Moral responsibility in Christian preaching emphasizes the accountability of believers for their intentions and actions before God. It highlights that true responsibility depends on the motives of the heart, not merely external results, reflecting the call to righteous living and stewardship (Romans 14:12, 2 Corinthians 5:10). Illustrations often use the contrast between hidden motives and visible deeds to convey this truth.
Intentions determine moral responsibility, not just the outcome of actions.
The attendant on King William Rufus, who discharged at a deer an arrow which glanced against a tree, and killed the king, was no murderer, because he had no such design; and, on the other hand, a man who should lay in wait to assassinate another, and pull the trigger of a gun with that intent, would be morally a murderer, not the less though the gun should chance to miss fire. Whately.
Hypnotism can cause crime without intent, but blame lies with the instigator.
Hypnotism as an aid to crime has been variously discust in France from both the medical and the legal side, with the general conclusion that legislation is needed to cover the most palpable employment of it. The fact that a hypnotized subject can take and execute a criminal suggestion made by another, and yet be really innocent of any immoral intent, is beyond all doubt; and this fact has led observers to the conclusion that the blame must rest upon the giver of the suggestion. An additional precaution which the true originator of the crime might take would be to give a suggestion forbidding the subject to reveal to any one the name of the suggester or the fact of the suggestion. On the contrary, he was to say and feel that the act was committed of his own accord. This complicated the legal aspect of the question very seriously; but further experiments have shown that the instigator of the crime would not be so entirely safe, after all. M. Jules Liegeois, who has studied most carefully the legal aspects of hypnotism, suggested to a lady subject that she take a pistol and shoot a certain Mr. O. She acted out the suggestion perfectly, not knowing that the load was a blank cartridge. When again hypnotized, she admitted the crime and defended her action. Another gentleman now gave her the suggestions (1) that when the instigator of the crime enters the room she should go to sleep for two minutes; (2) on awakening, she should fix her eyes upon the man constantly until allowed to desist; (3) she should then stand in front of him and attempt to conceal him. When M. Liegeois entered the room, she fell asleep, and did all that was asked of her, thus revealing the instigator, tho told by him not to do so. Professor Bernheim induced a subject to steal, and forbade him to mention that he had been told to do it. The patient said he stole because the idea occurred to him, but, when told to go up to the true criminal and say, “Please sing me the ‘Marseillaise,’” he did so. It seems, then, that the subject will do nothing that he has been categorically forbidden to do, but that he will succumb to an indirect mode of revealing the true instigator of the crime. This certainly aids the courts, but it is a question how far it will be of service when the true criminal is not present, and whether additional suggestions in the first instance will not considerably interfere with the reliability of later testimony. Its further development will be watched with great interest by all students of the scientific aspects of mental phenomena.--_Science._
Cynthia didn't know it, but she had just confronted the woman the news media nicknamed "the nun from hell."
"Do you want to take me on? Come on, I'm ready," invited Sister Connie Driscoll, a tough 67-year-old with a black patch over one eye. But Cynthia, a prostitute and drug addict, took a second look at her steely-faced opponent and realized she'd met her match. Reluctantly, she agreed to obey the strict rules of the homeless shelter Sister Connie runs.
Cynthia eventually found employment as a restaurant cook -- work that allowed her to pay the rent on her own apartment and support her children. The success of people like this in turning their lives around is one of the best reasons I know why private faith-based efforts work, and why government handouts fail.
Sister Connie opened the St. Martin de Porres House of Hope for women eighteen years ago in a tough South Side neighborhood in Chicago. But Sister Connie, who has dodged bullets in the course of her work, is even tougher. And her shelter is, as the nun bluntly puts it, not a place where homeless women are coddled.
Residents must accept a strict regimen that includes rising at 6:30 A.M. Mothers must clean their children and their rooms before breakfast. Classes in parenting and life skills are mandatory. So are the daily twelve-step programs for substance abusers. Those without a high school diploma have to work toward one. And if Sister Connie suspects residents are hiding drugs, she's not above calling in a SWAT team to bust her own shelter.
