Part III: Ethics & Christian Faith

Chapter 7: Evil and Human Sinfulness

I) Identifying Evil

● Case: Physician Assisted Suicide

First let us recap through a case study of physician assisted suicide. This will lead us into the rest of Lesson
seven.
The goal of this recap is not to promote one side or the other in the debate around physician assisted
suicide. Rather, the goal is to use the tools of analysis we explored in Lesson five and six as a way to raise
some questions. The questions help to deepen our understanding of the values at stake and allow us to
explore the case from expanded horizons.

The recap will serve two purposes.

1. It will help us to hone our skills at ethical deliberation. Remember, a key component of ethical
deliberation is ensuring all the relevant questions have been asked and ensuring all the voices have
been heard. The tools in lesson five and six help us to achieve this goal.
2. Leads us into the topic for Lesson seven, the problem of evil and human sinfulness. Often, difficult
issues like physician assisted suicide bring us up against “limit situations”. [I draw this term from a
German philosopher named Karl Jaspers.] By limit situation is meant a moment or situation in our
life where we come to the boundaries of our existence.
For example, the death of a loved one or suffering caused by illness, an accident or a natural disaster will
bring us to this moment. We experience a shattering of our familiar existence, where our ordinary way of
understanding and existing in the world is no longer sufficient. At the same time, the limit-situation brings
us to an awareness of “transcendence” which can become a liberating experience. The experience of
limitedness is the problem of evil and human sinfulness. The experience of transcendence is the religious
realm. Let's now consider the following case:

- Scenario: The case to do with a Canadian woman named Sue Rodriguez who, in early 1991, was
diagnosed with Amytrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects
never cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Her prognosis was grim. The medical team predicted the
disease would take its course within 2-4 years leading to death.
People diagnosed with ALS eventually become totally paralyzed and require a ventilator to breathe. The
prospect of living with a disease that would gradually reduce her physical ability to care for herself was
unbearable for Rodriguez and she ended her life with assistance from a physician on February 12, 1994.
Rodriguez did not die quietly but struggled to change the law prohibiting doctor-assisted suicide in Canada.
She wanted to be able to choose the time of her death, but the symptoms of the disease made it
impossible to her to end her life without assistance. She took her case to the Supreme Court of British
Columbia to attempt to change the law but her request was denied. She then went to the Supreme Court
of Canada who also denied her request but by the time the decision came down, Rodriguez had died with
the help of an anonymous B.C. physician.

- History: Below is the list of the criminal code and the courts
http://publications.gc.ca/Collection-R/LoPBdP/BP/bp349-e.htm#INTRODUCTION(txt)]
● Makes it a criminal offence to assist a person to commit suicide
● Ms. Rodriguez applied to the Supreme Court of B.C. for an order declaring invalid under the
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
● The B.C. court dismissed her application and a majority of the B.C. Court of Appeal affirmed the trial
judge’s decision
● Ms. Rodriguez then appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, where she argued that violates
some sections of the Charter
 ● Everyone who aids or abets a person to commit suicide, whether suicide ensues or not, is guilty of
an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 14 years
● Everyone has the right to life, liberty in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice
● Everyone has the right not to be subjected to any cruel and unusual treatment or punishment
● Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and
equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on
race, national or ethnic origin, color, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability
● The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal and found it be constitutional

- Questions: Exploring this case in the depth needed would be too long and complex for our purposes
here. Again, ethics is about identifying questions and voices that are relevant to a concrete situation. Let us
explore the different aspects of the case through the following analysis of the relationship between moral
knowledge and the moral person and how both need to be understood socially.
● Whose body is it? This was an important foundation of Sue Rodriguez’s objection to the prohibition
against her seeking help to end her life. Her main argument was in relation to her personal
autonomy and her right to end her life at a time of her own choosing. She argues that she was
discriminated against because persons without disabilities like hers had the right to end their life at
a time of their own choosing and that it was not against the law to do so. Suicide is not against the
law in Canada. Because Rodriguez was not capable of ending her life due to her disability and
required assistance, she was being discriminated against.
● What level of the “good” is personal autonomy?
● What is the moral horizon against which personal autonomy is valued?
● How might freedom from constraint and freedom as self-determination be understood in relation
to this case?
● What is the relationship between physician assisted suicide and the following social structures? The
healthcare system, the code of ethics of physicians, Canadian law, Canadian society, the ALS society
● What are the fundamental obligations? How might we consider the fundamental obligations in
relation to this case:
- the obligation to take responsibility for developing ourselves as moral persons
- the obligation to participate in reinforcing and developing virtuous patterns of social identity
- the obligation to promote development through the 3 levels of moral meaning, to remove
obstacles that block development, and to reverse forces that lead to decline.
● Does Sue Rodriguez’s illness relinquish her from the need to consider her situation from the
perspective of the 3 levels of the good and from considering her decision in relation to the
fundamental obligations laid out here?
● Finally, what insights might the Christian faith bring to this case? This question leads into Lesson 8

