An Apology for Evil: A Response to an Article in Reuters

Last night, I read in article on Reuters' website about a Cambridge scientist who has offered a new definition of evil.  Read the article here.  Not only does he cross the boundaries between science and metaphysics, but his views inadequately address all facets of evil.

Never send a natural scientist to do a theologian's job.

I have grounds to ignore this fellow altogether, because he is committing the methodological equivalent of kicking the soccer ball into the sidelines and calling it a goal. Natural Science does not answer questions of purpose.  Instead it answers descriptive questions only.  A biologist, chemist, or any of the other empirical branches of science relies upon physical data and experiment to analyze certain patterns in behavior, given certain circumstances. Metaphysics, which comprises part of theology, answers the "why" questions:  Why do we exist?  Why do we commit acts of cruelty? And so forth.

He is well within his bounds to speak of causal relationships, however.  His research concerning certain "empathy centers" in the brain might prove germane to metaphysicians or theologians at some later point.  However, his misconduct lies in the fact that he makes the leap into metaphysics.  He argues that evil itself can be reduced to this "lack of empathy."  That is, people lack a certain skill at understanding other people's emotions.  The implicit assumption is that, given proper treatment, most people will learn empathy and cease to do evil. 

The only information that his research shows is that certain people's brains don't fire like other people's brains, and this anomaly correlates to a lack of empathy.

He not only fails to achieve his goal because he uses inadequate methods, but his definition is deficient.  Because he is only concerned with the empirically verifiable, interpersonal dimension of evil, he speaks of it in terms of subjective preferences:

 "We've inherited [the word "evil"]...and we use it to express our abhorrence when people do awful things, usually acts of cruelty, but I don't think it's anything more than another word for doing something bad. And as a scientist that doesn't seem to me to be much of an explanation. So I've been looking for an alternative -- we need a new theory of human cruelty."

This is not a new idea, but stems from a philosophical system called Emotivism.  In other words, he claims that no objective standard of evil exists, either from God, from Natural Law, or both.  Instead, evil is just a term that people use when they really dislike a certain behavior or thought.  For the strict empiricist, this is about the best system that they have at their disposal.  However, it doesn't cut the metaphysical mustard.

This definition fails to address any other variables that the metaphysical definition includes.  What about natural disasters?  Are these evil, or just an inconvenience?  What about diseases?  Cold-blooded, pre-meditated murders?  Victimless crimes?  Are these evil?  Are they merely another sort of sickness? Not only does his definition not address these issues, but it implicitly ignores the other facets of the metaphysical definition in order to legitimate his own. 

Another philosophy which underpins his scientific results is Materialism.  Materialists reject the notion of any soul or spirit in the human person.  The mind and brain are one and the same.  For this reason, he seeks to explain the "drive to respond appropriately" in terms of firing synapses.  Man is a sort of machine; if the wires work correctly, then the machine runs effectively. 

This raises several questions:  What constitutes a malfunction?  Who determines the nature of a malfunction?  What about people who do not have this malfunction, yet still commit cruelty?  As you can see, his usage of materialist and emotivist philosophies is not only inadequate to answer most permutations, but it is also highly unoriginal.  B.F. Skinner developed his Behaviorist philosophy along Materialist lines, whereas A. J. Ayer utilized Emotivist philosophy in his Language, Truth, and Logic.

In the next article, I will put forward other philosophical views regarding evil, views which I might not personally agree with, but will most likely prove more satisfactory than Baron-Cohen's hackneyed view.

An Analytic Science

First thing first--[] issues an excellent corrective to the narrow view of science that is widespread and does justice to the non dogmatic nature of doing philosophy or theology--you most def have to be willing to shift premises, reconsider in the light of new evidence, etc. What was going to be a post focusing on Nietzsche's joyous science has quickly become a dangerous foray into philosophy proper, from which in the past couple years or so I have merely begged, borrowed, and stolen from for my own purposes rather than dealt with much in its own right. I won't claim to try to reconcile this with recent centuries developments in theology, but theology as you outline it falls into what is broadly referred to as the analytic style of doing philosophy.

