Our Moral Purpose
Given by James Covington on November 14th, 2004
The subject is a vast one. I admit that. Moral purpose is a topic with a long, long history of discourse. To mention Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, St. Augustine, is to name but only a few of the ancient philosophers who have attempted to understand the origin of morality. Is it of God, or of something else?
Modern scientists have also given much attention to the meaning and origin of moral values. Edward O. Wilson, the Harvard scientist and socio biologist asks the question: Do we invent our moral absolutes in order to make society workable? Or are these enduring principles expressed to us by some transcendent or Godlike authority? Not surprisingly, Wilson comes out on the side of science and the biological basis for moral reasoning that is often manifested in religions. Human nature is biologically based. He tells us that religion will possess strength to the extent that it codifies and puts into enduring poetic form the highest values of humanity consistent with empirical knowledge.
Even more interesting, America’s founding fathers, particularly Thomas Jefferson, who was not necessarily a moral exemplar, frequently addressed the question of morality. He said, I believe that justice is instinct and innate, that the moral sense is as much a part of our constitution as that of feeling, seeing, or hearing; as a wise Creator must have seen to be necessary in an animal destined to live in society. Clearly, Jefferson, along with others of the founding fathers of our country, held a keen interest in the subject of “moral purpose,” as they debated and honed their ideas for the Constitution.
You might say our country was founded on the idea of “moral purpose.” In 1792, Jefferson wrote to George Washington: No government has a legitimate right to do what is not for the welfare of the governed.
In 1814 he wrote: When we consider the moral purpose of an individual, we are considering his existence in its broadest sense. We are asking ‘What is the purpose of his life? What are the dynamics of his existence? What is it that makes life meaningful? What indeed is the point of it all?
For Jefferson, the whole purpose of morality is to enable us to live in a society of other humans. Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong merely relative to this. The moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of a man as his leg or arm.
From these formulations, and I have only given you a miniscule sample, Jefferson’s formulation of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as unalienable rights” is one indicator of his ongoing debate with himself and the founders. But these pursuits were never meant to be fulfilled at the expense of the greater society. It was understood that individual happiness and liberty must always be compatible with the happiness and liberty of others in a just society. The founders considered this social relationship an intrinsic part of existence and the very ground of moral purpose.
I present this to you this morning as a backdrop against the recent outbreak of interest in moral values. I spoke about this last week, but I want to return to it again today. I believe in light of the renewed interest in moral values, that we now have an opportunity, not unlike we had during the civil rights movement, to redefine for one another and for the nation and the world, the true meaning of morality as it is undeniably defined for us by the prophets of the Bible, the ancient philosophers and the founders of our nation. I include the Bible, because that book remains the bedrock of the right-wing part of religious fundamentalism and used to uphold their particular narrowly defined issues of moral behavior.
When I was in seminary and the civil rights movement was moving toward its apex, I remember only too well, how the religious right used the Bible to support its contention that God was only interested in saving sinners. Social issues were not a concern. The liberal progressive religious community refuted that argument and argued that social justice was always the foremost concern of Jesus and the prophets.
We now have an opportunity to redefine that vision in a world that is much different that it was 40 years ago. Yet, I submit to you the nation’s moral purpose remains as it always has: “to love mercy and do justice.”
According to the exit polls, “moral values” was the single largest concern among the electorate and a determining factor in the re-election of the president. What are people thinking about when they express a preeminent concern for moral values? Judging from election rhetoric alone, when we unwrap the moral values package, surprising few moral values seem to be included within it: abortion; late-term abortion in particular; gay marriage; perhaps prayer in the public schools, and God in the Pledge of Allegiance. When it comes to the larger ethical discussion—broadly contained in the prophet Micah’s mandate to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God,” this handful of so called moral values barely scratches the ethical surface.
I do not suggest that self-identified “moral values” voters are insincere. Quite the contrary. Only that the moral values politicians have been harping so successfully on—with resonant pro-life, pro-marriage, pro-family, pro-God rhetoric—themselves each raise a new set of ethical questions.
To give but one example, a majority of the self-designated values’ voters are opposed to stem-cell research. One can easily pose a moral counter argument. Which position reflects a higher moral value: opposition to the destruction for scientific use of the cells of frozen embryos (which will otherwise in almost every instance ultimately be destroyed anyway)? Or unfettered medical research in search of cures for diseases that affect or will one day affect perhaps half the population? The latter, in my view, is the pro-life position.
To be fully pro-life or pro-family, for instance, expands the moral compass well beyond the narrow circle in which embryonic stem-cell research or abortion or gay-marriage is addressed. Should we pander to bigotry? No, of course not. There can be no compromise with respect to a woman’s right to choose or the continuing struggle for equal rights for all Americans, regardless of their color, gender, or sexual orientation. But we must not be tempted to demean, parody, and condemn those who hold moral beliefs that differ from our own. These people are not ignorant. They are not yokels. They are citizens guided by specific religious and moral values who, quite understandably, are frightened by the influence of the larger culture. With respect to the social debate that is raging in this nation, our task is not to change our values or pander to prejudice, but to express our values—which I believe to be in the highest sense both true American and true religious values. Rather than fighting a defensive, rear-guard battle, we must witness to the founders’ belief in liberty and equality, to the prophets’ call for justice and mercy, and to the great commandments of Jesus—love to God and love to neighbor.