What is evil?
The Oxford English Dictionary definition of evil:
▪ that which is injurious, painful, hurtful, or calamitous.
▪ morally bad or unacceptable. Sinful. Wicked. Vicious. Corrupt.
▪ that which impedes the achievement of goals, ideals, happiness, or general well-being.
▪ misfortune
What might be some examples of “evil” as defined here by the Oxford English Dictionary? Make a list of a
few examples that come to your mind. We will come back to your examples shortly.

Do you think the following events in recent history are examples of evil?
▪ The December 26, 2004 tsunami off the Indian Ocean that killed more than 200,000 people and left
millions homeless?
▪ The December 14, 2012 shooting in Newtown, Connecticut of 20 children and 6 staff members by a
20 year old man who then shot himself?
 ▪ The September 11, 2001 attacks by the Islamist terrorist group al-Qaeda upon the United States in
New York City and Washington, D. C.?
▪ The December 2-3, 1984 gas leak incident in Bhopal, India at the multinational Union Carbide
pesticide plant. Over 500,000 people were exposed to methyl isocyanate gas and other chemicals.
It is difficult to know for certain how many people died from this disaster but perhaps the most
credible number is 10,000 with over 200, 000 people being affected and of those who died, most
were among the poor of Bhopal.

The problem of Evil

How do we understand evil in relation to Christian ethics?
o How do we articulate the problem of evil?
The problem of evil might be articulated this way: how do we reconcile an imperfect world where evil
happens with the goodness of God? Or, how could a creator who is perfect (all-knowing, all-good
and all-powerful) have made a world in which pain and evil form a large part of life?
To begin to address these questions, we need to consider evil as emerging both in intentional acts and in
non-intentional acts. This brings us to an important distinction between moral evil and premoral
evil.

o What is moral evil?

Here we are referring to a transgression of the moral law, the intentional breaking of a law. In terms of
Christian faith, moral evil would be considered disobedience to the will of God.
So, examples of moral evil would be premeditated murder or willful cruelty (psychological or physical) to
another human being.

o What is premoral evil?

With this form of evil, we are referring to ills that do not proceed directly from human sin or human
intention. For example, natural disasters bring about horrible “evils” in people’s lives but would not
be considered morally evil because of the absence of human intention.

o When is evil moral or premoral?

Sometimes, it is difficult to discern where an evil is moral or premoral. For example, environmental
disasters caused by global warning might lead to us blame those who profit from big industries
which have a huge impact on the environment. We might believe industries and those who profit
from them cause some of the “natural” disasters we experience today.
An example here might be clear cutting trees in Brazil to make room for cattle grazing. The clear cutting
removes rainfall buffer zone that protects land from floods and erosion. There is little doubt that
human action influences natural disasters in the long term. Ask yourself, is this moral evil or
premoral evil?

o What is the distinction between moral and premoral evil?

Coming back to the previous examples, given the distinction between moral and premoral evil, how might
we think about the suggested examples of evil?
- The 2004 tsunami?
- The Sandy Hook, Connecticut killings?
- The terrorist attacks on NYC and Washington, D.C.?
- The Union Carbide gas leak in Bhopal?
How clear is it in these events to distinguish between moral and premoral evil? What questions might we
need to ask in order to come to a clearer understanding?

What is the nature of evil itself?

According to Thomas Aquinas evil is a privation of good. Evil is the absence of a good in something that
should have that good by its very nature. So, for Aquinas, evil exits as a negative not as a positive. Evil does
not have its own reality so to speak, rather it is the absence of a good that should exist. Aquinas uses the
analogy of the opposition between light and darkness. Darkness is the absence of light, not the other way
around. We do not know light because of darkness, rather we know darkness because of light. In the same
way, evil is the absence of the good. We know evil because of the absence of the good.