Analytic philosophy has all sorts of methods--including both straight-up rationalism and empiricism. The analytic style is entrenched in philosophy proper (my own experience and http://www.philosophicalgourmet.com/analytic.asp attest) and features, on the whole, incredibly specialized advances in very narrow nooks of wider problems. Continental philosophy struggles for a foothold in philosophy departments but nearly shuts out analytic philosophy in wider humanities discussions...the philosophy that does the "founding" for studies in rhetoric, sociology, etc. is almost always continental (perhaps with the exception of economics, as I've learned in Deidre McCloskey's Rhetoric of Economics). Both these wide-ranging styles have a huge amount of literature and approaches, but this basic distinction, I think is important, because theology so defined does resonate with philosophy--analytic philosophy.

Science Council Gets it Right: Theology Included in Re-Definition of Science

The Science Council, a UK-based organization of science professionals, has recently redefined the term "science".  This has been a long time in coming, and I hope that this is the first of many organizations to attempt similar corrections to this word's currently impoverished denotation.  In particular, because theology is a science long neglected by the broader scientific world

It's not malapropism.  You just didn't know the entire definition.  Theology is a science.

Nowadays, the commonest definition of the term restricts science to those which are properly called natural sciences.  Simply because this definition is the most common, however, doesn't mean that it is the only acceptable one.

As with the term theology, we will begin with etymology.  Science comes from the Latin noun "scientia", a word meaning "knowledge.  That's right, knowledge; they didn't make a distinction between "empirical knowledge" or "theoretical knowledge" in the term.  This was because mathematics, philosophy, religion, and any of the other means of learning about the world were viewed as true, valid knowledge.  Take Pythagoras for example.  He was an ancient Greek philosopher who sought to understand the cosmos through mathematics.

Just think, if his esoteric philosophical school didn't exist, then we wouldn't have had his theorem or Scarecrow's memorable line:

 

But I digress.  What I mean is that the definition of science underwent subdivision, most likely during the 16th and 17th century.  At this time, thinkers such as Copernicus, Galileo, and others were discovering new objective laws at work in the world.  The entire worldview was changing; rather than viewing the world as a great interconnected organism, scientists began thinking of it in more mechanical terms.  Thus, "science" gradually referred more to understanding the objective cogs of the machine, apart from any religious or philosophical methodology.  

Of course, natural science still relies upon a theoretical method, but only as a guide to the empirical investigation.  Rather than developing theoretical systems, natural sciences rely upon experiments.  Therein lies the distinction between natural sciences and those like theology, or formal sciences.

Formal sciences rely primarily upon a priori facts and logical systems.  In other words, they start from foundational assumptions and reason their way to derived principles.  This is true for theology proper.  For example:

Assumption 1:  Divinity/Divinities exist.

Assumption 2:  Divinity/Divinities is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent.

Premise 1:  Divinity/Divinities are incorporeal, for otherwise they could not be omnipresent.

Premise 2:  Divinities who are incorporeal and share the same essential qualities have no distinction.

Conclusion:  There is only one Divinity.

Granted, this is not original.  Ancient Greeks came up with this.  However, this is theology/philosophy.  They are both formal sciences and share the same method:  they rely upon postulates and reason in order to create theoretical systems.  Postulates are not infallible; they are simply foundational assumptions for the system.  They can be questioned or restated at any time.  

Now you know.  And knowing is half the battle. 

Reference List for Upcoming Summer Article Series

Roman Catholic Social teaching, especially pertaining to secular authority or economics, is often  misinterpreted, even among Catholics.  Certain favorite passages are quoted out of historical and social context.  Often, all different document types are given equal weight, when they aren't meant to be interpreted that way.  Over the next several months, I will be drafting several essays that survey the social teachings of the Papacy.  I will draw upon Wikipedia extensively for secondary source material and the Vatican's website for primary sources.

