes, by figure of speech the typical sins of capital vices are sometimes called capital sins. Note, incidentally, that the text gives the correct reason for calling them 'capital'.

    I call “homosexual lust” the vice the latter suffer from.

    The vice the latter suffer from is called lust.

    So each capital vice in the list of seven is necessarily very harmful, since as you explained it leads to the other vices with unusual ease.

    Every vice is necessarily very harmful. Not every vice in the list is especially harmful in itself compared to other vices; there are many vices immensely more harmful than gluttony, it's just that gluttony opens the door for a lot of relatively petty vices.

    Here I have the impression that by “gluttony” you mean both the vice and the respective sin of overeating.

    It takes no great reading skills to see that I explicitly in the passage you are talking about distinguished the sin of gluttony from the vice of gluttony; the former is the typical act of the latter. Your equivocation is arising because you are taking the fact that by a figure of speech we use the same word to mean that one does not have to make the distinction.

    thought it is a universally accepted understanding in Christianity that we are born in a state of vice.

    No, vices must be acquired; we are not born vicious.

    Can you imagine a person whose soul is healed of all seven capital vices, and who nevertheless commits a sin?

    Yes, every vice is opposed not merely by virtue but by at least one opposing vice, so someone could lack all capital vices and still be vicious -- for instance, he could lack vainglory because he is pusillanimous, lack envy because he is boot-licking, lack wrath because he is timid, lack sloth because he is presumptuous, lack greed because he is unthrifty, lack gluttony because he is self-starving, lack lust because he is frigid.

    So instead of focusing on the very grave sin of murder we'd be better off focusing on the vices of wrath and envy which often move people to commit murder.

    As I said, understanding the wrongness of murder is important for understanding wrath and envy in the first place.

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  27. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  28. Can you imagine a person whose soul is healed of all seven capital vices, and who nevertheless commits a sin?

    I should have added as well, on this point, that vices are not necessary conditions for sinning; they are often acquired in the first place by the sins that they then facilitate. So if you rid yourself of vice, you are perfectly well still capable of committing sins. Freeing oneself from vices does not give one salvation from sin; it only makes us more open to grace, which is the only thing that can save.

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  29. @ Brandon

    I'd like to start with thanking you for this discussion which I've found very useful. The idea that each of the capital vices as it were pulls up the others was an eye-opener for me. Earlier I wrote that when I recently read for the first time about the seven capital vices it felt like reading the story of my life. I discovered I have them all and even more surprisingly I had trouble deciding which one I had to a significant degree less than the others. Now I understand why.

    Now that the growth in each capital vice makes it easier for the other vices to grow - that's the bad news. The good news is that succeeding in beating down one capital vice makes all other vices easier to beat down too – an insight of momentous practical significance. The seven vices are not like independent stones one carries on one's back and so by throwing away one of them the load becomes lighter. Rather they are like seven horses that together pull a carriage towards the precipice. If one makes one horse stronger it will make the other horses run quicker; but if one on the contrary weakens one horse it will hinder all the others. Here I'd like to speak of a personal experience. During the last 10 days or so I started an effort to beat down on my gluttony – and do it right in the sense of not only lessening the overeating while leaving the desire unchecked. And I already experience that laziness and wrath are somehow lessened. It's an extremely small example of course and I hope I am not imagining things.

    Incidentally can you recommend a beginner's book on moral theology? One not only focused on theory but also on the practical applications in the actual life of common people?

    You write: “it's just that gluttony opens the door for a lot of relatively petty vices”

    Isn't it the case that each capital vice opens the door for all other capital vices at least? So for example isn't it the case that gluttony opens the door for sloth?

    Here we are not really discussing theological matters per se, but facts about the actual structure of the human condition and in particular about the illnesses of the human soul. Come to think of it wouldn't it be useful to find the connections between ancient wisdom and the modern science of psychology? To some degree they walk the same ground.

    “No, vices must be acquired; we are not born vicious.”