Let us look at an example. In chapter two of Melchin’s book, he writes about a bank robbery that he
experienced. He explores why theft is wrong through the lens of the context, intentions, consequences and
the goals and objectives of the social structures itself. Theft is wrong, bad, evil not in and of itself, but it is
evil because of what is missing, what is absent, that is, the good of human trust, stability, progress and
flourishing. Theft erodes these goods that are part of human living together. Theft is evil because it causes
deterioration (a taking away, a diminishment) in human living.

This brings us to the logic of good and evil, the logic that good exists and evil takes away from or
diminishes the good. So, first there is the Good that one might identify as the human flourishing that
comes about through fidelity to truth and then the risk of Evil as privation and perversion of the Good.

The forms of evil

Evil can take 3 main forms:
1. Betrayal
This is an extremely difficult experience of evil because by definition, betrayal comes from someone who
was once trusted. There are many examples of betrayals in history: Brutus’ betrayal of his uncle
Julius Caesar, Benedict Arnold the American general who shifted his allegiance to the British during
the American Revolution and Judas Iscariot who betrayed Jesus to the Roman authorities.

2. Delusion
The confusion of unreality for reality. Hitler is an example of how delusional thinking leads to evil. But,
closer to home, our own inattentiveness to data and our unwillingness to ask all the relevant
questions lead to incorrect judgement of facts. This in turn leads to decisions being made on the
basis of flawed judgements and while most of the time our decisions and actions do not do a lot of
damage, sometimes they can do immense damage. We all suffer somewhat from delusion and we
see dramatic examples of this in people who come to realize that the organization for which they
work is engaged in dishonest practice or is covering up information that the public should know.
A good example of this is the phenomenon of whistle blowing. Often, people go along with the demands of
an organization without bothering to question the ethics of what they are doing. Whistleblowers
begin to ask questions and so they identify wrongdoing that everyone else either refuses to
acknowledge or rationalizes away. Not asking all the relevant questions is a form of delusion
because we are not facing or accepting what is in fact true. Propaganda is an example of a tool that
is used to create delusion in people in order to manipulate their behavior.

3. Terror
Both the extreme fear of terror and the use of terror to intimidate people as witnessed in totalitarian
countries and in acts of terrorism are evil. The concentration camps are examples of the effort to
reduce human beings to non-human status bereft of having a place in the world. Terror is tactic
used by some people to intimidate other people. It is not uncommon. We can see examples of it in
schoolyard among children, in universities among faculty members, in organizations among co-
workers and in families.

II) Sin & Evil

The notion of sin
The Oxford English Dictionary definition of sin:
▪ An act which is regarded as a transgression of the divine law and an offence against God, a violation
(esp. willful or deliberate) of some religious or moral principle
▪ Without article or pl. violation of divine law; action or conduct characterized by this; a state of
transgression against God or his commands
Sin in religious category even though it often overlaps with moral categories. However, sin, as we see from
the OED def., includes violations against and these violations do not necessarily include a moral category.
An example is the 1st commandment to worship God alone. So, sin encompasses more than immorality.

The Old Testament (Hebrew Scriptures) consistently teaches that sin is rooted in human freedom and
consists in an abuse of the gift of free choice that springs from the heart of a person.
Here is an example from the Hebrew Scriptures Sirach 15:14-17:
14 It was [the Lord] who created humankind in the beginning, and he left them in the power of their own
free choice. 15 If you choose, you can keep the commandments, and to act faithfully is a matter of your
own choice. 16 He has places before you fire and water; stretch out your hand for whichever you choose.
17 Before each person are life and death, and whichever one chooses will be given.

The teaching on sin being rooted in human freedom is continued in the New Testament.
Here is an example from Mark 7:20-21
20 And [Jesus] said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. 21 For it is from within, that evil
intentions come…”

There are several terms used in the N.T. to refer to sin. These terms give us some idea of the complexity o
the concept of sin. They are:
● Hamartia and hamartema: designates that sin is a freely chosen deed turning one’s back on
God’s commands or norms for human living.
● Anomia: literally means “lawlessness” and is often used in the N.T. in relation to contempt
and a spirit of rebellion against God and God’s law.
● Adikia: refers to “injustice” and is a refusal to live according to God’s justice God has
revealed, as revealed in the prophets and in the life and words of Jesus.
● Pseudos: meand “falsehood” so sin is opposition to the truth.
● Skotos: refers to “darkeness” referring to living in darkness rather than in light.

