Situation Ethics Quotes Flashcards
Morality
Fletcher
“The morality of an action depends on the situation”
Morality
Whitehead
“The simple-minded use of the notions of ‘right and wrong’ is one of the chief obstacles to the process of understanding”
Law
Fletcher
“No casuistry at all may reveal a punishing and sadistic use of law to hurt people instead of helping them”
Antinomianism
Fletcher
“It is literally unprincipled, purely ad hoc and casual. They follow no forecastavble course from one situation to another. They are exactly anarchic i.e. without a rule”
Situation Ethics
Fletcher
“Follows a moral law or violates it according to loves need”
Law
Paul Tilich
“love is the ultimate law”
Antinomianism
James Childress
“Even though Fletcher rejects both, he appears ti fear the tyranny of legalism more than the anarchy of antinomianism”
Agape
Paul Tilich
“The law of love is the ultimate law because it is the negation of law; it is absolute because it concerns everything”
Legalism
Fletcher
“With this approach one enters into every decision making process encumbered with a whole apparatus of prefabricated rules and reguations”
Boss Principle
Fletcher
“This is the radical simplicity of the Gospels ethics, even though ut can lead situationally to the most complicated, head aching, heart breaking calculations and grey rather than black or white decisions”
Virtues
Fletcher
“Augustine was right to make love the source principle, the hinge principle upon which all other ‘virtues’ hang, whether ‘cardinal’ or “theological’”
Agape
Fletcher
“Moral Principles can be cast aside in certain situations if love is best served… and goodwill at work in partnership with reason”
Pragmatism
Fletcher
“In the chair, at the head of the conference table”
Agape
St Paul
“Now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
Love is the only norm
Fletcher
“To love christianity is a matter of attitude, not of feeling. Love is discerning and critical; it is not sentimental”
Relativism
“Situation Ethics relativises the absolute. It does not absolute the relative”
Pragmatism
“Pragmatism is, to be plain spoken, a practical or success posture”
Relativism
Fletcher
“There must be an absolute or norm of some kind if there is to be any true relativity”
Love is not liking
“Love wills the neighbours good whether we like him or not”
‘Love only is always good’
“Only one ‘thing’ is intrinsically good; namely, love: nothing else at all”
Positivism
Fletcher
“The christian does not understand God in terms of love, he understands love in terms of God as seen in Jesus Christ.”
Personalism
“Man was not made for the sabbath, but the sabbath for man”
Teleologicalness of situation ethics
“Unless some purpose or end is in view, to justify or sanctity it, any action we take is literally meaningless”
Love justifies the means
“Only the end justifies the means; nothing else”
Love and Justice are the same
Fletcher
“Justice is the many- sidedness of love”
Love decides there and then
“Loves decisions are made situationally, not prescriptively”
Strengths- Autonomy
Thompson
“It allows individuals to make up their own minds about what is right and wrong in a particular situation”
Strengths- Love is selfless
Tyler and Reid
“Love seeks the well being of others, even if the course of action is not one of preference”
Strengths- Agape is altruistic
Miller
“immorality of morality”
Strengths- Responsibility
Robinson
“The only ethics for the man come of age”
Weaknesses- not easy to determine consequences
Peter Vardy
“It is not easy to determine the consequences of an action and this the situationist need to do”
Religious Compatibility-Jesus had a relativist approach
Jeo Jenkins
“Situation Ethics appears to be more in line with Jesus’ teachings whereby love is more important that law”
Weaknesses-Nothing is intriniscally good or bad
Barclay
“The right and wrong are no so easy eliminated”
Weaknesses- Agape is subjective
Bowie
” How can individuals safely decide what is the most loving action”
Weaknesses- Selfish Intentions
Peter Vardy
“There is a danger of selfishness creeping in under the banner of ‘love’ “
Religious Incompatibility- Other qualities
St Paul
“The fruit of spirit id love, joy, peace, patience”
Religious Incompatibility_Jesus broke religious conventions not moral laws
Patrick Clarke
“At no time did Jesus set aside a significiant moral law, such as those contained in the Decalogue, un order to help someone”
Religious Incompatibility- Excuse
Pope Pius XII
“an individualistic and subjective appeal to concrete circumstances of actions to justify decisions in opposition to the natural law of Gods revealed will”
Religious Incompatibility- reject relativist approach
Pope
“We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism whcih does not recognise anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal ones ego anf ones own desires”
Religious Incompatibility-Obey the law of the land
Matthew
“Everyone must submit jimself to the governing authorities”
Religious Compatibility-Tolerance for others
Barclays
“We do well, still to remember that they are laws which we break at our own peril”
