Homosexuality, Again

The widely agreed upon data, admitted both by the Left and Right:  

1)  Sexual activity is extremely important and has deep moral significance (which is one of the reasons rape is so bad)

2)  Sexual activity is a unique and unparalleled form of relationship between humans

3)  Sexual activity has extremely strong normative protections (the standard of consent is extremely high, for instance)

We need an account of sexual activity that both explains the goal of the activity and respects the agreed upon data.

There are three plausible accounts of sexual activity:

A. Pleasure

B. Psychological closeness

C. One-body union striving towards reproduction

Note that if (A) and (B) are correct, then homosexual behavior is permissible, for gay couples can get pleasure and psychological closeness from their sexual activity.

But (A) and (B) both fail to explain the data.  Pleasure fails as an account of sex as it can be achieved in a variety of non-sexual ways, so it undermines the uniqueness of sex.  Given the possibility of "empty pleasures," it seems that pleasure is only of deep moral significance when it is reflective of a more fundamental good.  So pleasure also fails to explain the deep moral significance of sex.

(B) also fails as an account of sex, for we can be psychologically close to multiple people. And, it seems permissible (rarely) to coerce others into psychological closeness - for instance, a court order requiring a person to get psychological treatment.  Yet it is never permissible to force someone into a sexual relationship.  Psychological closeness is also achievable by a number of different activities, so does not account for the unique and unparalleled character of sexual activity.  So (B) fails to explain the exclusivity of sex, it’s normative prohibitions against coercion, and its uniqueness.  

What about (C)?  It holds that the significance of sexual activity is that it unites people into a one-flesh union, wherein the bodies of both people mutually strive towards the common goal of reproduction.  There is no other behavior or activity of humans that is like this, so it preserves the uniqueness of sexual activity.  (C) also focuses our vision on the reproductive striving of sexuality.  An activity that has the coming into existence of a person among its natural goals cannot be anything but sacred.  This account thus preserves the deep moral significance of sex.  Given this deep moral significance and uniqueness to sexual activity on (C), it’s easy to see the normative protections around sexual activity as justified.  And thus giving an account of sex as one-body union striving towards reproduction preserves the data extremely well.

And with this account of sexual activity in place, we can see that sexual activity between members of the same sex gives rise to an experience of a union as one body without the actual reality of it.  It is thus an emotional self-deception. And self-deception in a matter as important as erotic love is morally wrong.  

(Much of this is taken from Alexander Pruss, but the presentation is mostly my own.)

A Criticism of Amyraldianism?

So my brother pressed an objection to Amyraldianism and thought it important.  Here’s the context:

Proposition: If a reprobate person were to believe, then they would be saved.

Basically the question is this:  How is it that the reprobate could be saved on the basis of belief even apart from election?

Traditional Calvinism cannot countenance this proposition, as the reprobate could not be saved even if they believed, as the atonement was not provided for them.   The atonement was only provided for the elect on traditional Calvinism.

My brother thinks a powerful response is that the reprobate would be, if they believed, members of the elect – so that the atonement would be for them on the condition of their belief.  He thinks that this is sufficient to account for the proposition.

Here’s my response: 

Why would the reprobate be members of the elect if they believed?  It cannot be because of their belief, for belief does not cause election, but election causes belief.  

So if they were to be members of the elect, it wouldn’t be on account of their belief, and if not on account of their belief, then not members of the elect at all.  So this response will not work - for we’re trying to account for the truth that the reprobate would be saved if they believed *despite* their not being members of the elect. 

So you can’t use their election as an explanation for why the reprobate would be saved if they believed, for their election *follows* their belief.  If one did say something like this, then they would be conditionalizing the atonement along an Amyraldian direction - If one believes, they’ll be granted election and hence salvation.  And an Amyraldian just may be fine with that. 

Objection:  If they had belief, then that belief would be the result of election, and they would be saved.  That’s enough to account for the proposition. 

Response:  Not really, for it’s still the case that they would be saved apart from election if they were capable of having true belief on their own, even though they are not capable. 

Compare:  It’s impossible for me to live in the Roman Empire apart from time travel. But if I did live in the Roman Empire, I would have existed before the Renaissance. 

So even though it’s impossible for me to live in the Roman Empire apart from time travel, it’s still the case that *if* I did live in the Roman Empire, then I would exist before the Renaissance.
Time travel = Election
Existing in the Roman Empire = Belief
Existing before the Renaissance = Salvation

Unless you want to say that election can be, though isn’t, responsive to belief:  God would elect those individuals who believe apart from election - and we could still say that Christ died only for the elect.  This still conditionalizes the atonement in an important way and seems a step towards Amyraldianism.  