I intend to write  essays over these topics:
1.)  The Social Writings of Pope Leo XIII (1878-1903)
2.)  The Social Writings of Blessed Pope John XXIII (1958-1963)
3.)  The Social Writings Arising out of Vatican II (1962-1965)
4.)  The Social Writings of Pope Paul VI (1967)
5.)  The Social Writings of Blessed Pope John Paul II (1978-2005)
6.)  Conclusions

In preparation for this essays, I have assembled some relevant sources:

On Interpretation of Church Documents:

Bradshaw, Benjamin P. "Types of Papal Documents"
Different Authoritative Weight of Papal Documents

On the Popes
Pope Leo XIII 
Blessed Pope John XXIII 
Pope Paul VI 
Blessed Pope John Paul II 

On the Second Vatican Council
Council Overview 
Lumen Gentium: The Light of the Nations 
Gaudium et Spes: The Joys and Hopes 
Dignitatis Humanae: Concerning Human Dignity  

Economists' Responses to the Church Documents

Austrian-School Capitalists
Thomas Woods, Jr. 
Robert P. Murphy 
Numerous Articles by Thomas Woods, Jr.

Distributist Economics
G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936)
Dorothy Day (1897-1970)
Thomas Storck
The Distributist Review


Discussion is welcome throughout the series.  It is especially welcomed after the conclusion, since we will hopefully have a more comprehensive view of the Church's socio-economic teachings. 

Disclaimer:  The posts pertaining to this project are only my opinions and of those who participate, and do not necessarily constitute the Church's infallible teaching. 

A Response for Mr. Palmer

 In my post entitled, "Simply Complicated:  One Catholic's Response to the Bin Laden Brouhaha," the following quote proved ambiguous:

In the wake of such a socio-political tsunami, Christians would be wise to withdraw from shore, regroup, and carefully plan how to respond to the aftermath, rather than rush headlong into the tide, spouting choice prooftexts or joining in the chaos. Instead, they should reflect upon the Church's historical teachings and ponder the whole of Scripture; usually they will find that the "Christian solution" is equally multi-faceted.

In this post, I will attempt to elaborate upon this quote, as well as put forth other necessary elucidations that have been brought up in the post.

Mr. Palmer brings up a valid point:  this particular situation only really lends itself to two initial responses.  One can either choose to participate in the mob celebrations or refuse.  However, the act of refusal will necessarily peak the mob's curiosity.  They will inevitably question the rationale for this act; the Christian needs to have a better explanation than a few verses.  He doesn't need to have a treatise memorized verbatim, but he does need to have some sort of response for those who know enough about Scripture to respond to the favorite proof-texts with their own choice verses.

What I intended by this quote was this:  this world needs more than an army of Bible-thumping automatons who know three verses about "loving thy neighbor."  It needs a community of believers who have taken the effort to internalize Scripture, have relevant knowledge of the traditions of their community, and respond with a cogent, persuasive reason for their refusal to participate in the this orgy of nationalistic bloodlust. 

These things being said, I will attempt to present an example of how one might begin to formulate such a view systematically:

Scripture:  Throughout Scripture, we find general themes regarding creation and humanity.

 Creation is very good.  Humanity is God's unique creation, having been made in His image.  Mankind's state in Eden is that of benevolent steward over creation.  God laments Abel's death at the hands of Cain.  God indicates the great value of human life by demanding an account of any murderer; he institutes lex talionis: eye for an eye.  The Decalogue, which God gave to Moses on Sinai, includes among its tenets an injunction against murder.  Both Major and Minor Prophets preach about an idyllic, just, war-free society (Genesis 1-2, 4, 9; Exodus 20; Isaiah, Micah )  

Jesus Christ declares that he has come to fulfill the Law, rather than abrogate it, through His ministry and teachings , teachings which include loving one's enemies, refraining from violent resistance against oppression, and restraining one's hatred for others.   The Apocalypse of John promises that Heaven and Earth will become one, and God Himself will dwell among His people.  Edenic imagery abounds, indicating that the world to come will be a consummated Eden. (Matthew 4-7; Revelation)

Tradition

One has committed a mortal sin if and only if:
1.)  He commits it with deliberate consent
2.)  He commits it with full knowledge of its gravity
and
3.)  He commits it in a grave matter, i.e. the weightier of the Ten Commandments:  murder, adultery, theft, violating the Sabbath, etc. (CCC pg. 454)

The Catechism of the Catholic Church outlines the principles of legitimate defense:  one can only legitimately defend oneself in the instance of confirmed threat of life or limb.  Governments are allowed only punishment that is proportionate to the gravity of the committed offense.  The overriding principle which the Fifth Commandment upholds is that God holds life, especially human life, to be sacred.  Scandal, or acting or speaking in such a way that encourages another to commit evil actions, is akin to murder, if done willingly and knowingly.  Murderous anger, which is the desire for one's death or punishment that goes beyond mere desire for justice, is a sin.  (CCC  pp. 544-554)

Reason

Taking pleasure in Bin Laden's death is a sin, in that it damages charity.  It also does not spring from righteous desire for justice, but instead from sinful hatred of another human being, who shares in the common dignity of all human beings.  According to Jesus' teachings, hatred is murder.  Knowingly hating another person, in spite of knowledge of God's injunctions to the contrary, risks mortal sin.
 