    Theologically then, how does your understanding comport with our fallen state?

    And as a matter of observation, how do you explain that very small children (say by the age of two) already display behavior we associate with vice (e.g. envy)? How did these very small children acquire it?

    “lack envy because he is boot-licking”

    Yes, I can see how a vice may oppose another (another new idea for me). But the question was about somebody who is free of *all* capital vices. I don't see how somebody who is free of pride and greed and envy and wrath and lust and gluttony and laziness – could be boot-licking. It's not a logical impossibility, but to the degree I know the human condition this as a matter of fact does not obtain.

    In general I don't see how without any vices whatsoever (whether capital, minor, grave, etc) one could resort to sin. Isn't it the case that vices produce the sinful desires that lead many to sin?

    “understanding the wrongness of murder is important for understanding wrath and envy in the first place”

    I agree. But since almost everybody understands the wrongness of murder shouldn't we in soteriology focus more on the capital vices such as wrath and envy that when allowed to become strong open the door to potential murder?

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  30. Isn't it the case that each capital vice opens the door for all other capital vices at least? So for example isn't it the case that gluttony opens the door for sloth?

    Arguably one can get from any vice to any vice that doesn't oppose it. But this doesn't mean that all paths are equally likely.

    Theologically then, how does your understanding comport with our fallen state?

    And as a matter of observation, how do you explain that very small children (say by the age of two) already display behavior we associate with vice (e.g. envy)? How did these very small children acquire it?


    Vice is distinct from original sin or concupiscence.

    As I previously noted, vices are not necessary conditions for sins; they harden us into them.

    But the question was about somebody who is free of *all* capital vices.

    You could be free of all capital vices and be pusillanimous or boorish, so still have vices. Likewise, I don't see why the vice of bootlicking or slavishness particularly depends on any of the capital vices. It's opposed by vainglory and envy; wrath and sloth are not particularly relevant to it; and greed, gluttony, and lust seem only to facilitate it under some conditions, not to be requirements for it under all conditions. Because they are so diverse, they cover a lot of ground, but the capital vices weren't picked out because they are essential for all other vices.

    Isn't it the case that vices produce the sinful desires that lead many to sin?

    Sins can be caused by vices, but sinning in general does not depend on vice -- vices are usually acquired by sins (although sometimes just from the spilling over of other vices); they are habitutations to sin. Lots of people commit the sins typical of a vice without having that vice -- e.g., when they do things out of character, or because they are faced with new temptations.

    But since almost everybody understands the wrongness of murder shouldn't we in soteriology focus more on the capital vices such as wrath and envy that when allowed to become strong open the door to potential murder?

    (1) Soteriology has to do with divine grace; it is about what Christ does, not what we do. Vices can enter in very indirectly insofar as they are impediments to cooperation with grace, and insofar as grace aids us to virtue, but this is very indirectly.

    (2) If people really understood the wrongness of murder, they wouldn't have much trouble with wrath and envy. But they don't. They'll repeat that it's wrong and go on to make judgments that don't take into account why it's wrong, and act in ways that are wrong in the same way, just on a smaller, less harmful scale. Practically every age seems to have its own sanitized customs of killing other human beings -- gladiatorial games, dueling, violent feuding, euthanasia, and so forth. We don't live like we understand it, and if we do understand it, we live like we compartmentalize a lot of things away from it.

    (3) Even if people did understand it, in moral life as in any other practical field, one must often return to basics. Likewise, teaching must in great measure address the kinds of things people actually have questions about or puzzle over, and murder and related issues are perennial points people have questions about.

    (4) People can make their own judgments about what to focus on. If you want to focus on wrath and envy, go right ahead; if someone else thinks it's better to focus on acts like murder, there's nothing wrong with that.

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  32. Oh wow, that After the Ball thing. Nasty.

    It’s this kind of thing that makes Russia’s ban of LGBT propaganda at least somewhat understandable.

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