So we should broaden the atonement beyond the elect to adequately explain the truth that the reprobate would be saved if they were to believe, even though it’s impossible that they do so believe.

NFP and Contraception

The Catholic church permits the use of Natural Family Planning (NFP) to prevent conception.  Given the Church’s teaching on contraception, can this avowed permissibility of NFP be maintained consistently? 

This post is a collection of excerpts from Pruss that I’ve rephrased mixed with a few of my own comments.

If periodic abstinence is permissible, then it seems that periodic abstinence on fertile days (NFP) is as well.  But NFP seems to be done with the intention that conception not happen - and isn’t this what makes other forms of contraception wrong?

As a response, first note that in using NFP, one does not do anything to render that particular sexual act sterile.  The act would have been as it was with or without the intention - the couple does not contribute anything to that particular act to make it infertile.  

One may think that by ‘moving the act’ to an infertile period one has rendered the act infertile - but one cannot move an act; instead, they engaged in another act altogether. 

The sexual act in positive contraception is infertile because they couple has made it so.  But in NFP, the act is infertile just because that is what acts at that point in the cycle are like.  

Here’s an extended analogy to help with the case:  There are two chess players, Gertrude and Matthew, who do not want to win their next match - perhaps they’re afraid they’d become too haughty if they win.  They use different methods to ensure defeat.  Gertrude will only play a grandmaster, ensuring her defeat.  Matthew will play anyone, but takes drugs to cloud his mind, ensuring defeat.  

Why did Gertrude lose?  Because her opponent was a great player.

Why did Matthew lose?  Because he drugged himself.  

Matthew was not really trying to beat his opponent.  But we can assume that Gertrude really was trying, and strove as hard as possible, to beat her opponent.  Matthew negatively impacted his striving.  Gertrude did not negatively impact hers.  Similarly, the contraceptive couple is positively opposing their reproductive striving.  The NFP couple is not engaged in such opposition. 

Gertrude did something to negatively impact the goal of winning, but she did not do anything to negatively impact her striving.

Couples that engage in direct contraception are deceiving themselves, for they intend to unite physically yet oppose that unity by contraception. Their thus acting against erotic love, which is wrong.  

This does not mean that a couple needs to explicitly intend reproduction.  There’s another option besides intending to reproduce and intending to not reproduce:  One can just remain uncommitted either way - and this is what a couple does, or should be doing, that engages in NFP. And if one chooses this non-commitment, then they are not directly acting against erotic love.  This is the same reason that there’s nothing wrong with abstinence, for one is not acting against erotic love in abstaining from sex, but is remaining silent on it.  A short analogy will help:  There’s a difference between telling the truth, lying, and silence.  Lying is always wrong.  Telling the truth is good.  But there’s nothing wrong with silence, ceteris paribus.  Silence is and abstinence are neutral acts that are neutral with regard to reality, while contraception and lying are contrary to it.  

The ‘Aqedah and Kant

So there’s an additional problem in the ‘Aqedah - which is that Abraham should have been more sure of the moral prohibition against killing his innocent child than he was sure that the voice commanding him to kill his innocent child really was God’s voice.  We can call this the Kantian problem of the ‘Aqedah, as Kant clearly set forth the problem.

As Pruss notes in his paper, Abraham must have put an extremely high credence, perhaps close to 1, on the belief that it was God commanding him, else the action he undertook would be an immoral one.  But given Abraham’s epistemic environment wherein he had witnessed God’s action personally, along with other more general epistemic considerations - such as God providing the appropriate amount of assurance and evidence, externalism and such – then it doesn’t seem like a forlorn conclusion to hold that Abraham could have been so justified.  Plus the more general considerations that situate the ‘Aqedah, such as God’s right over our lives, the original sin of Isaac, the capacity of God to immediately resurrect him, Abraham’s belief that the action would be undone, etc.

Pruss and Beauty

Heavily Pruss Dependent:  

An often cited example in support of subjectivism is the idea that in some cultures what counts as beautiful isn’t considered beautiful in other cultures.  The long necks of the Padaung are beautiful to members of that culture but not to Americans.  This seems to intuitively support the relativity of beauty judgements.  But consider the following example:  In visible light, Van Gogh’s paintings are beautiful - but not so much under x-ray.  We don’t think that this implies relativism.  Why not? What’s different about the two cases?  In both cases, for beauty to be appropriately perceived, you must possess the necessary context and perceptual apparatus.  But once you have that apparatus, you will - presumably - find these cases beautiful.  So while there’s a sort of relativism present in both cases, there’s also an absolutism.  

