Ethics and Morality

Morality is knowing right from wrong.
As put forward by the Definition of Morality, by the Oxford Dictionary on line, "Morality" -mass noun - principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behaviour"
- count now - " particular system of values and principles of conduct of a bourgeois morality"
- "the extent to which an action is right or wrong.

Bill Cosby, the great American comedian did a particularly funny sketch about a couple of cavemen eating bushes. One day these vegetarians decide to eat meat. Bill Cosby has them starting by trying to eat a saber tooth tiger. This begins the long search of 'trial and error' that has lead to the 'morality' of our cuisine today.

"thou shalt not kill" or as the Evolution of God writer said, given the understanding of the day, "thou shalt not kill Jews or members of your tribe." At the other end of the spectrum is the great African Christian physician Albert Schweitzer who took this to mean thou shalt not kill living creatures until he understood that even as he stepped in the woods he was killing countless bacteria and other beings of the microscopic world.

Society collectively espouses a morality, the laws of the land decided by the parliaments and congresses as practiced by the courts of the day and undertaken by the police and citizens of a community. Individual morality may be that of my Baptist Aunt, once executive assistant to Canada's ambassador in Washington during WWII. She said she never thought you should say bad about another. And frankly I and the family would be hard pressed to cite an example of her doing this which she called 'back talk' and saw as a grave sin of the very first order. Trungpa, the great Buddhist philosopher said that North Americans had great difficulty with 'systems' of 'law' and 'conduct' as they were forever treating all collections of laws, including spiritual laws, as a smorgasboard where one picked or chose.

90% of the world's lawyers are congregated in North America and at the core of the Christian religion Jesus is seen as an advocate. In the rest of the world by contrast a person speeding pays a penalty when caught. It is not open to dispute. There is no court of appeal where lawyers can get a person 'off' yet another drunken and driving charge. There is a law and the mitigating circumstances are few. Of course laws can be broken especially by the powerful but the charade of the legal proceedings is to a large extent circumnavigated and costly child's play. Judges take bribes of course but they do that in North America as well. The laws are more etched in stone perhaps than written in sand on a beach at low tide.

Ethics, for contrast and comparison is defined by the Oxford Dictionary as
1. " moral principles that govern a person's behaviour or the conducting of an activity" eg 'medical ethics also enter into the question'
2. "the branch of knowledge that deals with moral principles" eg 'neither metaphysics nor ethics is the home of religion'

It seems hard to consider a person having morally correct behaviour without at the same time being ethically correct. However, this is the present day problem of wearing many hats in a rapidly transforming society. In a person's personal life they may have a high standard of morality and yet feel compelled to work in a government position where there is a low standard of ethical conduct. Sober, non drinking and non drug using, pro life physicians had the misfortune of practicing in a community where the majority of their colleagues had serious problems with addiction and ascribed to a pro abortion stance. Having taken a Hippocratic oath these physicians were faced with increasing encouragement to include euthanasia as part of their practice, covertly rather than overtly. Much of the dialogue was derailed from the matter of 'ethics and morality' to 'budgetary constraints while the administration in these communities were "fat cats" and personally saw 'altruism' as evidence of weakness and immaturity.

Where religion and ethics were closely bound throughout history, morality was internalized as part of this quasi religious background. In Communist Regimes, the first and most prevalent of the 'areligious' and 'aetheistic' political systems, mass murder on a scale grander than ever known throughout history, beyond any religious based killings through out time, more individuals killed by Communist Russia, Communist China and the Pol Pot than killed in the history of all religious wars in a matter of decades.

This 'failed experiment' continues to plague society globally. In contrast Western worlds did not deny religion by according to Jeffersonian principles separated religion from state. However this was before "multi culturalism" and "culture" contains elements of relgion as central to the morality and ethics of the individuals who share in this experience. That said, 'multiculturalism' has only known a few decades of 'trial' and the leading countries of the western world who espouced it as an ethical principle have rejected it because of it's failure. It remains smouldering but has given rise to the realization that a 'culture of religion' is comparable to a 'culture of secularism.'

This idea is explored in the New York Times Bestseller novel "American Gods" by Neil Gaiman. He creates a combat scenario between the old gods of the old religions carried over by American immigrants to the new lands from all their original destinations with the new 'gods of america' which he describes as the 'television' , 'casino' , 'mall' , 'radio' , etc. He sees us praying to these and imbuing the ideas of them into mythical possibilities with powers and magic.

Indeed today it's recognised that Americans, though political, are not particularly well educated as a group in sciences or mathematics.

In Celtic Religion the morality derives from the earth sciences and the spiritual insights and cultural traditions. It is a mind, body soul religion that encompassed the whole individual and demanded a scientific approach to matters of traditionally considered religion.

It is morally and ethically celebrated today by the quantum physicists who saw that at the 'nano' world of 'cosmic uncertainty' religion and secular belief overlapped. In this regard the new ideas of science suggest the nano reality, the quantum phenomena seen previously at the edges of reality indeed shape the reality.

Deconstructionism before it was deconstructed as merely negative criticism of the Occam's Razor sort did make mockery of all western morality and ethical pretention. It was to some exent merely bourgeoisie but lingers in the desire many of the leaders have for the golden era of leadership 'pre magna carta'. Then there was a two tier moral and ethical system, one for the masses and another for the leaders.

Out of this came the notion that 'power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely".




