Social Morality

There has been a lot of talk about morality recently. In the various discussions however, certain people only want to look at the part of morality dealing with relations between man and man. I’m sure we have all quoted, ‘Do unto others…’, at one time or the other. The other two parts of morality are often swept under the carpet and if they are introduced, the jeers begin. The other two parts of morality are the relations between the things inside each man and the relations between man and the power that made him. When issues involving the relations between man and the power that made him surface, the disagreements become more serious. Some people even make very silly statements implying that one should not drag religion into such discussions. The very attempt if you think about it, is absurd (but I do concede that such statements have great rhetorical force). The philosopher of science Michael Polanyi has shown that no truth is arrived at without the scientist assuming (or having faith) in a particular worldview. Knowledge about anything (including morality), is always held by someone as a commitment. So the faith component whether revealed implicitly or explicitly, is always present. There is no getting away from it. There is no such thing as discussing moral issues without ‘dragging religion into it’. Moral knowledge does not exist in a vacuum, it is held by people with commitments to one worldview or another. Those who preach separation of Church and State are indulging in fantasy. Be kind to these people and pray for them, but whatever you do, don’t take them seriously.