Situation Ethics
- Created by: beccigraced
- Created on: 22-11-14 14:58
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- Situation Ethics
- General Principles
- 'Love your neighbour as thyself'
- Not a a rule or law
- No two situations are identical- no fixed rules apply to everything
- Agapeic love informs the choices we make.
- Most loving way= morally sound
- Legalism
- Christian idea that you have to do good to get to heaven.
- Antinomianism
- Idea that Christians believe going to heaven has nothing to do with the things you do right or wrong
- Situation ethics in the middle
- Christian idea that you have to do good to get to heaven.
- Is love easier than sticking to rules?
- Situation ethics in the middle
- Idea that Christians believe going to heaven has nothing to do with the things you do right or wrong
- 'Love your neighbour as thyself'
- Conscience
- Butler
- It is separate from reason
- 'Our natural guide, the guide assigned to us by the author of our nature'
- We must obey our conscience. It helps judge between self love and benevolence.
- Aquinas
- Conscience is not always right, it is your reason and logic.
- Newman
- 'The conscience is a messenger of divine law. It is from God and should be obeyed.'
- Augustine
- 'Conscience is an innate faculty which reveals God's moral law as it is inscribed into men's souls'
- The rules have to be ingested first
- Conscience is informed by rules.
- 'Conscience is an innate faculty which reveals God's moral law as it is inscribed into men's souls'
- Bible
- Record of right and wrong 'I try to keep my conscience clear'- Acts 24
- 'My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent' 1 conrinthians 4
- Conscience can be wrong
- 'The requirements of law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness.' Romans 2
- God puts the law in our hearts
- 1 Corinthians shows that people have different conscienceses- they say different things.
- Catechism- the conscience tells you that you need forgiveness.
- S.E needs conscience.
- Fletcher
- Conscience is a verb, not a thing/noun
- Butler
- Fletcher's 6 Fundamental Principles.
- Only one thing is intrinsically good, namely love; nothing else.
- The ruling norm of Christian decision is love: love replaces law
- Love and justice is the same, for justice is love distributed
- Love wills the neighbour's good, whether we like him or not. Agape: love is the desire for the good of others.
- Only the end justifies the means
- Love's decisions are made situationally, not prescriptively.
- Fletcher's 4 Presumptions/presuppositions
- Pragmatism
- Emphasis on practicality; Agape must be put into practice.
- Relativism
- Love relativises the absolute, it does not absolutivise the relative
- Love can replace law
- Rules are relatively important
- Positivism
- Start with a positive choice- to want to do good
- 'the spirit of Jesus must be applied, more importantl than dogma.'
- Personalism
- Prioritise people in decisions (ie. over rules)
- Made in the image of God
- Prioritise people in decisions (ie. over rules)
- Pragmatism
- Application to Nagasaki
- Evaluation
- Strengths
- Bishop John Robinson
- 'Situation ethics is for a man come of age'- you need the Bible until you can know love.
- 'There is no one ethical system that can claim to be christian' It all boils down to love
- Zygumun Bauman
- 'Legalistic approaches actually cripple our ability to make moral decisions.'
- William Barclay
- Some actions will always be wrong but sometimes necessary
- A dangerous drug is never called anything else but a poison.
- Some actions will always be wrong but sometimes necessary
- Love thy naeighbour as thyself is the ultimate duty'
- Bishop John Robinson
- Weaknesses
- Pope Pius XII
- 'in opposition to God's natural law'
- Allowing you to ignore God's instructions
- Daniel Callahan
- 'no ethics at all'
- lets you do what you want
- Bernard Hoose
- 'It is never right to go against a principle unless there is proportionate reason.'
- We should have laws, which are sometimes necessary to break
- Thomas Aquinas
- 'There is a natural basic moral law which is divinely inspired.'
- Situational is not right- laws come from God, which we must obey.
- Pope Pius XII
- Strengths
- General Principles
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