THE CHURCH AND MORALITY (By His Grace the Archbishop of Wellington.)

New Zealand Tablet, 23 August 1906, Page 11

THE CHURCH AND MORALITY

(By His Grace the Archbishop of Wellington.)

The present subject is the Church and morality— a most important theme, touching our most sacred interests aivd the diiection of our life, nay, our everlasting future— a most opportune theme, because the question of morality was never more discussed than in our day. You hear a gieal deal in certain quarters about independent morality- and religious moialuy ; the former emancipated from all dogma is vaunted to the skies, the latter resting on the idea of God is spurned and despised. This capital eiror must be exploded. Whatever people may sa.y, it is entirely wrong to distinguish between independent, morality and religious morality— no such distinction exists ; fur there is but one morality and that one and only morality cannot stand without the Church. Because she is indispensable to morality for three reasons: (1), as the guardian of morality ; (2) as the suppoit of conscience ; and (3) as the source of sanctity.

I.

The Church is the guardian of morality, because she maintains the unshakable bases of morality • a code, a legislator, and a sanction. (1) It is needless to show , the necessity of a code of morals. Morality -being the rule of manners is imposed on all persons, consequently must be universal and immutable. It must be the same for all countries and for all latitudes, the same for the civilized man and the savage, the same for the child and the aged man, the same for the learned and the ignorant. But the conscience is not the same in all ; it is more or less enlightened more or less upright, more or less timorous, more or less broad. Neither is education identical in all nor temperament, nor passions, nor interests. And you are aware how different may be the appreciation of the same act as conscience, or education, or temperament, or passions, or interests vary in each individual Nevertheless, it is evident that the morality of an act cannot depend merely on contingent, outward circumstances, that would make morality t-he' sport of caprice, nay, bring about its annihilation. You therefoie see the absolute necessity of a code which, by pointing out to everybody where duty lies serves as the basis of the moral appreciation of our acts. That code is the Decalogue, or the Ten Commandments. God implanted it in man's heart at his creation ; but man becoming in course of time either unable or unwilling to discern these commandments inscribed in his conscience and forming what is called the natural law, it was requisite that God should formulate them, and solemnly give them to Moses, for transmission to the Hebrew people as His and their law. Jesus Christ took this Decalogue, completed, elevated, perfected it, making it the law of exquisite purity, incomparable beauty, and consummate elevation, which we call Gospel morality.

But this Gospel morality— will men understand it? If they understand it, will they accept it? If they accept it, will they preserve it ? Or, like the natural law, will it gradually fade away from the human conscience, vanish and disappear when Jesus has left the earth? No ; thanks to the Church that morality was never to perish. The Church gathered it from the lips of her Master, proffered it to mankind, interpreted it to the would which, at the time when the Apostles begjan to preach, was steeped in fearful corruption ; she kept it intact and lesplendenl. When we recollect ia what a fierce deluge of human passions the Gospel teaching appeared, we ask how the Church was able to maintain its doctrine entire and inflexible. Yet she did it, as even her adversaries admit. Always and everywhere the Catholic Church preaches a moral law which mortally wounds pride and lust, those two 'deities of the corrupt human heart. All the passions o£ the mind and the /lesh encountered her on their way and complained that she was too incompatible. From the barbarian, who asked her to shut her eyes to his plunder and revenge, down to the kings who sought to divorce their wives, she met with rebellion and violent opposition. Even to-day men inquire why she is so holy, why she does not consent to relax certain laws by which she binds human consciences ; why she is not more indulgent to the passions and necessities of men Many would fain come to her who are deterred by 'her rigor, the yoke of Avhich they dread. But she has received from (Jod the deposit of holiness, and with it the guardianship of conjugal honor and domestic purity. She hears with pain, but inflexibly rejects such shameful proposals, and maintaining the full perfection of Gospel morality she answers with God : ' My grace is sufficient for thee." Thus the Church for the last twenty centuries preserves in its integrity and spreads abroad this perfect Gospel moral code, undimmed like a shining lighthouse radiating into consciences and showing them where lie duty, honor, virtue and the light way. (2.) The second basis of morality is a Legislator, and the Church keeps the idea of Him in the world since He is lur origin, and she teaches His doctrine' incessantly reminding man of Ins duty of adoration, praise, and thanksgiving towaids His infinite majesty. Not only is the moral law universal ami immut^ able, but it is absolutely obligatory; no one is free to go against its orders ; when it speaks, all must ob«y. Accordingly, it supposes and demands a teg-is^ lator. For, if man commanded himself, he would modify, according to his own whims and fancies, the orders of the law, which would soon go out of existence. Duty must, theiefoie, bfc imposed upon ,us by a will which is the rule of our will, and which has an absolute right over us, in other terms, the Divine Will. Nowadays the necessity of this sovereign Lawgiver is often denied ; men loudly vaunt an independent morality based on the nobleness of duty, on self-respect, on human dignity. Assuiedly, all these things are excellent in themselves, and may sometimes hintler the fail of certain privileged, noble, elevated finely blalanccd natuies ; but all are incapable of heeding their voice and feeling their influence ; for most men these barriers are ineffectual. Even for the best of men, they arc not always sufficient ; for if conscience shows us the beauty of virtue too often it is daikened by the passions which divide our heart. Look into yourselves : have you never known these hours of conflict and anguish when everything in and around you seemed conspiring your ruin • when your soul, like a hapless barque drifting in the storm, was tossed by the violence of your evil instincts and threatened with instant shipwreck ? In those moments, had you perceived no light but that of reason to guide you, and. no force to help you in the struggle buj, the prestige of duty and personal dignity, it is greatly to be feared that you would have run on the rocks in the fierce current of pleasure. To remain steadfast and safe in the tempest, we require the thought that God is there in our soul as He was in the Apostle's boat— God the supreme Lawgiver Who intimates to us and shows us His orders in a more vivid light— God our friend Who seems to sleep, as on the lake of Genesareth so as not to deprive us of the merit of battle and victory, but Who watches over us, gives us strength to struggle, nay, struggles with us— God the Sovereign Judge who awaits us, when we leave the world, to reward or punish us eternally. (3.) For, the third essential basis .of morality is a sanction. Every act, implies a consequence for the being that performs it ; that is true alike in the moral and the material order. Free beings we are responsible for our actions. ; and this responsibility requires a section, that is, a reward for the good done and a punishment for the evil committed. This sanction is the imperative demand of justice. But who

