Situation ethics

Relativistic= There are no absolute moral rules that everyone must obey

Teleological= An ethical system that is concerned with the consequences of actions

Legalism= The belief that there are fixed moral laws that must be obeyed

Antinomianism= The belief that there are no fixed moral principles and that ethics should be spontaneous

History

• Developed in the 1960s by Joseph Flether
• In the twentieth century, the USA and UK were facing changes that involved people moving away from legalism and towards antinomianism- This happened because people did not want to be told what to do by God anymore

• American theologian
• He wanted to preserve the Christian principle of love, therefore situation ethics involves making decisions depending on what 'best serves love'

Agape love

• Situation ethics has one single maxim which is agape love (Agape love= selfless love)
• Fletcher claimed that agape love was essential and it should be applied to every situation

Pragmatism

• The action must work towards the end which is love

Relativism

• The situationist must avoid words like 'never' and 'always' because there are no fixed rules- All decisions must be relative to Christian love

Positivism

• 'God is love'- You must give first place to Christian love

Personalism

• People must come first

• Only one thing is intrinsically good which is love
• The ruling norm of Christian decision making is love- Jesus broke the rules when it best served love
• Love and justice are the same- 'Justice is love distributed'
• Love wills the neighbour's good, whether we like him or not'
• Only the end result justifies the means
• Love's decisions are made situationally, not prescriptively

• It shows that Christians can be situationists and still follow biblical laws
• It provides a good enough reason to break ethical principles
• The whole system is guided by the desirable principle of love
• It isn't tied to rules like deontological ethics- This makes it flexible because each situation can be judged individually

• It's a religious ethical system- It doesn't appeal to everyone
• Our ideas of love might be subjective
• This theory allows bad actions to bring about more 'loving' consequences
• This theory is permissive- It allows things that Christians would never allow
• They say that there are no ethical principles but they allow one: Do the most loving thing- This contradicts itself