It's tough love with a vengeance -- and it works. Since 1982, more than 10,000 women have passed through the shelter, and thanks to Sister Connie's tough-love approach, 95 percent of them leave the shelter system -- and welfare -- for good. That's a far higher success rate than government-funded shelters can promise.
Sister Connie's secret, of course, is the moral demands she adds to the assistance she gives. The secret is the Gospel. The most common cause of homelessness, she believes, is lack of personal responsibility. With government assistance, her clients almost always receive enough money to pay their rent; unfortunately, they don't use it for that. Instead, according to Sister Connie, the money often disappears up their noses -- in the form of crack cocaine.
By contrast, Sister Connie's approach meets the biblical definition of compassion: that is, to suffer along with the homeless. It means getting personally involved with people who truly need help. That's something no government check can ever do.
If assistance is to make a long-term difference, it has to come with moral strings attached. It involves making people learn how to behave responsibly. That's what Sister Connie demands of everyone who walks through her doors.
There's been plenty of criticism of the President's proposal for faith-based solutions lately. But if your neighbors question the need for these initiatives, tell them about the "nun from hell," who chews up drug addicts for lunch -- and then sends them out with job skills and dignity.
We need to help people understand that the best way to solve entrenched social problems is to offer what Sister Connie offers: compassion -- and a sense of moral responsibility.
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Copyright © 2001 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. 'BreakPoint with Chuck Colson' is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.
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The subversion of moral responsibility is one of the most significant developments of recent decades. Though this subversion was originally philosophical, more recent efforts have been based in biology and psychology. Various theorists have argued that our decisions and actions are determined by genetics, environmental factors, or other forces. Now, SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN is out with a report on a study linking determinism and moral responsibility.
The diverse theories of determinism propose that our choices and decisions are not an exercise of the will, but simply the inevitable outcome of factors outside our control. As SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN explains, determinists argue that “everything that happens is determined by what happened before -- our actions are inevitable consequences of the events leading up to the action.”
In other words, free will doesn’t exist. Used in this sense, free will means the exercise of authentic moral choice and agency. We CHOOSE to take one action rather than the other, and must then take responsibility for that choice.
This link between moral choice and moral responsibility is virtually instinctive to humans. As a matter of fact, it is basic to our understanding of what it means to be human. We hold each other responsible for actions and choices. But if all of our choices are illusory -- and everything is merely the “inevitable consequence” of something beyond our control, moral responsibility is an exercise in delusion.
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN reports on a study performed by psychologists Kathleen Vohs and Jonathan Schooler. The psychologists found that individuals who were told that their moral choices were determined, rather than free, were also more likely to cheat on an experimental examination.
As Shaun Nichols reports:
The Western conception idea of free will seems bound up with our
sense of moral responsibility, guilt for misdeads and pride in
accomplishment. We hold ourselves responsible precisely when we
think that our actions come from free will. In this light, it’s
not surprising that people behave less morally as they become
skeptical of free will. Further, the Vohs and Schooler result
fits with the idea that people will behave less responsibly if
they regard their actions as beyond their control. If I think
that there’s no point in trying to be good, then I’m less likely
to try.
Even if giving up on free will does have these deleterious
effects, one might wonder how far they go. One question is
whether the effects extend across the moral domain. Cheating in
a psychology experiment doesn’t seem too terrible. Presumably
the experiment didn’t also lead to a rash of criminal activity
among those who read the anti-free will passage. Our moral
revulsion at killing and hurting others is likely too strong to
be dismantled by reflections about determinism. It might well
turn out that other kinds of immoral behavior, like cheating in
school, would be affected by the rejection of free will, however.
There are limitations to this kind of research, of course, but the report is both revealing and unsurprising. If we are not responsible for our actions, they why would people do the right thing? The most immediate result of such thinking is the subversion of moral accountability.
