Dr. Claude Mariottini - Professor of Old Testament: The Sanctity of Marriage

Dr. Claude Mariottini is starting a series on his blog that should be extremely interesting . He started with pointing out that Joseph Fletcher wrote a book in 1966.Mariottini wrote the following:

The book, Situation Ethics (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1966), caused a furor because Fletcher was advocating a new form of morality, a morality based on individual responsibility in which a situation decided whether an action was right or wrong.

Fletcher developed the argument of his book by saying that “any act, even lying, premarital sex, abortion, adultery, and murder, could be right depending on the circumstances.” To Fletcher, when love reigns, love dictates what must be done. Thus, when a person is confronted with a moral decision, the solution is relative. The most loving thing is the answer to the problem. The introduction to Fletcher’s book quotes him saying: “Rising above any creed, this renewed morality of loving concern is based on agape, the love of which only God is capable, but which every man must endeavor to emulate. Just as Jesus defied convention to make decisions on the basis of particular people and particular circumstances, so must modern man.”

The reason I think we need to discuss these points that Mariottini is bringing up is that moral relativism is a drum being beat by the "new" atheists. They really think that under certain circumstances anything is moral. They conclude that with no objective moral standard that there is no god. The problem I have with Fletcher's book is that the Bible does not give situational ethics any quarter. It never says "Thou shalt not....unless.....".  Agreed Jesus defied the traditions of  his day, but never the law of God.  I agree that there is the "letter of the law" and the "spirit of the law". I even agree that we must always do the most loving thing - but the most loving thing is what God tells us to do and in our own human intellect it doesn't seem all that loving all the time because it's not what we want to do; I know we need to obey God and use his definition of "loving" not our own. . 

Fletcher illustrated his points by providing anecdotal scenarios where immoral acts could be more moral given their context. In his series of posts, Mariottini is going to present  some of them and is inviting readers to comment on them.  Checkout the link below to get the first  one.


Dr. Claude Mariottini - Professor of Old Testament: The Sanctity of Marriage