Still, there also seems to be the possibility that the Padaung are in error about their judgment.  But this supports absolutism, for one cannot be in error about their judgements of beauty if beauty judgements are relative. 

From these considerations, Pruss argues that beauty has both a relativistic and absolutist element.  There may not be one objective beauty for humans, angels, and vulcans.  But so long as Bob, Sally, and Daryl are humans, there is one beauty for them.  So beauty is relativized to the kind of thing something is - mixed with a proper function account.  If a member of a kind is properly functioning, then it will find beautiful what that kind considers beautiful.  

For something to be objectively beautiful, it is true regardless of human opinion, feelings, beliefs, or experience.

For something to be subjectively beautiful, it is only true because of human opinion, feelings, belief, or experience.

If we let in too much subjectivism, then we cannot admit the possibility of bad taste and error.  It seems possible that someone is wrong about what they consider to be beautiful.  But societal subjectivism isn’t right either, for then when one is admiring a proof or painting, then it ceases to be beautiful if society happens to change its mind behind your back.  So that seems wrong.  Plus this strong subjectivism doesn’t seem to make much sense of the importance of beauty.

Some further arguments against the subjectivity of beauty:  If beauty were just the pleasure and appreciation experienced by those who behold the beautiful object, “then Renoir would have done something in every way more valuable had he made his paintings somewhat less beautiful (say, 20% less beautiful, if that makes any sense) but worked to ensure that they would have twice as many viewers. That is absurd. Furthermore, although this intuition is not shared by all, it appears wrong to me to destroy a beautiful vase for no good reason even if nobody would ever again see it.”

But too much objectivism doesn’t seem to work either.  For what a human finds beautiful may not be beautiful to a vulcan.  Perhaps vulcans only see in infra red, and even though a human will find Van Gogh’s paintings beautiful, a vulcan cannot properly appreciate it.  

So it seems that we need a mix of subjectivism and absolutism or objectivism.  The beautiful is relative to kinds, and properly functioning members of a kind will find beautiful what that kind finds beautiful.  We get absolutism in that individual relativism is ruled out and in that there is a proper function for individuals.  

There is a stance dependence to beauty, but it’s an absolutist kind of stance dependence. Beautiful simpliciter is what is beautiful relative to some kind or other. For every kind of beauty, there is a kind of being that appreciates it.

Immensity

As William Lane Craig has laid out in one of his Q&As, there have traditionally been two views of God’s omnipresence in the Christian tradition: that God’s essence transcends space or that God is present everywhere in space. On the former view, God’s omnipresence would be spelled out reductively- basically, God can be counted as being present everywhere in space via his exhaustive and immediate knowledge and his exhaustive and immediate power – so that his omnipresence is nothing above and beyond these two attributes. On this view, the answer to “where is God’s essence?” is “nowhere, for his essence isn’t in space.” I’ve always preferred this story. But Francis Turretin forcefully rejects the reductive view in his systematic theology - and I’m keenly feeling the force he’s applied.

Turretin argues that omnipresence is a secondary, consequent property of God, that it follows from God’s immensity. “For out of immensity arises omnipresence, which supposes immensity as its foundation. God is therefore omnipresent because he is immense.” This seems to easily avoid some possibly heretical notions held by Isaac Newton that space was either a necessary effect of God or an aspect of him - for on Turretin’s view, neither omnipresence nor the universe is a necessary attribute of God, rather God spills into the universe upon creating it given a deeper characteristic of his, his immensity.  Turretin primarily rests his argument for God’s immensity on perfect being considerations - it’s better for God to exist everywhere, fully and without separation, than for him to not exist anywhere in space.

But there are problems for understanding God to be present spatially everywhere by his essence.  First, if God is in space, doesn’t this imply that he’s a material being?  Second, wouldn’t God’s essence have to be non-simple for him to be present spatially? Some of him here, some of him there?

For the first objection, Pruss provides a nice account of material beings that can simultaneously hold that God is in space without being material – to be material, one must be possibly capable of occupying a proper part of space.  But God cannot possibly occupy just a proper part of space, so does not count as material.  I like this answer.