This answer took about 20 minutes of thought to formulate, drew from several sources, and still wasn't comprehensive.  However, this is still leaps and bounds more substantial than merely quoting "love your enemies" in a tweet. Also note that I preferred citing whole books, rather than verses.  This is not merely because I wished to save time; I meant to emphasize that one needs to learn whole books and their shared themes, rather than mechanistically quoting verses as if they sufficed.  The Catechism is reference by nature, so quoting articles and passages is appropriate.

Response to "Simply Complicated," "Interpreting Walsh" and "Is Libertarianism Necessary for Liberty?"

I read over "simply complicated" several times, but eventually decided on the section I could most adequately respond to:

In the wake of such a socio-political tsunami, Christians would be wise to withdraw from shore, regroup, and carefully plan how to respond to the aftermath, rather than rush headlong into the tide, spouting choice prooftexts or joining in the chaos. Instead, they should reflect upon the Church's historical teachings and ponder the whole of Scripture; usually they will find that the "Christian solution" is equally multi-faceted.

Does this speak to an axiom of inaction for Christianity? If this only a specific case where reflection is warranted, what are some that do not require it? Materially, there is nothing multi-faceted about the Christian solution: you will either participate in the celebrations out of patriotism, or choose not to out of apathy or disagreement. Even if sober reflection is an ideal to pursue, this seems a situation where it is difficult to implement.

With "Interpreting Walsh," I understand the figure-ground issue, interpreting some passages in light of others, but fail to understand how this puts infallibility at the center of the discussion. Is this an issue inherent in interpretation that cannot be escaped? By this I mean, are we forced to elevate certain passages as the ground of interpretation? If not, it seems the infallibility debate is between elevating certain passages and not elevating certain passages. If so, it seems we have a descriptive account of one way amongst many to worship god, one way to interpret the scriptures among many--which if I understand from previous discussions, is what sacraments can be understood as.

Finally, with the "Libertarianism" piece, I would like an elaboration on the kind of force it is wrong to initiate against others. Christianity would seem to have injunctions to exhort brethren, rebuke sin, kick out unrepentant, and otherwise initiate plenty of force and influence on the lives of others. Is this initiation against others purely a shared Pacifist understanding, then? Or is something else afoot?

You'll both have to forgive any novice misunderstandings, if this truly is to represent collaboration in spite of our various disciplinary backgrounds, such clarification will be part and parcel.

Is Libertarianism Necessary for Liberty?

"Really great moral teachers never do introduce new moralities: it is quacks and cranks who do that." - C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

More and more I have been thinking about the relationship between Christianity and libertarianism. I mentioned in my response to the USA Today that capitalism does not offer moral guidance. It is not a philosophy. It is an economic system. I also said that if capitalism did offer moral guidance, if it did say, "Give to the poor," then Christians should be uneasy with capitalism for when they did give to the poor there would be a dilemma about which moral code they were really following. This is important for Christians because the supernatural element is foundational to physical actions. Giving to the poor because you love Christ is very different than giving to the poor because you have humanitarian concerns. Having said this, then, I believe I have put myself in a quandary, because while capitalism has no ethical code - again, it is purely a descriptive term referring to a complex system of private property exchange - libertarianism does have an ethical code, namely the non-aggression axiom. It says that we are all owners of our persons and that no one, not even a government, has the right to initiate force and violate that ownership. (Note: There is a summary of my argument at the end of the post).

