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To: stuartcr
So for you, there are moral absolutes, but since others think differently and your moral absolutes shouldn’t be forced on another, where is the real absoluteness?

I'm not sure I see the connection, but I would like to point out that I didn't say NO moral absolutes should be forced on people. I said SOME shouldn't.

But if morality has to do not only with action but intention (the intention specifies the act", says Aquinas) and intention can't be forced - at least I think it can't - I might be able to compel some behaviors or the avoidance of some behaviors, but others would be beyond my power to compel. For instance, I could punish marital infidelity, but I don't see how I could compel husbands to love their wives.

Shouldn’t a real moral absolute be something inherent in every soul throughout history?

Well according to the account of the "God, The universe, and Everything" which I hold, they were inherent, but humans got broken, or broke themselves. They don't know themselves, they don't know what they want, much less what they ought to want, and even when they have a clue about what they want, they don;'t know how to get it.

It's not the absence of moral absolutes which makes for disagreements, it's the absence of self-knowledge. Other aspects of our personal disintegrity (?) have to do with how we don't or can't do what we think we should. But, in general, yeah, if there is such a thing as human nature, I think there is at least a logical inherentness to the best way to be human. But that doesn't mean we know all of it.

Again, it seems that very nearly every culture on earth teaches that you shouldn't just have sex with whoever whenever (or whatever!). This is so general an idea that the few cultures that don't think so are regarded as truly weird

But the notion that it "works" best when it's one guy and one chick and a lifelong commitment to reflect the relationship between Christ and His Church, that's not (or is no longer) inherent. That's got to be revealed.

102 posted on 08/15/2007 6:19:06 AM PDT by Mad Dawg (Oh Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.)
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To: Mad Dawg

Personally, I don’t believe in moral absolutes for all. I just believe that men have been designed to strive for what they believe to be a moral absolute.


105 posted on 08/15/2007 6:42:41 AM PDT by stuartcr (Everything happens as God wants it to.....otherwise, things would be different.)
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