What does faith have to do with morality?

“La foi n’a rien à voir avec la morale.”  Faith has nothing to do with morality.

graffiti scrawled on the back of a sign 

We came upon this piece of graffiti three years ago while in Tournon in southern France.  It could have been written yesterday in response to the Islamic terrorist attacks in Paris that killed 129 people and wounded scores of others.

When crimes like this one occur, it is tempting to demonize religion and believers. The Abrahamic religions - Judaism, Christianity and Islam – come under particular scrutiny. Some argue that the Hebrew Bible, the foundational text of these religions, encourages violence and immoral acts.  They point to passages of scripture that command the stoning of adulteresses or the smiting of one’s enemies to the practice of slavery and to misogyny. 

These passages are clearly problematic from today's moral perspective, and I have no intention of defending them.  It would be dishonest to pretend that over the millennia religion has not played a part in man’s inhumanity to man. However, it is quite a leap to claim that religion has nothing to do with morality. Faith can be a strong influence on morality and can govern behavior, for better or for worse. Terrorist attacks committed in the name of religion illustrate the worst of that behaviour. 

No rational person, especially a deeply religious one, accepts violence as moral. Rational people (and most religious people fall into this category) share a universal understanding of morality. Boiled down to a basic principle, morality might be summed up as “do no harm” to others or yourself.   Violence as an exercise of faith is especially odious since love and compassion are inherent qualities of the world’s great religions.

We do not need to think very hard to find inspiring examples of faith filled moral individuals. Gandhi, Mother Theresa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Jean Vanier and Jimmy Carter spring to mind.  I can think of examples from my own small town. Whether they are handing out food at local food banks or spearheading actions to reduce poverty or holding the hands of the dying, religious individuals are positively impacting my community. 

The Judeo-Christian tradition has shaped my understanding of morality as it has shaped that of much of the western world.  Its moral tradition, with which we struggle, precedes and goes beyond the “do no harm” principle.  For the prophets, three things were necessary: to love mercy, to act justly, and to walk humbly with God.  For Jesus of Nazareth, the great commandment was to love your neighbour as yourself. To love, to be merciful, to be concerned about others, to be humble are some of the ways that a person of faith honors the goodness of God and behaves in a moral way.

Islamic terrorists are not the only group of religious people who commit violence. One need only think of the Crusades, the burning of Protestant “heretics’ at the stake, or the bombing of abortion clinics to find other examples of religious zeal gone wrong.  In an unequivocal condemnation of the Paris attacks, Grand Mufti Shawki Allam of Egypt wrote, “We must remember that as recent attacks in many parts of the world indicate, violent extremism knows no particular faith. It is rather a perversion of the human condition, and must be dealt with as such.”

We cannot let this latest attack on humanity warp our collective moral sense and harden our hearts towards others.  Since the Paris attacks, there has been a backlash against Syrian refugees.  When I wrote this, 35,000 Canadians had signed a petition to stop the resettlement of Syrian refugees into Canada.  This is clearly irrational; many of the Syrian refugees are not even Muslim, and the terrorists carried French or Belgium passports. It is also wrong. Fear of those who are different can prevent us from doing the right thing, as much as it can motivate someone (like a terrorist) to do the wrong thing.

No one has a monopoly on morality. A person does not have to be religious to be good. And while one would hope or expect a religious person to be moral, we know this is not always the case.

Faith and morality are like two streams flowing into one river, shaping the river’s ability to sustain or destroy the life along its banks. For better or for worse, religion can shape behavior and influence moral decision-making.

Online shaming

"With no one but the online mob as guide, it (is) all too easy for people to throw stones, while claiming the moral high road for themselves."

A modern twist on an ancient story

It's a modern twist on an ancient story.

Our modern story concerns some scandalous behaviour that occurred during a summer festival in Alberta. 

The ancient story, recounted in the Gospel of John, goes something like this. Some Scribes and Pharisees, accompanied, I imagine, by a crowd of onlookers, brought a woman “caught in the very act of adultery” to Jesus. Their motives are questionable. Not terribly concerned about adultery, they want to trap Jesus with a tricky question. 

Rembrandt: Woman Taken in Adultery
National Gallery, London

They ask him if they should stone the woman. Jesus, who is in no hurry to answer, bends down and writes in the sand before he looks at the woman’s accusers and says, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”   Beginning with the elders, the crowd slowly disperses as individuals slink away in embarrassed, guilty silence. 

Left alone with the woman, Jesus asks her, “Does no one condemn you?”  to which she replies, “No.”  “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more,” responds Jesus.

The modern version of the story goes like this. 

A young woman and two male friends were cavorting in an alley when a Peeping Tom spotted them, filmed their tryst and posted the video online where it went viral. Viewed by several million people, the woman became the object of online shaming, while the men were applauded.

There are lots of things wrong here, as others have pointed out.  Some point to an invasion of privacy. Others focus on society's acceptance of online shaming. Still others draw attention to the misogyny inherent in the shaming that slams the woman and high-fives the men. All of these concerns point to the precarious condition of the collective moral compass.

Let’s return to the crowd in John’s story.

A few individuals had probably whipped up the moral outrage of some in that ancient crowd. Others may have just been along for the ride, not wanting to miss out on a good spectacle. And a spectacle it was, although not the kind they were expecting. 

Jesus silenced everyone, effectively asking, “Are you sinless?”. He created space for people to think about their own behaviour.  With the moral compass swinging away from the woman towards their own shortcomings, people in John’s crowd had the good sense to shut up and go home. 

Not so for today’s online crowd. With technology providing an instant platform to condemn someone else’s bad behaviour, our crowd was neither predisposed nor inclined towards self reflection.  And with no one but the online mob as guide, it was all too easy for people to throw stones, while claiming the moral high road for themselves.

Without even realizing it, the online crowd called its own moral credibility into question. It was, you might say, “caught in the very act” of voyeuristic tendencies, which are hardly a hallmark of integrity. In shaming, the group restricted moral conduct to the breaking of sexual taboos . They forgot that the way we treat others outside of intimacy also speaks to the content of our character. 

The collective moral compass is in need of repair.  No one involved in this sad and sordid affair can claim the moral high road. Everyone - the threesome, the filmmaker, and those who viewed and commented - sullied themselves with their failure to respect the innate dignity of the human person.

Our ancient story teaches that sin is not excused, but forgiven. Moral slip ups are not a cause for condemnation. They are an opportunity for tweaking a wobbly moral compass and getting back on track.

 Compass image: courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The moral tragedy of Steubenville, Ohio

That August evening in Steubenville saw the convergence of two powerful cultural influences – football and technology – on a group of young people.  The sad result of this mix was a collective failure of morality.  

 In August 2012, two high school football players were charged with the sexual assault of a 16 year old girl, and last week the court ruled on their guilt. In this case, as in others that are hitting the news, technology and social media factor into the offence. In Steubenville, the sports culture was also a factor. To read more of my thoughts on this, please go to  

http://www.troymedia.com/2013/03/25/the-moral-tragedy-of-steubenville-ohio/ 

where you will find an opinion I wrote for Troy Media.