Doris Wrench Eisler concludes her most recent letter to the editor (Gazette, July 28) with the observation that “secular society has developed in opposition” to (I assume) “past religion-based abominations.” Of course, we should probably temper our understanding of the term “secular society,” because if the 20th century showed us anything, it is that radically secular societies are capable of far worse abominations.
It's easy to point at e.g. the Crusades or the Spanish Inquisition as examples of the failure of religious rule ... so how then are we to regard the murderous excesses of Stalinism, Maoism, the Khmer Rouge, or the Castro regime? These radically secular – in some cases, overtly atheist – regimes killed well over a hundred million people in the span of mere decades, and often in shorter spans of time than that. By comparison, the Spanish Inquisition handed out fewer than 5,000 death sentences in more than three centuries of operation.
Against the horrors of communism, something like the summer grant program's politically charged attestation is not a severe concern. But it's still troubling, and I ask again: would Eisler (or anyone else) be as sanguine about the attestation if it had been put in place by a conservative-leaning government, and if it went in the opposite direction as concerns an organization's stance on abortion.
And don't take my words to mean that I believe that secular society is in general a bad thing; it isn't. But it is to say that there is something which distinguishes European, American, and/or Canadian secular society from the examples I cited previously. And I submit, for the reader’s consideration, that one such distinguishing feature that the laws and principles underpinning these societies is grounded in a philosophical framework which has been knit together over the centuries, and which incorporates no small amount of Judeo-Christian moral sensibility.
But what is morality? For the Christian, morality is to be in alignment with the will of God? So: what is the will of God? We should perhaps first ask what the nature of God is, and the simplest answer to that question is the observation that God is love. So: what is love? At its purest, love is to will the good of the other; note that already, this is being set in the context of a relationship of persons, rather than in the context of individuals.
So what is morality? Put plainly, to be moral is to effect love in the world: to will the good of the other, and to take what actions are necessary to see that good realized. This is why abortion can never be moral, for example; not only does it bring harm (rather than good) to the unborn child, but often it has harmful effects on the mother as well. The moral approach to the question of “unwanted” pregnancy is not expanded availability of termination options, but expanded support – from both community and state – for new mothers and their babies.
But I digress. Do Christians have a monopoly on moral precepts? No, and the assertion that Christians could claim this is laughable. In fact, it's the other way around; moral precepts simply are; what is moral is what effects love in the world, what brings about the good of the other. Christians don’t own morality; they are only its humble servants.
Kenneth Kully, St. Albert