Of course, this pattern of thought also renders human existence irrational. How can we understand ourselves, our children, our spouses, our friends, or our neighbors if moral responsibility is undermined by determinism. Our legal system would completely collapse, as would the entire experience of relating to other human beings.
Shaun Nichols explains that “the Western conception of free will seems bound up with our sense of moral responsibility.” That “Western conception” is a product of the Christian inheritance and the biblical worldview. The Bible clearly presents human beings as morally responsible. Christians of virtually all theological traditions -- including Reformed theology, Arminianism, and Catholicism -- affirm moral and spiritual responsibility and the authenticity of the experience of choice.
As a matter of fact, this capacity and accountability is rooted in the biblical concept of the IMAGO DEI -- the image of God. Our Creator made us as moral creatures and planted within us the capacity of conscience. All this refutes the concept of moral determinism.
In its most modern forms, determinism is a product of naturalism -- the belief that everything must be explained in purely natural terms. Naturalism explains the human mind (including the experience of moral choice) as a matter of chemical reactions in the brain, and nothing more.
Determinism is implied by naturalism and relieves human beings of moral responsibility. There is no moral revolt against the Creator, no Fall, and no need for the Gospel. This subversion of moral responsibility is both a delusion and a trap. And, as the SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN report indicates, even those who say they believe in moral determinism are unable to live consistently with this assumption. We KNOW we are responsible.
John Seabrook of the New Yorker magazine wrote an in-depth article about Dr. Kent Kiehl’s research into psychopathy titled SUFFERING SOULS.[1] As part of his work with the Mind Research Network, Dr. Kiehl is using a portable fMRI machine to image the brains of hundreds of prison inmates and juvenile delinquents. The work is impressive and illuminating, but prone to Overclaim Syndrome as is evident near the end of the article:
Psychopathy also raises fundamental issues about justice. At the
core of our judicial system is the assumption that someone who
appears sane is culpable for his actions. (In the U.S., there is
no insanity defense for psychopaths.) As Jean Decety, of the
University of Chicago, put it to me, “We still basically work out
of a Biblical system of punishment — we don’t consider, in most
cases, to what extent the offender’s actions were intentional or
unintentional.[*] But what neuroscience is showing us is that a
great many crimes are committed out of compulsion — the offenders
couldn’t help it. Once that is clear, and science proves it,
what will the justice system do?” Joseph Newman told me, “I go
around and give speeches to the staff in prisons, saying the
inmates are not just [jerks], and afterwards the guards come up
and say, ‘Enjoyed your talk, Doc, but are you saying these guys
aren’t responsible for their crimes?’”
Besides the fact that MENS REA is very much part of American criminal law [it is the Latin term for "guilty mind" and signifies that a criminal must be aware that they did something wrong, and intended to do so, in order to be held responsible], there exist at least two problems with this sort of conclusion. First, despite the weight of neuroscience showing abnormalities in the brains of psychopaths, the theory that psychopaths have UNCONTROLLABLE impulses remains unproven. This is no small matter as controllable impulses are writ large in human nature.
Second, what matters for the law is not whether the brain is compromised but whether such impairments are so substantial that they deprive one of the ability to know their behavior was wrongful at the time of the alleged crime. Predisposition for behavior - which is what the hard line biological psychopathy crowd is asserting - is not sufficient to reduce culpability - and for good reason. We are all predisposed genetically towards behaviors. And some people, unfortunately, suffer worse biological deficits than others. But legal culpability is grounded in a social heritage which sets the exculpating bar high under the assumption that everyone brings liabilities to the responsibility table.
Our society has determined that outside severe deficits in rationality, one is expected to conform their behavior according to the law irrespective of their biological imperfections.
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1. New Yorker magazine, November 10, 2008, page 64.
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* However, the Bible itself does consider the intentionality of a crime. The Old Testament makes clear that killing out of malice is a crime, but killing by accident is not. See Exodus 21:12-13 and Numbers 35:20-25.
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