New York City, N.Y., Jan 30, 2018 / 05:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A Hungarian cardinal has said that free societies must depend on the wisdom of religion to address the moral and social problems of the modern world.
Cardinal Peter Erdo, Archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest, delivered the Bampton Lecture at Columbia University on Monday, Jan. 29.
Addressing Columbia students and faculty, Erdo warned about the dangers of moral relativism, and discussed the necessity of the Church in a secular state.
The cardinal said that relativism— the inability to declare something as objectively right or objectively wrong—is a “grave crisis” of modern secular states. Without a foundation in natural law, he argued, societies become unstable, and moral evil becomes permissible.
“It is difficult for the state to decide what is good for man,” said Erdo, without some foundation in natural law and a religious worldview. Absent natural law and “by a weakening of belief in the rationality of the world,” societies lose trust in democratic institutions.
”Even the majority can end up with wrong or harmful decisions, especially if the concept of the common good becomes uncertain, because there is no consensus even on the anthropological foundations of law,” explained the cardinal.
Erdo said that until the philosophical Enlightenment, societies were effectively governed with an understanding that moral law was based on transcendent realities.
“Law, morals and religion prove to form an organic whole, which is characteristic of Western society right up to the age of Enlightenment,” Erdo said.
But in the modern era, relativism has separated legal norms from the natural law, he said. “The idea of relativity and the unknowability of the natural law, or the rules of upright human behavior based on its connexion with nature, gains ground, as also does the separation of law from so-called natural morals.”
Due to the rise of relativism, the relationship between religion, the state, and a person’s worldview became “a problem.”
The separation of morality from law has led to the creation of immoral laws, such as the ones that existed in Nazi Germany, said Cardinal Erdo.
“The trials of Nuremberg showed where the separation of law and morals can lead. It was not easy to convict people whose actions were based on current, but immoral laws.”
The cardinal said that in the era of the Soviet Union, religion and morals were, in theory, replaced by Marxist-Leninist ideology. When the ideology fell, a “moral vacuum” was formed. Seeing this, leaders of formerly communist countries began trying to recreate a religious and moral framework for society, and are not bothered with “relativist ideologies.”
He mentioned that many former communist countries countries specifically mentioned the importance of religion in their new constitutions. For instance, Erdo’s home country of Hungary explicitly recognizes “churches, denominations and religious communities […] are entities of prominent importance, capable of creating values and communities.”
The cardinal noted that in the West, humanity is witness a “shaking of the anthropological foundations of democracy.”
“Western democracies presume that politicians and parties present and defend their political programs on a rational basis and that mature and responsible citizens make their choices and elect people using rational arguments,” he said.
“Today, this sounds like a utopia…the picture of reality has become very complicated.”
“There has to be a lot of trust for someone to believe the basic premises of a political program, so that the elected body, based on a democratic majority, can count on the trust of that society. It seems to be a vicious circle. We have to place our trust in somebody in anticipation, in order to let such a decision pass, in which we can trust,” he added.
Erdo expressed concern about the effect that scientific advances will have on human rights without a religious moral framework regulating society. He said that technological advances are moving quicker than legal morality can keep up, and that this is a new challenge humanity will be facing.
“But the discoveries open new levels of reality, so the description of facts needed for moral evaluation and legal treatment are falling behind,” he said.
Despite this, Erdo believes that humans “cannot grow weary” of maintaining “basic moral values,” and that these need to be applied to new situations as well.
Erdo said that the West’s Judeo-Christian heritage is centered on a belief in a benevolent God, and the hope that a Creator seeks to communicate with humanity. That communication drives trust.
“And this, beyond giving a basic moral point of view, gives something extra, which is even more important. It generates trust both in the individual and in the community,” said the cardinal.
“It generates trust that even though our cognitive abilities cannot keep up with the fullness of reality, we can always somehow reach the necessary knowledge and cognitions…the weakness of our recognition is not a reason to give up our pursuit of the truth.”
The Bampton Lectures in America were created in 1948, and feature talks from theologians, scientists, and artists.
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Honor to this President for standing up for Palestinian rights and for warning our nation against the inordinate influence of Israel.
May God grant salvation to President Jimmy Carter.
Yes, let’s pray for his soul. But let’s not forget that Carter—in addition to being pro-abortion, pro-“gay marriage”, and slanderous towards pro-lifers—praised Castro and Cuba, China, Tito (“a man who believes in human rights”), Kim Il Sung, Yasser Arafat, and the PLO, Mengistu, Cédras, Assad, and Hamas. Jimmy was most inept (whereas Joe is mostly corrupt), but he was also a sanctimonious embarrassment far more often than his hagiographers (that is, the legacy media) will ever admit. For more, see my July 2009 post at Insight Scoop.
Upon Carter’s election, the astute and long-time Singapore President Lee Qwan Yew wrote (of world leaders) in his own autobiography, “we knew we would just have to put up with him for four years.”