For example, is not a moral issue raised when we see a dramatic decline in the welfare roles even as poverty rises? Is it not a moral issue to wonder where those people went? And is it not a moral issue to worry about humanity’s trashing of the earth – after all in Genesis God said that “It was good” and made humanity earth’s steward. And does not the “culture of life,” which Mr. Bush so often invokes to oppose abortion, also include concern for the thousands of women and infants who die for lack of international family planning programs this nation refuses to fund? And is not concern for the “general welfare” a moral issue when tax cuts starve a federal government which is constitutionally mandated to promote it?
Is it not a moral issue that we live in a world where 1.6 billion people go to bed hungry at night while our nation worries about obesity? Is it of no moral consequence that we Americans, who constitute something like 6% of the world’s people, consume 40% of its resources? In other words what passes for moral values in 2004 is a narrow range of sexuality issues in which negativity plays a dominant role.
Again, what I am saying to you is that the liberal religious community now needs to recast political and moral dialogue to broaden this nation’s understanding of what moral values really are – values rooted in love and inclusion, not hate and exclusion. We need to reframe the issues in as effective a way as the religious right has done. For example, “partial-birth abortion” is not a medical term; “tax relief” suggests rescuing people from an oppressor (even the poor support tax cuts for the wealthy); the word “marriage” is narrowly defined and drips with homophobia in the 11 anti-same sex marriage initiatives that passed. “No child left behind” was stolen from the Children’s Defense Fund which has a very different vision.
We need to define the “culture of life” as including the freedom of human beings to make their own choices and make every child a loved and wanted child. We need to remind the nation that, in the words of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, “Taxes are the price we pay for civilization,” and are our investment in the common good. We need to proclaim that in a world so full of hate, loneliness and despair, we ought to be grateful any time we see expressions of committed love.
Now in regard to family values, conservatives have a private view of how to improve family life(people should do the right thing, and liberals have a public view(family values are about jobs, child care, and well-funded professional services.) New government programs to support families are a taboo subject for conservatives, lest they be accused of advocating big government, and calls for personal responsibility in marriage and parenting are out of order for liberals, lest they be seen as moralizing or advocating one kind of family form over another.
This either/or split played out in the 1990s after Hillary Clinton wrote her book “It Takes a Village” to raise a child and conservatives retorted that it “takes parents.” Both statements of course are accurate. Family values are about the village and also about how people behave in the village; about economic justice for all families and also about personal decisions on whether to be married and economically viable before having children, about high quality child care outside the home and also about high quality parenting in the home.
For several years, surveys have shown a large majority are worried about declining morals. Their voices were heard, for example, in the outcry over decency on the airwaves sparked by this year’s Super Bowl halftime show.
In a poll taken just after the election, 42 percent of voters cited the war in Iraq as the “moral issue” that most influenced their choice of candidates, while 13 percent cited abortion and 9 percent same-sex marriage. Asked to name the greatest threat to marriage, 31 percent said “infidelity,” 25 percent cited “rising financial burdens,” 22percent cited gay marriage.
The truth is, we all should rank moral values at the top of our list of priorities. Moral values should encompass and instruct every position we embrace—on economic justice, on international policy, on civil rights and human rights, on everything we care about. The language of morality should inform our every argument. It should elevate the level of our discourse. It should chasten our rhetoric. In short, what we believe must spring as eloquently from our hearts as it does from our minds. This is indeed, ultimately our moral purpose.
And I would also say that all we do here in this place should nurture and inform that moral purpose. Here we come to center our lives. Here we take stock of our lives. We give each other the sustenance we need to live fully and morally. We care for broken spirits. Here we come to be inspired to never give up the dream of just and compassionate existence. Here we come to be reminded of our task in the world, our moral purpose: the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness, not only for ourselves but for all humankind.
There is, of course, a problem – hinted at by Oscar Wilde: “The trouble with socialism is that it takes too many evenings.” The same might be said of Unitarian Universalism or of democracy itself. It takes up too many evenings. Advocates of the religious right have committed themselves to those evenings far more than have those of the religious left. Our response will tell just how seriously we take our liberal religious faith and our democracy.
Politicians come and go - parties win and lose - but life abides - in birth, suffering, joy and death. The ultimate human issues persist even as public issues swirl about our heads. Not all human problems are “solved” by politics and the religious institution not only grapples with proximate political issues, but also helps us confront the ultimate issues of human existence. Comforted by this perspective, I once again turn myself to the “hum drum work of democracy,” knowing with Annie Dillard that “there is no one but us.”
Closing Meditation: Spirit of Life and Source of All Being, keep us steady at the core. Release us from anxiety; help us with the insight and courage we will need in the days to come as we pursue our devotion to the common good of all. In the midst of all of life’s challenges, may we also stay present with our joy, celebrate our love of life, and keep the faith that justice and compassion will always prevail.