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My Relationship with God today

My God is everything and nothing.  I believe in a Creator who made the heavens and the earth.  There was no Creator and building blocks.  So today there is just God stuff. The Bible says I am made in the 'image' of God.  Genesis 1:27 "So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them."
"Image" to me is the 'imagination' of God. Dr. Carl Ridd taught me this in my first theological class at University of Winnipeg, "Literature of the Bible."  I never forgot that insight.
I am by nature God stuff and God dream.  It's good to remember in a hierarchal world where authorities are forever belittling, humiliating and dominating you to secure their own position and priviledge. In the eyes of God we are equal because there is no less and no more than God.
Science tells me that E=MC2.  Energy and matter are one, matter just slow energy in reality.  My sense of the duality of self is that of thought which is like energy and body which is like matter.  I believe that duality is a product of my mind which divides the indivisible.  I am a spiritual being living in a material world.
I further believe that I am like the orobunga (?spelling - the snake eatings it's tail).  The story goes that God being lonely divided itself creating the first duality.  In this God who knows himself as God is half and God who doesn't know himself as God is half.  So the journey is from God unknowing to Knowing God.  This is spiritual evolution.  There is no need for this 'progress'.  Indeed much of our sense of the spirituality is 'arbitrary' and based on the learning of childhood and culture.
What I know further is only this time for yesterday is gone and mere memory while tomorrow is yet to come.  All divisions are intrinsic or arbitrary.
I live in this flow.  God is a good word for the stream in which I'm becoming more aware of my liquidity one might say.  There are countless images of the transformation of self.
When I studied chemistry in the lab I enjoyed the process of changing solid to liguid to vapour and back again. I like that rain becomes cloud becomes rain.
It gives me hope for my own transformation.  I feel mostly forgetful of Godness.  I live in a secular limitted gravity dominated world with expectation of death among those who insist that everything is heavy and there is but death and taxes.
What I want is to soar free, levitate and dream manifestations.  My friend wants to pray a person alive or restore their lost limbs. I confess I'd settle for the capacity to manifest a porche. I am amused at my own materialism and the fear that underlies all such consumerism.  Trungpa, the great Buddist spiritual teacher describes the modern westerner as a 'spiritual consumer'.  I would hope that I could be more.
In the Christian sense this is 'disciple ship'.  The essence of 'black magic' versus the 'white magic' of Wiccans is that the 'ego' of the dark megalomaniac master is trying to make things go their way whereas the white witches work with the forces of creation and are trying to 'right' matters in the best interest of others. The Christian message, I think, goes even further.  Jesus was the  'servant king'. A great parable and image from the Bible is of God Incarnate washing the feet of his human disciples.
Bob Dylan sings that great spiritual song, "You've got to serve someone, maybe the devil or it may be the Lord, but you have to serve someone."
Dr. Willi Gutowski in his recent ebook at Amazon, called Living Life, says that we are all listening to a spiritual radio and have to learn to keep ourselves tuned to the God channel.
In the meantime I muddle along.
God is a kind of central office parental relational thing.  I pray and talk with God and thank God and try to remember God and life is better. It seems that way. Certainly there is extensive research to support the benefits of spiritual life.  Less pain, less fear, better mental and physical health and all statistically significant.
I am always asking for guidance. I think there's a better way.  I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe God became human and resurrected. That like chemistry is a message about my nature and my eventual return to Godstuff.  Death then is a passage.  But it may be a loss of ego.   I believe also the Bible is a Holy Book that can guide me on this journey in life.  Days also go better when I consult this regularly.  I've read it cover to cover several times but daily make a point of reading some passage and reflecting on it.  I learned this as a child and lost it sometime as an adult. I was glad to return to the practice.  There's no 'resting on one's laurels' in the spiritual life. I have to take care of my spiritual health on a daily basis just as I do my physical and dental health.  If I don't I'm that fat old  man with poor teeth talking about his last football game in high school.
The Yogi sings "I am the bubble , make me the sea'. In Hinduism there's much talk of the separation of self from the whole and the isolation of the ego. Hindu's don't see Jesus as the son of God but see him as an enlightened one as with Buddha.  His teachings are ranked high in India along with their own home grown truth.  Jews recognise Jesus as one of their own but don't see him as the messiah. He's ranked as best as a great prophet.  I loved studying at Regent College where despite the ecumenicalism of the day I heard it very distinctly taught , "The Jews are wrong" when it comes to Jesus.  No doubt in a Jewish school they same the same thing about Christians.  It's easy to forget that Moslems have been influenced by Judaism and Christianity.  The 'twist' they take on Christianity is 'wrong' in my mind but I think the Suffis have alot in common with the mystical traditions in Christianity. The great Catholic monk, Thomas Merton who studied with the Buddhists saw the similiarities.
Ecumenicalism is searching for similiarities. The fact is Adolf Hitler and Mother Theresa were 99.9% similiar according to DNA and genetic mapping. There is difference in the detail.  So while one must keep an open mind, hopefully it won't be so open that one's brains fall out.
The Christian mystic longs to  experience God more fully.  There's that sense of 'grokking God' which was Heinlein's word for the mystical ineffable union.  The Medieval called this also the 'cloud of unknowing'. I have a connection but it's often vague whereas sometimes it's crystal clear and absolute. I don't know why or what makes for the maintenance of that state of knowing the sacred so directly so that it 'works' all the time.  I have to be present, that's for sure. There's much that can be done.  Certainly prayer and meditation, reading spiritual works, studying the Holy Bible, sharing in spiritual practices, becoming a regular attender and follower of a spiritual tradition. It's too easy for one to consider spirituality as a 'smorgasbord' which may be fine at first but as one progresses in their spiritual life there is room for greater selection.

Personally,   I'm too often too mundane for my own liking.

So God fill me with your awareness. Guide me today and always. Thy will be done.