Augustine’s understanding of sin

St. Augustine offers two classic definitions of sin:
1) Sin is “anything done, said, or desired against the eternal law.” (Contra Faustum, 22.27) By “eternal
law”, Augustine means “the highest norm of human life.” For Augustine, human beings are made to
participate in God’s law.
2) Sin is a “turning away from God and turning toward the creature.” (De libero arbitrio, 2.53). One is
reminded here of the famous passage from Augustine’s Confessions: “You have made us for
yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” Sin, for Augustine, is a turning away
from our natural orientation toward God.

An example of what Augustine is getting at in his two definitions can be found in the N.T. story of “The
Prodigal Son” which is found in Luke 15:11-32. In this story, we see the prodigal son withdrawing from his
father’s love. He takes his share of the inheritance and goes off and squanders all his money living a life of
dissolution or depravity. So, the prodigal son both commits acts of depravity (Augustine’s definition of sin
#1) and withdraws from his father’s love (Augustine’s definition of sin #2). While the sins of his particular
acts are serious, more serious is his decision to cut himself off from his father’s love and charity. This
understanding of sin is core in the New Testament.
Sin as separation from God
The New Testament expresses strongly that sin is separation from God, from the relationship God has
entered into with God’s people. Sin is a refusal of God’s love, a refusal that is rooted in one’s heart. Sin is
viewed as a fundamental option: are we for God and therefore committed to the life of grace or are we
against God and therefore committed to a life of sin?
The idea behind fundamental option is a focus on a state or a condition rather than on particular acts. Acts
are secondary to this fundamental option but particular, concrete acts are what move us toward our
fundamental option.

There is a distinction in Christian ethics regarding sin that is similar to the distinction between moral and
premoral evil we looked at previously. The distinction is between formal and material sin.
● Formal sin: Here, an act must be deliberated and voluntary. The act of stealing when done
deliberately and strictly for personal gain is an example of formal sin.
● Material sin: Here, an act may be wrong materially, from an objective point of view (for example,
stealing) but the person who performed the act cannot be judged as completely responsible. (He or
she may have been driven to steal because of desperate poverty and a family that needed feeding.)

Structural evil
Oppressive social structures independent of individual action:
Structures of evil have to do with “horizons”. As we have already seen, moral knowing goes on within
horizons. It is possible to get beyond or to expand our moral horizons.
As Melchin indicates, “Moral knowing goes on within horizons. We can break through constricting horizons
to broader, more comprehensive understandings of life. We become aware of horizons precisely because
such breakthroughs can and do occur.” Oppressive social structures do not need to be planes. As Melchin
shows us in Chap. 4, they can take on a life of their own independent of individual action.

→ Case study: Lance Armstrong, are his actions an example of structural evil?
The story of Lance Armstrong brought to our attention, again, how important winning is in professional
and amateur sports. His “confession” concerning his use of performance enhancing drugs for all 7 of his
Tour de France victories and the overwhelming evidence of the prolific use of performance enhancing
drugs in many sports places in question the value of professional sports or of events such as the Olympics.
▪ Who is to blame? Is it the individual athletes themselves or is their sponsors (companies or
countries) who push them to win or it is the doctors who provide the drugs or could it be the fans
that watch sports, pay huge amounts of money to attend a sports event and who “worship” the
winners?
▪ What does Melchin say? Melchin states that social structures have their own form of evil that is
broader and more encompassing than individual acts of evil. We may be raised within a corrupt
social structure and so have no idea that it is corrupt.
▪ How can we address a more pervasive evil? How many come to believe that if they did not take the
drugs, their effort to win would be useless and meaningless because “everyone else” is doing it and
so will always have the advantage? It is not that people like Lance Armstrong are not responsible
for their actions, but a question remains: is there a surplus of evil beyond what can be ascribed to
Lance Armstrong? If so, how can we begin to address this larger, more pervasive evil?
▪ How can we change both the social structure and ourselves? As Melchin states, when we are faced
with corrupt structures it is easy to give up. In face of the enormity of a problem like global
warming with the complexity of the issues and the huge complicity of all of us, how can we muster
the courage and energy to try to change both the social structure and ourselves? To address this
question, we need to consider our human nature are developmental and then, the notion of a
“surplus of evil”.
III) Surplus for Evil
Horizons make us aware of our limitations
There is a basic incapacity or incompetence that is a permanent feature of moral living. Limitations in
capacity will mean limitations in our ability to know when and where we have encountered our limitations.
We can expect to find ourselves acting with the illusion of moral competence, only to find out later just
how wrong we were.
Despite our efforts to become aware of our biases and blocks, we will always be limited in our moral
knowledge and so can expect our actions to continue (to a greater or lesser extent depending on our
advance in self-knowledge) to have negatfc ive effects on others and on our world. Our limitation remains
a permanent feature of our acting in the world. Our limitations will continue to have a negative impact on
others, ourselves and on our world.