Now, the non-aggression axiom is, I believe, consistent with Christianity. Christ's Sermon on the Mount tells us to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. This, he says, is a summary of all that is taught in the law and the prophets. He repeats Moses's law, "Thou shalt not murder," but goes one more step and says to avoid even anger. He calls those who work for peace "blessed," and says that they will be called the children of God. His lessons on revenge are almost pacifist. The 10 Commandments not only tell us not to steal, but not to covet. There can be no doubt that when it comes to Biblical teachings, peacemaking and non-aggression are present.

So, where does libertarianism fit in this picture? If the non-aggression axiom can be found in the word of God, what good is libertarianism?

Murray Rothbard's Ethics of Liberty takes a Natural Law approach. I've read Part I three or four times and listened to it on audio book once or twice. This paragraph has always troubled me:

We shall be speaking throughout this work of "rights," in particular the rights of individuals to property in their persons and in material objects. But how do we define "rights"? "Right" has cogently and trenchantly been defined by Professor Sadowsky:

"When we say that one has the right to do certain things we mean this and only this, that it would be immoral for another, alone or in combination, to stop him from doing this by the use of physical force or the threat thereof. We do not mean that any use a man makes of his property within the limits set forth is necessarily a moral use?"

Sadowsky's definition highlights the crucial distinction we shall make throughout this work between a man's right and the morality or immorality of his exercise of that right. We will contend that it is a man's right to do whatever he wishes with his person; it is his right not to be molested or interfered with by violence from exercising that right. But what may be the moral or immoral ways of exercising that right is a question of personal ethics rather than of political philosophy-which is concerned solely with matters of right, and of the proper or improper exercise of physical violence in human relations. The importance of this crucial distinction cannot be overemphasized. Or, as Elisha Hurlbut concisely put it: "The exercise of a faculty by an individual is its only use. The manner of its exercise is one thing; that involves a question of morals. The right to its exercise is another thing" (p. 24)

I think Rothbard's distinction is unfounded, and though he says it cannot be overemphasized, he doesn't really emphasize it that much. This notion of a "personal ethics" on the one hand and a "political philosophy" on the other creates a line which I think does not exist. Surely, personal ethics involve questions about murder, theft, and trespassing. These are some very old moral problems. Was Christ formulating a political philosophy when he told his listeners not to murder, or was he telling them how to live rightly and in peace? How can Rothbard simply move these violent acts into a "political philosophy" category? This doesn't make sense. But, if his entire political philosophy as such is premised on setting apart acts of violence from other moral problems, and if this distinction is illusory, which I believe it to be, then there is no need for libertarianism, at least for the Christian. All of its ethical principles are bound up in Christianity. Ludwig von Mises lists property, freedom, and peace before anything else in his discussion of libertarianism, three concepts which I think are unquestionably Christian. Peace and property ownership have a strong place in the Christian tradition. Corinthians 6:12 reminds us that while all things may be permissible, not all things are profitable. This, I think, reinforces the concept of freedom. So, even in the Christian tradition, there is an understanding that people may use their property for any number of immoral purposes and that no one - save for God - is justified in interfering, provided of course that the actions are not violent. Perhaps I am making a mistake in this analysis, or perhaps I could stand to explain myself better, but I do think Rothbard has a problem when he removes murder, theft, and trespass from the "personal ethics" category.

Lord Acton, the great 19th century liberal historian, has this to say on libertarianism and Christianity. I can't disagree with him: "There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it. That is the point at which the negation of Catholicism and the negation of Liberalism meet and keep high festival, and the end learns to justify the means." Ethical double-standards for those in power and justifying the means of government action based on some highly touted end are absolutely anathema to Christian ethics. The fact that Lord Acton called himself a liberal and was at the same time devoutly Catholic makes me think that I'm missing something when I ask, "Is libertarianism necessary?" Nevertheless, I'll continue on.

