Powerpoints by Dr. Peter Vardy
Vice-Principal, Heythrop College,
University of London
SITUATION ETHICS
• Situation Ethics was put forward in its
most developed form by the Anglican
theologian, Joseph Fletcher, in 1965 –
although it pre-dated Fletcher.
• It is a CONTEXTUAL and SITUATIONAL
approach – it therefore rejects the
DEONTOLOGICAL approach of Natural
Law. What is right and wrong depends on
the specific situation.
• Situation Ethics has been condemned by
the Pope John-Paul ll and the Catholic
Magisterium as a position that no Catholic
may hold.
Fletcher’s hero
• At the beginning of his book, Fletcher tells the
following story: A friend of his who arrived at St.
Louis in the U.S.A. just as a presidential
campaign was ending. The cab driver who drove
him was clearly involved in the battle and said:
• "I and my father and grandfather before
him, and their fathers, have always been
straight-ticket Republicans."
• "Ah", said Fletcher's friend, "I take it that
you will vote Republican as well?".
• "No" said the driver, "There are times
when a man has to push his principles
aside and do the right thing.“
• THIS CABBIE, FLETCHER CLAIMS, IS THE
HERO OF HIS BOOK.
Fletcher….
• Fletcher claims that Jesus came to
reject the Law – i.e. the Jewish Torah.
• The Law was too inflexible and attempted
to transform the spirit that lay behind the
law into fixed rules.
• He said there is no ethical system that
can be said to be Christian.
• Fletcher argues that Jesus’ two
commands to love (God and neighbour)
are the foundation and heart of all
Christian morality.
• There are no moral absolutes.
ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES
• Fletcher claims that there are only three
possible approaches to ethics:
1) The legalistic approach i.e. ethics based
on unalterable laws (The Jewish Torah or
Natural Law in the Catholic Christian
tradition would fit in here)
2) The lawless or unprincipled approach
which says that there are no more rules
3) The situational approach which judges
what is morally right and wrong based on
the situation in which the decision is
made.
The four working principles of
Situation Ethics
Situation Ethics rests on four key principles:
1) Pragmatism (it deals with the actual situation in
which decisions are made and ‘what works’
matters
2) Relativism (all ethical judgements are relative –
but they are relative to the absolute command of
love)
3) Positivism (moral reasoning takes place within
faith – so situation ethics rests on a faith claim
about the centrality of love)
4) Personalism (the Christian is committed to love
people – not abstract moral rules. It is therefore
on the side of human beings.
Fletcher says that it is not the unbelieving
who invite damnation but those who do
not love
Nothing, other than love, is good in itself
• Situation Ethics claims that only one
thing is intrinsically good - namely love.
• Nothing, apart from love. is good in and
of itself. Actions gain their value only
because they help human beings (in
which case they are good) or hurt people
(in which case they are bad). What is
right in one case may be wrong in
another
• Love wills the neighbour’s good
whether we like him or her or not – it
is NON-PREFERENTIAL. This is
AGAPE.
AGAPE
• Agape is very different from eros (or love
based on physical attraction).
• Agape is the Christian concept of love
which flows from the common humanity of
every human being as all human beings
are children of God.
• Agape is a duty – a duty not to feel the
emotion of love but to act lovingly towards
every human being irrespective of race,
nationality, gender, sexual orientation,
state of health, poverty or wealth. It is a
hard and demanding challenge as it is a
command to love those who are not
lovable.
• St. Paul put the importance of love well………………………..
• LOVE AS CENTRAL
• “If I speak in human and
angelic tongues but do not
have love, I am a resounding
gong or a clashing cymbal.
• And if I have the gift of
prophecy and comprehend
all mysteries and all
knowledge; if I have all faith
so as to move mountains but
do not have love, I am
nothing. If I give away
everything I own, and if I
hand my body over so that I
may boast but do not have
love, I gain nothing.
• Love is patient, love is kind.
It is not jealous, love is not
pompous, it is not inflated, it
is not rude, it does not seek
its own interests, it is not
quick-tempered, it does not
brood over injury, it does not
rejoice over wrongdoing but
rejoices with the truth.
• It bears all things, believes
all things, hopes all things,
endures all things. Love
never fails. If there are
prophecies, they will be
brought to nothing; if
tongues, they will cease; if
knowledge, it will be
brought to nothing.
• For we know partially and
we prophesy partially, but
when the perfect comes,
the partial will pass away.