How our Moral Horizons are limitated?

To come back to an example I used before, I might grow up in a family or a society that taught me that
certain races of people were less than human. I may be taught that these people were intellectually and
morally inferior to our race. Why wouldn’t I believe this? The people I trust the most are telling me it is
true just as the people they trusted the most told them it was true.

We can all think of examples in history when this happened. How else could groups of people slaughter
other groups of people? There has to be a profound belief that the lives of those being slaughtered are not
worth much and that their demise is meaningless.
We are limited by our moral horizons. It is impossible not to be limited by our moral horizon. Our limitation
stems from our developmental nature.

Human beings as developmental

At any time in one’s life, one is in a stage of development. Who a person is now is not what he or she once
was and is not what he or she may become. This is because of the developmental nature of being human.

Different types of development:

● Biological: All beings develop biologically. We are born; we grow and develop into mature
adulthood. This is a form of development that we do not have control over. It occurs automatically
if we are cared for as children. This type of development has limits. Our development reaches its
apex at a certain age and then begins to decline.
● Sensitive: We also develop at a sensitive level. We are aware of ourselves in a particular space, we
have a sophistication of movement, recognition and memory. These are capacities that develop
both in animals and in humans as we grow. This also is a natural form of development.
● Intellectual: This level of development is uniquely human because it is not simply a natural process,
it is a process that can be honed, improved upon and developed intentionally. Intellectual
development is the source for higher forms of development. Herein lies the essential root of human
freedom effectively lived in human development.

“The proper criterion of intelligence lies in its own capacity for critical reflection, for grasping the
unconditioned, for determining the norms of investigations that are headed toward the unconditioned and
therefore probable.” (Bernard Lonergan, Insight: A Study of Human Understanding, p. 489)

Fundamental tensions
Our human development confronts us with two fundamental tensions.
▪ The first arises because any development is the movement from the familiar to the unfamiliar. Yet,
there is a tension within us between the part of us that wants to harmonize (fit in, keep things as
they are) and the part of us that is on the move (wants to change, to grow, to develop, to improve).
 ▪ The second tension is more fundamental. Human development is from what one is now toward
fuller being. This development is for humanity a conscious development (intellectual development)
and it involves us in a fundamental tension. Our animal sensitivity focuses us on the immediate
world of our senses. Here, we are concerned with the self-centred demands of organic and psychic
needs. But human beings are also guided by the demands of the “detached and disinterested desire
to know” beyond our self-centred demands. We reach toward what is true and what is good. But
our reaching makes us aware of our limitation. Here the tension is between limitation and
transcendence. Our seeking and our questioning are infinite but our capacity to answer our
questions is limited as it our willingness to change and overcome our biases.

Because of these fundamental tensions within our human living, we participate in corrupt social structures
without explicit awareness. The important point, and Melchin has emphasized this, is that the effects of
evil can reach far beyond our explicit intentions. Not only can evil be deliberately chosen and can become
habitual, its effects can reach far beyond our original and explicit intensions. Evil can expand in directions
almost completely removed from our conscious intention.