can apply it ?— Society ? Yes, to a certain extent. Opinion forms around us, according as Aye act well or ill, an atmosphere of honor or shame which we must seriously take into account. Besides, this purely moral sanction, society disposes of material sanctions, formidable punishments, or coveted rewards. But how often opinion and society are mistaken in their decrees ! How many elements of appreciation they lack ! How many secret actions escape their judgment ! Will man punish or reward himself for. his good and bad actions ? Yes, again, in part. When we have done -well, when we have come victors out of a violent moral struggle, when we have had the fortitude and manliness to sacrifice our passions to duty, our conscience gives us inward felicitations, the sweetness of which surpasses all applause and reward ; we feel ourselves belter, worthier, most estimable, greater, in a word, more men. If, on the contrary, we have done evil, our conscience protests, and stands up against us, as an avenging witness, to upbraid us with our sin. Nevertheless, this, testimony of conscience will prove insufficient. There are culprits whose conscience is so clouded, stunted, deadened, annihilated, that they feel not the. weight of remorse after the most revolting crniK's. As for those felicitations which follow a good action, they are experienced, especially after gaining a harder victory which required particular generosity. In the faithful accomplishment of our daily duties, we find peace of soul, and this rewaid is highly valuable and desirable ,' but does it effectively correspond to that constant effort, or rather that heroism, which sometimes is required for the continual application to the humble and monotonous labor of each day '> Know you not, also, that if there are men always self-»atisfied, be their merits ever so diminutive, there are others, on the contrary, whose conscience becomes more exacting in proportion as they lisc in perfection ? There must, then, be a judge who penetrates the interior of souls, ami scrutinises our Thoughts, who discerns the motive of our actions, and knows all their moral value, who weighs impartially our part of responsibility in our determinations. r l his judge can be God alone. He alone can apply the sanction in accordance with the rules of infallible justice. lie usually abstains from interference, because He respects our freedom and does not, as a rule, disturb the order of His laws. He reserves Himself for the hour of judgment, when lie will render to every one according to ins works. We often hear in our day severe criticism on this hope of a final sanction, and our adversaries fling at us the repioach that our morality is an interested morality, since its incentive is the fear of punishment and the hope of reward. 'It is far more perfect,' they say, 'to work solely for duty's sake, because it is duty, without, the attraction of icwaid either present or future.' Nothing is easier than the answer to this objection. Presented cleverly, it produces a certain baneful impression, because some people do not see its refutation. First of all, we remark that we do not work' principally in view of a reward, but rather in view of God our last end. Very different is the vntue of hope from the virtue of charity or love. We are a Ware that low, according to the words of Christ, is the peifection of the law; hence, when we work, or suffer, or act, our first view is not to avoid hell or win heaven, but to please God and show Him our love. This St. Augustine expressed when he exclaimed . ' I love Thee, my God, I feel I am sure I do. My fears are not interested ; quench hell-fire ; I fear it only because I love Thee. Destroy paradise : my joy, my hope, my bliss consists only in loving Thee.' Nevertheless, while in our soul and our life we give the first place to love, we by no means repudiate hope, because it is a supernatural virtue • nay, more, because it is a natural virtue and a most human one ; our nature as well as our justice claims a reward for good, and a punishment for evil. We cannot abstract from that sentiment which clings to our inmost being and is a pai I of our very selves Thus tliose who carp at our invincible hope in tlie rewards of a life to come, and parade their socalled disinterested morality, are more consistent men in practice than in theory ; for they are the last to neglect, they are "keenly alive to the advantages accruing to them from the discharge of tlieir duty. In that they deserve our imitation, without our abating one jot oi our higher reward. Nor need we notice their inept and unfair attack. We have an ideal immeasurably above theirs ; and we are thankful to the Church foi daily reminding us of it, wlien we say : ' I believe in Jesus Christ. . . . Who will come to judge the living and the dead. 1 (To be concluded next week.)