accountability

Most of us recognize that a well-functioning society depends on people doing the right thing even when it goes against what is strictly in their own personal interest. No one practices that perfectly. Some violate it with impunity. And there is profound disagreement as to exactly what is the right thing to do in a given situation.

The greatest source of disagreement has mainly to do with the question of authority. By what authority is right and wrong determined? To what or to whom are we accountable? What are we obligated to do or not do? The most significant fault line is that which runs between those who believe that adhering to traditional morality is what is most important and those who believe that having an eye toward actual consequences is what is most important.

The vast majority of traditional morality is quite sound. It is hard to imagine a society functioning without understandings of right and wrong being passed down from one generation to the next. However, certain appropriations of traditional morality don't make sense in our culturally and religiously pluralistic society.

Being smugly indifferent to actual consequences (and sometimes even seeming to enjoy inflicting pain on other people) clearly reflects a perverse understanding of morality.  Christians who claim to hold to traditional morality would do well to pay attention to what their own tradition says: "Those who say, 'I love God,' and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen." (1 John 4:20 NRSV)

If what this biblical passage is talking about weren't a common tendency that its author believed needed to be fought, it would never have been considered necessary to include it in the Bible. And even though those who are most guilty of it deny their own culpability, it is still a problem today. They say that they "hate the sin, but love the sinner", but their actions speak louder than their words.