Evil beyond our intensions

A dramatic example of evil beyond our intentions is an event in history called the Manhattan Project, a
research program that developed the first atomic bomb during the Second World War. The Manhattan
Project employed more than 130,000 people. This work eventually led to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki.
There is a picture of a group of women working in one of the factories making the bombs (below). One of
the women saw this picture decades later and only at that moment when she saw the picture did she
realize what kind of work she was doing in the factory.

The surplus of evil and the religious realm

As we can see from the above example and our consideration of the problem of evil, there is a surplus of
evil beyond what can be blamed on individuals. It is precisely this surplus that pushes us into the religious
realm. How can we be good? How can a good life be possible? In what can we hope?

These are religious questions because they concern ultimate meaning and value and they point us in a
direction beyond which we have the capacity to address.

When we speak of the religious realm, what do we mean?

The religious realm is the realm of human existence that concerns ultimate value and meaning. It pushes
us or draws us beyond the ordinary, everyday existence when we reflect on an experience of something
more than we can contain. /Lonergan speaks of religious experience as being “grasped by an other-
worldly love.”

Strangely, it is the experience of evil that pushes us into the religious realm because:
▪ the effects of evil can reach far beyond our explicit intentions
▪ the difficult task of understanding evil
▪ evil appears to be structural more than individual

IV) Challenging Evil

Progress and decline

In this part of Lesson 7, we will look briefly at a pattern in history that we can recognize and chart. It is a
pattern that leads us to our final consideration, that is, Christian faith as a response to the challenge of evil.

There are two principles of change that are operative in human living, what are called progress and
decline.
What does this mean? If we consider our own lives, we see that much of our life is one of progress, that is,
we develop, we operate authentically and intentionally and so we flourish. Yet, we also are very aware of
times in our lives when we experience decline, that is, we experience our development as blocked, our
biases block our growth, we experience our own inauthenticity, we run up against tragedy, sorrow,
discouragement, we experience atrophy.

These two movements in our personal lives are also operative in events in history. A nation or a society
progresses and flourishes for many years but something will happen and decline will begin to set in.

Bias will not permit insight into the decline and so it continues unchecked until the nation or society has
become corrupt and delusional. We can think of many examples of this currently playing out on the world
stage.

Redemption
Redemption refers to the experience of being freed from some imprisonment. The imprisonment of
decline calls for redemption We cannot reverse decline from within the resources of decline itself.

Why? The difficulty lies in the developmental nature of being human. We are limited in our ability to know
and understand everything. Redemption is the possibility that in the midst of decline, growth and
development happen.

Examples of Individual and Social Levels of Redemption

o Individual - An example at an individual level is the experience of the death of a loved one. This is
most often a shattering experience and yet, somehow, in the midst of this sorrow we experience
the kindness of strangers, the love and support of friends and relatives. We experience this in a
manner that is new and life-giving. Somehow, in the midst of our sorrow and grief, we find we are
not alone. Others are standing with us in solidarity. The strange thing about this is that our
experience of solidarity only came because of the loss, the decline, and the sorrow.
o Social - An example at the social level would be the redemptive moment when the Declaration of
Human Rights was adopted by the then 58 member states of the United Nations. The Declaration
was the response to the horrific and barbarous crimes committed against human beings during the
Second World War, in particular the murder of millions of Jews in concentration camps in countries
occupied by Nazi Germany. Out of the evils that occurred leading up to and during the Second
World War came the redemption of the Declaration of Human Rights.

Christian faith
The facts of good and evil, of progress and decline, raise questions about the character of our universe.
They ultimately lead us to the question of God. We experience authenticity in self-transcendence, that is,
through being attentive to our experience, intelligent in understanding our experience, reasonable in
judging the evidence as to where our understanding is correct and, finally, responsible in deciding on an
action based on what we have discerned is the best thing to do.
We all have this capacity for self-transcendence. Yet, the experience of evil can bring apathy, disillusion,
hopelessness and a sense of meaninglessness. For Christians, faith in Christ restores one’s commitment
because Christ reveals to us that God is at work in history. Christian faith communities see the Gospel
narratives as mediating the self-revelation of a God to whom believers are invited to respond
KEY TERMS:
● Limit situation:
- By limit situation is meant a moment or situation in our life where we come up against the boundaries of
our existence. For example, the death of a loved one, struggle, suffering and guilt are examples of
experiences that bring us up against the limits of what is habitual in our life. Those moments can
and often do open us up to experience transcendence, the experience of something more or
beyond our limits. [German philosopher Karl Jaspers coined the term.]