For the second objection, the answer is more difficult.  As Craig says, “[God] would have to be wholly present at every place in space. Since God is not made of parts, He can’t be extended throughout space as the universe is, part here and part there. Rather He has to be wholly here and at the same time wholly there.”  This is definitely a weird and difficult concept to grasp, but perhaps not incoherent.  The Scholastics, and Turretin after them, termed this type of presence “repletive” presence, as opposed to definite and circumscriptive presence.  Circumscriptive presence is had by bodies who are commensurate with parts of space (normal bodies?).  Definite presence is had by things that are limited to a certain part of space (souls?).  Repletive presence is had only by God, in which he occupies all parts of space wholly, and yet is not contained in any part of space.  Difficult concept for sure, but perhaps not incoherent.  

I might want to opt for this more traditional view of God’s omnipresence.  I dunno.

Bonus:  The traditional take on omnipresence is the one required by my defense of the Causal-Likeness Principle.

I didn't know about this Inman paper until after I wrote this post, but it's super relevant and very good:  https://philarchive.org/rec/INMRDI 

Perseverance of the Saints

Q. Are there individuals who will experience something akin to Christian salvation and who truly believed that they were among God’s called, who nevertheless apostatize? 
A. Clearly so.  So it seems that we must admit that knowing whether one (or another) is a Christian or not can be subjectively opaque to some degree - and perhaps this is okay to admit, as such subjective opacity grounds the warning passage in Hebrews 6.

Q. Can one who is internally called by God apostatize?  
A. It seems not, but as stated in the prior question, discerning whether one is internally called can be an opaque process.

We must not confuse the doctrine of assurance with the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.  While the latter has good grounds in the Bible, the prior is shaky - and while God’s elect cannot be lost, it’s a matter of probability on this side of heaven whether we (or others) are members of the unshakable elect.  And while God’s elect cannot lose their salvation, it seems that God can use their subjective opacity as the means of preserving them (Heb 6).  

Still, it seems that the deepest, truest, and most real type of faith, in which one personally and wholly places their trust in Jesus in a way that cannot possibly be overturned, can only be the result of election (so that no temporary believer ever possesses this type of belief).  So there is a subjective personal fruit of election that is exclusive to members of the elect alone  – and perhaps this faith can occasionally give epistemic access into something like certainty as to one’s membership in the elect.  But maybe this access is only occasional.  Assurance is flickery.

I'm unsure about my conclusions in this post. 

Sola Fide

The following is a mix of excerpts from Paul Helm with some of my own comments mixed in.  

On Sola Fide, the primary motivation for a Christian’s moral activity relates to what has happened, that he has been justified by an alien righteousness, so that the fundamental motivator is gratitude to God on account of what he has done.

Those that deny Sola Fide hold that one of the motivations for the Christian’s moral activity is that through it justification can be caused or completed or strengthened.  This is a fundamentally different type of motivator than Sola Fide, and seems essentially less God-centric.

A person in this position may justifiably reason 'If I do not live appropriately, I will not be accepted'.  On the Non-Sola Fide view, moral failure puts justification in peril and should spur one on to a renewed effort.  If one has deep concerns about divine acceptance, this results in a very harsh view of God.  If not, it results in an easy moralism.

On Sola Fide, moral failure does not put acceptance or justification in peril.  Instead, moral failure triggers a renewal of faith in Jesus and obedience to him.  This also seems to lead the Sola Fide view to appreciate a deeper aspect of sin, in that it alienates one from God.

The purpose of the gospel is not primarily to overcome conscious failure, but to recognize God’s love and forgiveness in Christ.  

So the doctrine of Sola Fide has important subjective and objective features.  Forgiveness is not conditional on sola fide, an objective feature.  This leads to important psychological effects.

The stance of someone who loves in order to be accepted is much different than one who loves God because he has been forgiven much.  And so the 'spiritual theology' arising from these two sorts of cases is likely to be very different as well.

These words declare that salvation does not come from looking at our own works of righteousness, but from looking outside ourselves to another, to the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Indeed, sola fide is vital because it reminds us of the grace of the gospel, testifying that our salvation—our standing and acceptance before God—is entirely from God. Human works cannot accomplish divine salvation. Thus sola fide ascribes all the glory to God, so that no one will boast in man (1 Cor. 1:31). It reminds us that everything we have is a gift

Faith is an instrumental cause of salvation:  We are saved by Christ’s merit through the instrument of a perceiving faith.  Still, faith is a virtue; but is not on account of this virtue that we are saved, but on the account of Christ’s merit - nor is this virtue a product of our own work, but given to us by God.

