"Unthinkable"

[windlessuser]

I’ve recently watched this movie. For those who haven’t seen it, you can view the synopsis here. The movie really got me asking myself some questions, re my personal values. I know that the church says that the ends never justifies the means, However, the though of letting millions die for sake of one man just doesn’t sit right with me… What are your thoughts?

 

[St_Francis]

It was really hard for me to “get” that death is not an evil, and that God would prefer all of us to die to keep a mortal sin from being committed. We tend to think of it the other way around, but remember that mortal sin is an eternal “death,” and physical death is merely a passing over into the supernatural life.

I was not raised Catholic, so my head was just filled with secular ideas and ways of looking at things; it is hard to weed them out… this was a tough one for me to understand.

 

[John21652]

I’ve recently watched this movie. For those who haven’t seen it, you can view the synopsis here. The movie really got me asking myself some questions, re my personal values. I know that the church says that the ends never justifies the means, However, the though of letting millions die for sake of one man just doesn’t sit right with me… What are your thoughts?

I have not seen the film, but read the synopsis you linked to. It sounds not only gripping, but very thought provoking.

The Catechism has quite a lot to say about this in The Morality Of Human Acts..

At 1750 it tells us that the morality of human acts depends on:

• the object chosen
• the end in view, or the intention
• the circumstances of the action

“The object, the intention, and the circumstances make up the “sources,” or constitutive elements, of the morality of human acts.”

According to the storyline contained in the synopsis, the terrorist was a dead set fanatic who, under normal circumstances, was never going to divulge the locations of the bombs. He proved he was not willing to save his wife and he showed he was not concerned about his children being made parentless. He even feigned sorrow and remorse. So, one would have to conclude that there was nothing to be lost by attempting to extract the correct information from him by increasingly severe treatment in an attempt to save millions of innocent lives, which made that severe treatment morally right…

 

[windlessuser]

WoW. Thanks for the insight. Let’s pray this situation never arises

 

[Hokomai]

It was really hard for me to “get” that death is not an evil, and that God would prefer all of us to die to keep a mortal sin from being committed. We tend to think of it the other way around, but remember that mortal sin is an eternal “death,” and physical death is merely a passing over into the supernatural life.

I was not raised Catholic, so my head was just filled with secular ideas and ways of looking at things; it is hard to weed them out… this was a tough one for me to understand.

So given that some people who are aborted before birth would go on to sin mortally and thereby deserve hell, why are Catholics so concerned about abortion? While Catholics would consider that abortion is evil, and the end cannot justify the means, from your perspective they should regard the outcome of abortion as good - i.e. fewer people in hell.

 

[windlessuser]

So given that some people who are aborted before birth would go on to sin mortally and thereby deserve hell, why are Catholics so concerned about abortion? While Catholics would consider that abortion is evil, and the end cannot justify the means, from your perspective they should regard the outcome of abortion as good - i.e. fewer people in hell.

That is extremely twisted reasoning. Regardless of the persons future choices, aborting them is intrinsically evil. That’s like saying, that because we are most likely to commit a crime at some point in time, we should all be put in prison!

 

[beehumble]

I’ve recently watched this movie. For those who haven’t seen it, you can view the synopsis here. The movie really got me asking myself some questions, re my personal values. I know that the church says that the ends never justifies the means, However, the though of letting millions die for sake of one man just doesn’t sit right with me… What are your thoughts?

It is just another Hollywood soapbox plot device - this time Hollywood is saying torturing prisoners is of no avail - i.e. alluding to the political hot-potato of waterboarding, in this instance.

Another example of this is Million Dollar Baby, where Eastwood contrives such a hopeless situation that the audience begs for somebody to just kill the lady and put her out of her misery. It is Hollywood on a soapbox for euthanasia.

One simple fail in these soap box pitches is that the situation’s Hollywood sets up are so ridiculously contrived. Torture is to be shown to fail, so in the plot, as much torture as can be imagined by the viewing audience is applied, with the ending the same - a nuclear blast. The audience is supposed to conclude water boarding is useless.

In Million Dollar Baby, everybody who would or should or could give her hope as she lays in the bed - her family, for instance - must be shown to be void of any love for her. All sources of hope for the woman that the audience might perceive are removed by the Hollywood writers, trying to make the viewer conclude that her death is the best, only answer to her situation.

Beware of the Hollywood secular, anti-Catholic soapbox!

God bless you.

 

[Warrenton]

So given that some people who are aborted before birth would go on to sin mortally and thereby deserve hell, why are Catholics so concerned about abortion? While Catholics would consider that abortion is evil, and the end cannot justify the means, from your perspective they should regard the outcome of abortion as good - i.e. fewer people in hell.

Your first proposition is not a given.

All that is given is that people sin. The original state of sin is covered by baptism, and subsequent sins are covered by penance.

Without that given, the rest of the question is easy to resolve.

 

[Hokomai]

That is extremely twisted reasoning. Regardless of the persons future choices, aborting them is intrinsically evil. That’s like saying, that because we are most likely to commit a crime at some point in time, we should all be put in prison!

My point was that this was the reasoning of the OP.

 

[thistle]

I’ve recently watched this movie. For those who haven’t seen it, you can view the synopsis here. The movie really got me asking myself some questions, re my personal values. I know that the church says that the ends never justifies the means, However, the though of letting millions die for sake of one man just doesn’t sit right with me… What are your thoughts?

The end NEVER justifies the means and torture very seldom gets the truth which is the point of the movie. They tortured that guy into telling them where the bomb was but there was another bomb he didn’t tell them about.

 

[St_Francis]

So given that some people who are aborted before birth would go on to sin mortally and thereby deserve hell, why are Catholics so concerned about abortion? While Catholics would consider that abortion is evil, and the end cannot justify the means, from your perspective they should regard the outcome of abortion as good - i.e. fewer people in hell.

We Catholics are not against abortion because someone dies but because someone is killed. You propose that abortion is all right because the future mortal sins of that baby are prevented, but a mortal sin is committed when the baby is killed, which pretty much voids your argument.

 

[Hokomai]

We Catholics are not against abortion because someone dies but because someone is killed. You propose that abortion is all right because the future mortal sins of that baby are prevented, but a mortal sin is committed when the baby is killed, which pretty much voids your argument.

So your view is that God would prefer "all of us to die’ rather than a single mortal sin be committed, but that acting to make God’s preference happen is a bad thing?

 

[chipeto]

So your view is that God would prefer "all of us to die’ rather than a single mortal sin be committed, but that acting to make God’s preference happen is a bad thing?

Some actions are intrinsically evil, and so it is never right to do them. Consequentialism/utilitarianism is right out, for Catholics. Also, we do believe that there are things worth than death.

 

[St_Francis]

So your view is that God would prefer "all of us to die’ rather than a single mortal sin be committed, but that acting to make God’s preference happen is a bad thing?

Depends on whether the action taken is a mortal sin or not. Procured abortion is always intrinsically evil, therefore always an objective mortal sin. To commit a mortal sin to keep some potential future mortal sins from occurring is NOT God’s will, since a mortal sin is committed.