Wednesday, July 15, 2009

There must be limits to moral generosity

CSU FEE HIKES

Gary Robbins at the Reg’s College Life blog informs us that CSU student fees are liable to go up again:
Barely two months after it increased students fees by 10 percent, the California State University system is considering raising fees by about 20 percent to help California balance a budget deficit projected at $26 billion.

May’s 10 percent increase raised fees for full-time undergraduates by about $306. The roughly 20 percent increase would add another $672 to student bills, says Claudia Keith, a spokeswoman for the CSU, which has about 450,000 students. The university system says a full-time undergrad would pay about $4,962 — or more than $1,200 than a year ago — if the second fee increase is imposed.

The CSU must save $584 million for the 2009-10 academic year. The new fees will cover part of it. But the system is in the process of arranging to have all of its employees take two unpaid furlough days per month to save millions more….

• OLBERMANN PUTS DRAKE ON SHIT LIST:

Local pastor Wiley Drake named 'World's Worst Person' (OC Register)
...Southern Baptist Pastor Wiley Drake is certainly one of Buena Park's most famous denizens.

Cable channel MSNBC host Keith Olbermann gave Drake more exposure this week when he named Drake the "World's Worst Person." In video aired on the station on Monday, Olbermann's cited Drake's admission that he prays for the death of President Barack Obama as his basis for the selection.

Drake, who had not heard about the broadcast before phone calls from reporters, laughed when he heard about the "honor." ¶ "At least I'm No. 1. He could've hurt my feelings and made me No. 3.," Drake said.

According to the Reg, Drake says that it is his duty to make these dark prayers, cuz Psalm 109 “asks for punishment for evildoers.”

WHAT THE PSALM SAYS. Here’s the King James Bible version of Psalm 109 [edited for length]:
Hold not thy peace, O God of my praise;
For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful … they have spoken against me with a lying tongue.
They compassed me about also with words of hatred; and fought against me without a cause.

Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand.
When he shall be judged, let him be condemned: and let his prayer become sin.
Let his days be few; and let another take his office.
Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour.
Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children.

Let this be the reward of mine adversaries from the Lord, and of them that speak evil against my soul.

For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me.

Help me, O Lord my God: O save me according to thy mercy:
That they may know that this is thy hand; that thou, Lord, hast done it.

Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as with a mantle.
I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth; yea, I will praise him among the multitude.
For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor, to save him from those that condemn his soul.

THE PSALMIST'S "IMMORALITY"

Now, I’m not one of those people who thinks that humans have an innate sense of justice or morality that is true and correct. Such people (some of them anyway) will no doubt condemn the writer of this Psalm for his violations of the True Innate Morality.

I have no interest in condemning our psalmist. No doubt, in offering this psalm, he does not violate his world's morality, which, of course, is not mine. Nor is it yours. Nor is it Drake’s, I hope.

For that morality is repellant to us. The psalmist asks the Lord to torment, not just his enemy, but the wife and children of his enemy. For instance, he asks the Lord to arrange for these children to become beggars. He asks that the Lord show no mercy toward them.

Admirable, eh?

Our psalmist seems to be asking that God grant what nowadays is called a revenge fantasy. This particular fantasy goes beyond the torment of the psalmist’s enemy, for he asks that the torment of his enemy by understood by all as the Lord’s work.

Excellent fellow!

I especially like the last part. The psalmist seems to be saying: “Lord, do this thing for me and I’ll praise you bigtime.”

If we were to view our lives and values carefully and systematically, I do think that we would identify a (more or less) shared morality. Owing to historical accident, it is, of course, a kind of Judeo-Christian morality that reflects our time and place. It is a shared set of values and ideals that yields such phenomena as my admiring the honesty and integrity of my former father-in-law, Floyd. He is a Montana cattle rancher who is also a Christian and a staunch Republican.

Despite our obvious differences, I can do no other than to regard this fellow as a good and admirable man.

According to our shared morality (yes, dear reader, I'm referring to you and me and the morality we share), it is unseemly to seek an enemy's revenge, and it is especially discreditable to desire or seek the misfortune of his or her loved ones and descendents (and ancestors!).

Further, according to that morality, it is wrong to attempt to bribe a moral superior (e.g., one’s beloved wise grandmother or, say, the Lord).

And surely, among such moralists, it would be strange to suppose that our moral superior would be motivated to assist someone by the prospect of public praise!

Hey, I've been around. So I say this: I would not be surprised if, owing to some odd circumstance, I might encounter Mr. Drake (a few occasional conversations at the Buena Park IHOP) and this would yield a complex admiration of him, too. For it is at least conceivable to me that in much of his life, he is like my former father-in-law: good, honest, just, etc.

But then there’s his church and all that noise about praying for the President’s death.

There must be limits to moral generosity.

Sorry Wiley. You're not in Floyd's league.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, we are in a democracy until Mr. Drake and like minded folks create the new "City on the HIll" theocracy.

Bohrstein said...

I'm glad Drake is asking God (someone/something who/which he probably feels inferior to) to make the call instead of doing it himself. It's sort of like the Christian version of appealing to authority.

Though, the psalm is a bit of a tattle.

Roy's obituary in LA Times and Register: "we were lucky to have you while we did"

  This ran in the Sunday December 24, 2023 edition of the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register : July 14, 1955 - November 20, 2...