And, on the domestic scene, we recall that it was President Carter who gave us the cabinet-level position U.S. Department of Education, surely as a reward to the teachers’ unions that helped him get elected (formed on May 4, 1980, as a result of the Department of Education Organization Act–Public Law 96-88–of October 1979; President Jimmy Carter signed the bill into law.) The gift that keeps on giving.
Educationally speaking, Shakespeare gives us a clue: “The fault is not in our ‘stars,’ but in ourselves” (“Julius Caesar”). That is, the fault is not in those who are elected but in those who elect them. The corporate Peter Principle transferred to the gummint.
Yes, the establishment of the Department of Education was foolish. Yet, who kept it going, despite, as I recall, promises to the contrary? Oh, yeah, his successor, that “great conservative” Ronald Reagan.
Bravo! Sick to death of the hagiographies popping up everywhere.
Not that Pres. Carter endorsed this policy, but something to keep in mind from the late, great Huey Long:
“I don’t know much about Hitler. Except that last thing, about the Jews. There has never been a country that put its heel down on the Jews that ever lived afterwards.”
— Huey Long
For all his faults, Huey had some wise insights. May he & Jimmy Carter rest in peace.
Palestine must earn nationhood. Terrorism must never be rewarded. For over three quarters of a century, the only thing that Palestinians have excelled in is their ability to inflict incalculable suffering on a global scale, not only on others, but also on themselves.
It will only be by a direct intervention from God Himself that the hearts and minds of radical Islam will be converted.
It is for this we must pray.
Aside from rationalizing numerous acts of Islamic terrorism, possibly to downplay and make his years of cowardice not seem so bad while president, the post-president, “great humanitarian,” Carter met with leaders of the terrorist group Hamas. He embraced Nasser al-Shaer, the man who ran the Palestinian education system, brainwashing children into believing Jews are the descendants of pigs and dogs. He laid a wreath at the grave of Yasser Arafat, the most notorious terrorist thug of the 20th century.
Oh I forgot. Francis seems to indicate the Islamic world can’t do much that is morally wrong. He once reminded us that beheading children was the equivalent of domestic abuse, which he assumed was done by Catholic men since he read it in an Italian newspaper.
Freemasons defend the reputation of fellow members. Not suggesting that is what Bergoglio is doing at all, what so ever.
Thanks for your counter-witness, Carl. I confess my (naive) views of Carter have hitherto been based on the so-called mainstream media.
If Carter was mainly inept, what does that make Francis with his (supposed) assessment of him?
I volunteered in Jimmy Carter’s campaign & he was the first president I ever voted for . (And the last Democrat.) He really was a decent & faithful man in many ways but a very incompetent president.
In the beginning we believed he was a solid Christian believer but over time he veered off in some strange directions. God rest his soul.
Good question. I think there are a few factors involved. First, Pope Francis had to say something nice; it would be uncharitable to do otherwise. Secondly, Francis (I’m guessing) knows very little about Carter’s faith, life, policies, etc. Some of that is to be expected, as the Pope isn’t supposed to be an expert on all previous and current world leaders. But, thirdly, his remarks (praising “the deep faith” of Carter) just follow the standard, mainstream line, which is par for this pope and his inner circle. Fourth, I think that Francis is so keen on politics and political gestures that he probably believes Carter was a good president of deep faith. After all, that’s what the media legacy is trying to feed us here, even though the record says otherwise. Fifth, I think both men, in real ways, are 1970s liberals who have “evolved” on certain stances. Carter (as noted already) ended up embracing a hazy form of liberal Protestantism—or, better, of Protestantized liberalism—and jettisoned core moral beliefs, which in turn meant dismissing any sort of traditional, biblical Christian anthropology.
The bottom line, for me, is that Carter was mostly a disaster as POTUS and while he did some good things afterwards, he was a pro-tyrannical, pro-abortion, pro-“gay marriage”, post-1970s liberal whose Christianity was thin at best.
Carter’s was a failed presidency and American voters rejected him and his policies. I find it amusing and laughable how the leftists (inclusing Bergoglio) are tripping over themselves to canonize this man. Some of us are not fooled by the posturing. The guy was book smart but had the leadership skills of an idiot.
Carter was not a good President. I voted against him twice. He let the Iranian Shiite fanatics push him around, that said, he did become a decent ex President with the Habitat for Humanity business. I recall seeing a picture of him years ago, after he left the White House, wearing a tool belt and hammering nails at a construction site. I thought that was nice that he found some task that he can accomplish.
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Agreed on his presidency. It was, overall, a train wreck. Carter was a nice guy, and that meant that he did some nice and good things. But “nice” isn’t the same as principled or strong, and Carter (in my estimation) was neither of those.
Jimmy Carter’s single greatest accomplishment was in giving the United States of America eight years of Reagan.
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I took your recommendation, Carl, and read your 2009 article. I believe I am now sufficiently inocculated against the current media and papal hagiography.
I do think Habitat for Humanity does good work.
Respectful farewell to Jimmy Carter. RIP.