● Redemption:
- Redemption is understood in the Bible as deliverance by a ‘redeemer’ from some evil by paying a price.

- There are many examples of this in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). The Hebrew word for “redeem” is
go’el. This word is used of Yahweh as the deliverer of his people (Isaiah, 41:14 – “I will help you,
says the Lord; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.”)
In the New Testament, Christ redeems people from sin.
“Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our sins to
set us free from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5 to whom be
the glory forever and ever. Amen.” (Galatians, 1:3-5)

- “This redemption is both already effected (Rom. 8: 29) and yet also awaiting final completion with the
destruction of death (Rom. 8: 23). As in the OT, NT writers also mention that God has redeemed a
people for himself (Rev. 5: 9), and the death of Christ is proclaimed as redeeming mankind from
the consequences or punishment for their sins (Gal. 3: 13).” (Taken from A Dictionary of the Bible,
2nd edition, Oxford University Press, Online Version, 2010.)

- In the context of this course, redemption needs to be understood in relation to “progress” and “decline”.
Progress, decline and redemption can be understood as three forces in nature.
- Progress refers to the normal development of a person’s life, when everything is going well and
development is “as it should be”. Here, a person’s life is flourishing or thriving.

- Decline is what disrupts this progress. Something happens in a person’s life that gets in the way of
human flourishing.

- Redemption is the possibility that in the midst of decline, new life can emerge. (Several examples of this
are given in the course material.)

- For Christians, the cross is the symbol of progress, decline and redemption. Christ’s life and teachings are
progress. His arrest, trail and death are decline. His resurrection is the redemptive moment that
says death is not the last word.

● Evil:
- According to Thomas Aquinas, evil is a privation of good. Evil is the absence of a "good" in something
that should have that good by its very nature. So, for Aquinas, evil exists as a negative, not as a
positive. Evil does not have its own substance; rather it is the absence of a good that should exist.
Aquinas uses the analogy of the opposition between light and darkness. Darkness is the absence of
light, not the other way around. We do not know light because of darkness; rather we know
darkness because of light. In the same way, evil is the absence of the good. We know evil because
of the absence of the good.

There are two distinctions:

 ▪ Moral evil: here we are referring to a transgression of the moral law, the intentional
breaking of a law. So, examples of moral evil would be premeditated murder or willful
cruelty (psychological or physical) to another human being.
▪ Premoral evil: here we are referring to ills that do not proceed directly from human sin or
human intention. So, for example, natural disasters bring about horrible “evils” in people’s
lives but would not be considered morally evil because of the absence of human intention.

● Sin:
- Sin is a religious category even though it often overlaps with moral categories. However, sin includes
violations against God, and these violations do not necessarily include a moral category. An
example is the first commandment to worship God alone. So, sin encompasses more than
immorality.

- St. Augustine offers two classic definitions of sin:

▪ Sin is “anything done, said, or desired against the eternal law.” (Contra Faustum, 22.27) By
“eternal law”, Augustine means “the highest norm of human life.” For Augustine, human
beings are made to participate in God’s law.
▪ Sin is a “turning away from God and turning toward the creature.” (De libero arbitrio, 2.53).
One is reminded here of the famous passage from Augustine’s Confessions: “You have
made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” Sin, for
Augustine, is a turning away from our natural orientation toward God.

- There are two distinctions:

▪ Formal sin: Here, an act must be deliberate and voluntary. The act of stealing when done
deliberately and strictly for personal gain is an example of formal sin.
▪ Material sin: Here, an act may be wrong materially, from an objective point of view (for
example, stealing) but the person who performed the act cannot be judged as completely
responsible. (He or she may have been driven to steal because of desperate poverty and a
family that needed feeding.)

READINGS:
● Course Texbook - Kenneth R. Melchin (1998) Living with Other People: An Introduction to Christian
Ethics Based on Bernard Lonergan (Ottawa: Novalis).
- Chapter Four, pp. 85-106

DISCUSSION BOARD:
“In Lesson seven, we look at the notion of structures of evil. I suggested that drug use in sports is
a social structure of evil and I provide some reasons.
What do you think about my suggestion? Do you agree?
Do you have other examples of social structures of evil? »