C. S. Lewis's discussion about "Christianity And", which is found in The Screwtape Letters, specifically letters 7 and 25, is worth mentioning. Here is Lewis, speaking as Screwtape:

Whichever he adopts, your main task will be the same. Let him begin by treating the Patriotism or the Pacifism as a part of his religion. Then let him, under the influence of partisan spirit, come to regard it as the most important part. Then quietly and gradually nurse him on to the stage at which the religion becomes merely part of the "cause", in which Christianity is valued chiefly because of the excellent arguments it can produce in favour of the British war-effort or of Pacifism. The attitude which you want to guard against is that in which temporal affairs are treated primarily as material for obedience. Once you have made the World an end, and faith a means, you have almost won your man, and it makes very little difference what kind of worldly end he is pursuing. Provided that meetings, pamphlets, policies, movements, causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraments and charity, he is ours—and the more "religious" (on those terms) the more securely ours. I could show you a pretty cageful down here[.] (p. 22)

I call myself a Christian and a libertarian, or at least I used to. I am a libertarian because I believe it follows from Christianity. Libertarianism, however, I know is in some ways more dear to me than Christianity. Not in my heart, but in my reading and thinking and writing. Of course, God doesn't ask to be just in our hearts. Matthew 22:37 says that we are to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." Uncle Screwtape knows what he is talking about. Can you think of other social movements which begin with Christianity but seem to take on a life of their own as passions run high and the problems with post-Enlightenment moral discourse come to light? The pro-life movement is an obvious case of "Christianity And."

The last problem I want to talk about is whether or not an appreciation for market orders and the price system is possible without libertarian philosophy. If it is possible, then we again come a bit closer to answering the initial question. I want to argue, albeit very briefly, that it is possible, using the reason which God has given us to understand his created world. 

Like physics or geometry, economics provides a way of understanding the world around us. It doesn't require ethical conclusions; it is a science, not a philosophy, though it does involve philosophy, like any science. Economics is not the sort of science which depends on experiments. It is much more like geometry than it is like physics. Economic theory can be expressed in "if-then" statements, much like geometry. Consider the Pythagorean Theorem: If you have a triangle with a 90 degree angle and you square each side, then the area of the largest square will equal the area of the other two smaller squares. No one goes around measuring triangles looking to disprove this claim. Now, consider this statement about minimum wages: If you raise the minimum wage, all other things being equal, then unemployment will increase. The similarity is not a coincidence. It is a product of method. Both fields depend on deductive logical reasoning, and both fields utilize axioms or proofs. Economics begins with the axiom that "humans act to achieve ends." From this single point the entire structure of economic theory is deduced. This is a method of learning as old as Aristotle and perhaps older. 

Skipping several steps, and returning more explicitly to how one can appreciate market orders and the price system without libertarian philosophy, I want discuss Ludwig von Mises's "Socialist Calculation Problem." The reason why I took the time to write the above paragraph on method is because it makes clear that economics, as an independent field of inquiry, has nothing to do with libertarianism or ethics (outside of the idea that truth is desirable, which I suppose ties every field of study to ethics, but for the sake of not going down a rabbit trail I'm going to set that question aside). I am using Mises's critique, which is built using economic method - sometimes called praxeology - because it is a fatal blow to socialism and demonstrates that using reason one can come to the conclusion that private property ownership is an indispensable mechanism of human wellness, order, and prosperity. This is important because, to repeat, private property is the bedrock of libertarianism, and if one can dispense with libertarianism and yet still have arguments and reasons to support private property, libertarianism becomes unnecessary.

The critique is as follows: Let us suppose that the incentive problems of socialism are swept away and that well-meaning central planners are in power. Socialism would still fail to use finite resources in a way that would serve society and the common good; because under socialism, the government would own all capital resources, thus making market exchanges impossible, thus making rational pricing impossible. No money exchanges for tractors, trucks, land, oil, steel, copper, etc. would occur, and in that way the price mechanism would be completely silenced. Without prices, planners would have no way of making sense of their decisions in the face of innumerable alternatives. "What is called a planned economy is no economy at all. It is just a system of groping about in the dark," Mises said. In a market economy, accountants use market prices to determine if a particular enterprise is profitable or operating at a loss. Profit and loss as measured by prices thereby serves as a signal, letting business men and entrepreneurs know if they are using resources in a way that benefits society. A profit indicates that they are, a loss indicates that they are not. The important point to understand is that prices make this entire process possible. Without exchange, you have no prices, and without property rights, you have no exchange. Hence the reason why countries with greater property rights protections typically enjoy higher living standards, while those countries with a greater degree of government intervention suffer lower living standards. In the context of this discussion, I want to point out two conclusions: (1) A value-free economic analysis can demonstrate the importance of property rights, and (2) the old idea that the State and its bureaus possess the ability to come to a conclusion on what the common good is and on how to achieve it is fundamentally mistaken.