• When I was a child, I used
to talk as a child, think as a
child, reason as a child;
when I became a man, I
put aside childish things.
… faith, hope, love remain,
these three; but the
greatest of these is love.”
• St. Paul’s first letter to the
Corinthians Ch 13 1. - 13
FLETCHER’S REJECTION OF MORAL RULES
• Fletcher claims that Jesus did not come to lay
down a long series of moral rules – it is Churches
which have subsequently done this:
• "Jesus said nothing about birth control, large or small
families, childlessness, homosexuality, masturbation,
fornication, pre-marital intercourse, sterilisation,
artificial insemination, abortion, sex fore-play, petting
and courtship. Whether any form of sex (hetero, homo
or auto) is good or evil depends on whether love is
fully served.’ (Situation Ethics. p. 139)
• BUT IT IS ESSENTIAL TO NOTE THAT BY ‘LOVE’ HERE
FLETCHER MEANS AGAPE AND NOT SEXUAL DESIRE. IT
WOULD BE QUITE WRONG TO SEE FLETCHER AS
ADVOCATING PARTICULAR SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR OR SAYING
SEX IS MORALLY PERMISSIBLE JUST BECAUSE PHYSICAL
DESIRE IS PRESENT.
Conscience in Situation Ethics
• Situation ethics rejects four of the normal ways
of thinking about conscience. Conscience is:
• NOT personal intuition,
• NOT Guidance by the Holy Spirit or a guardian
angel
• NOT The internalised value system of a society,
nor
• There is, for Fletcher, no such thing as
conscience. Conscience is merely the word
we use for our attempts to make decisions
creatively, fittingly according to the
particular situation. Fletcher considers
that Aquinas' definition of conscience
comes closest to the truth 'reason making
moral judgements' - but it is in no sense a
separate faculty.
CRITICISMS OF SITUATION ETHICS
Situation Ethics can seem very attractive. it is
flexible and seems to be faithful to Jesus'
command to love BUT it can be criticised:
1) It is very individualistic and can lead to a person
justifying an action by saying that it was the
'loving' thing to do,
2) It is difficult to determine whether an action is
morally right or wrong as much depends on an
individual’s subjective assessment. There may be
no agreed standards available and therefore no
way of rejecting a claim made by an individual
3) It denies Natural Law and - if Natural Law is
valid - it therefore undermines the fundamental
basis for traditional Christian (specifically
Catholic) morality.
CRITICISMS OF SITUATION ETHICS (2)
• 4) It is difficult to decide what is the 'loving'
thing to do as there are so many consequences to
take into account. Take the cases of:
• i) a 14 year old pregnant due to rape. What is the
'loving' thing to do? Any assessment will need to
take into account not just the affect on the girl
but on the future possible child, the people this
child meets or marries, the sacrifice required of
the girl, her parents, the damage caused to her,
etc. etc. - working out all the variables may verge
on the impossible.
• ii) An old person who may be in pain. How does
one decide between the needs of this person and
the needs of younger people for medical
treatment when both may not be possible? Can
the 'loving' thing for the majority lead to the
killing of a minority?
CRITICISMS OF SITUATION ETHICS (3)
• 6) How is love defined? - sometimes it can
be loving to inflict pain on others (for
instance by having children inoculated) so
who is going to determine whether a
person is acting in accordance with 'real'
love or not?
• 5) Situation Ethics maintains that every
situation is different - but perhaps this is
not the case after all and situations are
much more similar than Situation Ethics
supposes. Stealing may always be stealing
and it may be ALWAYS wrong.
• 6) Once one rejects the firm absolute rules
laid down by Natural Law, one may be
embarking on a slippery slope and
opening Pandora's box - with no certainty
what the results will be.
CRITICISMS OF SITUATION ETHICS (4)
• 7) Fletcher says that being good requires
intelligence. He rejects the idea that: 'Be good
sweet maid and let who will be clever‘ by saying
that if you are to be good you have to be clever yet how many are clever enough to be able to
make these sort of decisions?
• 8) Situation Ethics is meant to be based on Jesus
command to love, BUT Jesus is recorded in St.
Matthew’s Gospel as saying that he did not come
to overturn the Law (The Jewish Torah) but to
fulfil it. He also said that no word of the Law
would pass away - so maybe he would have
rejected Situation Ethics.
• 9) Natural Law is not based on revelation or on
the Bible - it is based on REASON and should,
therefore, provide a basis for morality which all
human beings can agree to. Situation Ethics puts
'love' in first place and non-Christians may well
not accept this.