Ursinus: That not only all our merits, but that even faith itself may be excluded from that which is received by faith; so that when we say, we are justified by faith only, the sense is, that it is not by meriting, but only by receiving; as when it is said, This beggar is enriched only by receiving alms, all works and merits are excluded therefrom, yea, even the very acceptance of alms, in as far as it is viewed as a merit. It is for this reason, that Paul always says, that we are justified by faith, and through faith, as by an instrument; and never on account of faith, as the Papists will have it, who indeed admit both forms of expression, as if faith might be the application of Christ’s righteousness, and be also at the same time a certain work, or merit, by which we are counted worthy of being declared righteous, which is directly opposed to the very nature of faith. For if we were justified on account of our faith, then faith would no longer be the acceptance of the righteousness of another, but it would be the merit, and cause of our own righteousness; neither would it receive the satisfaction of another, for it would no longer stand in need of it.

On the Guilt of Heresy

Definition of heretic: Therefore heresy is a species of unbelief, belonging to those who profess the Christian faith, but corrupt its (central) dogmas.

The involvement of the will is a necessary condition for culpability. This applies to the guilt of heresy.

So if heresy is to be wrong it must be wrong with some respect to the will.  I can think of two ways that the will could be involved in heresy: (a)  Heresy, in the sense of heretical propositions, can be chosen or retained in a sinful way. This would be a sinful will ‘leading up’ to heresy - perhaps one pridefully rejects listening to Orthodox teachers and departs from their teachings due to the motive of pride. (b) Or heresy as a proposition can lead downstream to sinful willfulness; such that one substitutes a false image of God in his stead, and does not give God his proper due because of this substitution - for instance, if a person thinks pantheism is true, then their conception of God could be far too low and compromised. So heresy can be guilty for the way in which one holds the doctrines or for the results the doctrines have in how one conceives of themselves and God.

We need a distinction between heretical propositions, which we’ll call objective heresy, and heretical persons, which we’ll call subjective heresy.  Traditionally, in Catholic theology, a further distinction has been drawn between a formal and material heretic. This distinction concerns subjective and not objective heresy.  A formal heretic is a person who stubbornly and knowingly departs from Orthodox teaching.  A material heretic is one that holds to an unorthodox proposition but without a culpable involvement of the will. It may be that material heretics are not possible - perhaps all cases of subjective heresy are ones that result from culpable distortions of the will.  Or perhaps it’s possible for a person to hold an heretical proposition (material heretic) without thereby being a formal heretic.  The extent to which a person is a subjective heretic in a guilty manner or to which its depth and centrality corrupts the ability of the person to have genuine faith is to be determined on a case by case basis.  In difficult cases perhaps only God knows the true judgment. Clearer cases can be obvious.

Objective heresy concerns propositions. It is to be rooted out by creedal statements.  Not only are clearly heretical propositions to be ruled out by creedal statements, but such creedal statements can also target those propositions which lead or can lead to heretical distortions by logical or inferential consequence.  For instance, an error in the doctrine of the Trinity may seem innocuous at some level, but by logical consequence can wreak havoc on other central doctrines of or moral practices of the faith.  The purpose of creeds is to clarify and set forth the definition of Christian belief.  They are objective statements and condemn propositions, and not necessarily individuals.  Whether an individual holds to a proposition in a condemnatory way is up to further analysis.  Recall Charles Hodge's comments on Schleiermacher, who Hodge thought committed to objectively heretical views, but who, according to Hodge, still seems to have been a committed and saved Christian.  Schleiermacher's objectively heretical views do, however, imply on their own and by consequence propositions and behaviors that will sinfully distort the will.  

Subjective heresy’s involvement of the will:

1. A belief can be culpable if it results from willful and malicious dispositions, attitudes, or values.  
2. A belief can be culpable if it leads to consciously known violations of morality.
3. A belief can be culpable if it is held in a sinful manner; pridefully, arrogantly, boastfully.  

Objective heresy’s culpability:

1. If a proposition misrepresents God’s central teachings, actions, or nature.
2. If the proposition leads, by logical consequence, to other propositions that distort God’s central teachings, actions, or nature.

As we saw in a post a few months ago about Elizabeth Jackson’s work, we can easily see how beliefs can be morally intertwined with the will and thereby subject to moral evaluation.  Here’s a few options to see this:  (a) God has already provided us with the innate beliefs (or dispositions?) and they can only be denied sinfully (b) We can indirectly control our beliefs by focusing on certain types of evidence (c) We can directly control our beliefs in permissivist situation (d) and, it seems plausible to think that some beliefs may lead to a conflict with other known violations of conscience, such as a belief that Jews are non-persons leading to known violations of conscience in treating them as non-persons.