To conclude, what I have tried to investigate here is whether or not libertarian philosophy is necessary for liberty. The reason I think this is a worthwhile project is because libertarian philosophy makes ethical claims, namely that it is wrong to initiate force against others. I believe that Christianity also makes this claim. Something has to give. Christians are, after all, instructed to follow one master. A Christian who lives under two ethical systems, while they may be compatible, still must wonder which one he is really following. I have written this because I value liberty, property, and peace, and at the same time would rather not have to ask that question of myself, or have that question posed to me one day before God.

Summary: Christianity provides all necessary ethical principles for liberty. Private property is included in the Christian tradition, as are peace and freedom. Economics provides a value-free way of understanding the beneficial role of property ownership in society. Therefore, economics and Christian teaching are all that is necessary to appreciate the fruits of liberty. Therefore, libertarianism is unnecessary, at least for the Christian. This helps the Christian avoid the pitfall of "Christianity And," and sets him apart in a post-Enlightenment world full of social movements.

Editorial note: This piece is part of a series on religion and politics. It has been reposted from Econobot.

Simply Complicated: One Catholic's Response to the Bin Laden Brouhaha

God is simple.  It is we who are complicated.

This whole weekend has been fraught with brouhaha.  As if the royal wedding and the papal beatification weren't enough excitement to send the entire Western world into a manic frenzy, U.S. special forces have successfully killed terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden.  All of the media websites from NBC to Fox have saturated their websites with in-depth analysis and commentary over the event.

As if we didn't know the facts already.  He blew up several buildings and military targets, as well as all of the people inside.  What else do we need to know?  All of the political tit-for-tat can't dress up the brute evil that he has overseen.  And I am not just saying this because I am an American; I am saying this because I have eyeballs in my skull that just happen to still work decently and remain connected to my still-functioning brain.

Bin Laden committed grave atrocities, succumbed to his violent urges, losing the greater Jihad in the process.  He embraced a fundamentalist, radical version of Islam; Islam, like the other organized religions, is multi-layered, multi-faceted, and multi-cultural.  If any quintessentially "Muslim" solution exists for a practicing Muslim, it can only come from consulting the Koran, wise leaders, and the traditions of the community.

In the wake of such a socio-political tsunami, Christians would be wise to withdraw from shore, regroup, and carefully plan how to respond to the aftermath, rather than rush headlong into the tide, spouting choice prooftexts or joining in the chaos.  Instead, they should reflect upon the Church's historical teachings and ponder the whole of Scripture; usually they will find that the "Christian solution" is equally multi-faceted.

As a student of Church history, I have the luxury of a panoramic perspective; the Church has undergone steady growth and has blossomed brightly, despite certain periods of drought, doubt, and lack of clout.

Christianity has survived for so long and flourished so vibrantly precisely because it has refused to simplify its answers for a world that demands all of its answers in neatly-wrapped boxes.  

But isn't the Gospel simple?  Even a small child can read John 3:16 with a little help, so we shouldn't over-complicate God's simple message, right?

I agree that the message is simple.  It is beautifully simple.  God and his message are beautifully simple.  It is his world and all of sinful creation that are complicated.  It is precisely when such pristine, unalloyed truth encounters this perverted creation and attempts to untwist it that the process gets complicated.  How does one provide for the poor in a world with such scarce resources?  How does a society govern itself justly without relying upon manipulation or violence?

How does the Church uphold both its mandate to be the "salt of the world" and to "love [its] enemies"?  How does the Church, the very sign and sacrament of the renewed humanity, embody within its weak members God's saving power?  How does humanity, with all of its multiplicity, emulate and participate in God's divine unity?

It does so by asserting both Divine qualities unflinchingly, by affirming all true demonstrations of God's presence, and by admitting that, despite its best efforts, its own attempts to demonstrate God's one, unchanging, saving action with her own is imperfect at best.  

We are the Body of Christ. Even His resurrected body bore those salutary scars; through those wounds, he saved Thomas from his doubt.  It is precisely through uniting the world's suffering to His through her Body that the Church ushers in the kingdom.  For "it is in dying that we gain everlasting life".  Christ gave life only through self-renunciation and death.  We should do the same.

It's that simple.