What IS good, and how do we determine it?

[Catholic_Lady]

The isolated act of pushing a knife into someone? No. :-)

Because as someone pointed out, it could be a medical procedure to save/improve the life of another person.

Thanks for addressing the question, even if the punchline was a bit premature. The fact that you felt the need to add a qualifier tells me that, as with the murder thing, you do recognise that there are actions which are context-driven - hence, relative.

You are correct. There are actions that are context driven. The knife thing is one of them. That is definitely relative.

Murder and rape on the other hand, I do not believe are context driven. I believe that as acts in and of themselves, are inherently immoral.

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Hmmm... can you explain how? If this man was put in jail for the rest of his life at that point instead of killed, he would still not be able to offend again. Unless you mean the child would be able to recover better if the man was dead verses behind bars? Is this what you mean?

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[

Self defense is not murder. ;-)

I apologize CL because I did not see this question but I wasn't ignoring you.

1. How do you know the father would have been in jail for the rest of his life? There is no guarantee that her husband would be found guilty even if child molestation carried a life sentence.

2. She saw that her child was in danger so at that moment, she defended him. I have no idea if the child would have been better or not if the man was in jail.

Oh no problem. I miss questions all the time! There are 2 different things at play here.

1. Objectively speaking, I still don't think it's moral to murder someone on the grounds that they may not get convicted. I do not believe that this is a justifiable act. Either legally or morally.

2. I understand that. Which is part of the reason why I don't think she carries any culpability. She blacked out and was acting on pure motherly instinct. This does not make her a bad person.
Separate from that though, (as far as I understood the story that was told to me) the fact still remains that this was not a life threatening situation and that it was not a case of killing someone in order to save a life. If this was the case, Becca can correct me, and of course, it changes things.

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Oh sorry.

Hadn't seen it.

Well, is the sex itself consensual? If not, then it is rape.

If the sex is consensual, and the decision to not use contraception is consensual, then I don't know what you mean about impregnating "without consent?" Can you clarify?

Oh, come on!  Yes, I think your morals leave a little bit to be desired, but you're not thick.  I think you know where I'm going with this.

I'll admit, after I responded, it did cross my mind that perhaps you were referring to the Virgin Mary. But it was consensual. As the story goes the angel appeared to her and asked her if she accepted this. So I was confused...

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Well! Congratulations, CL. You're the first theist I've heard admit that.

Yes. :-)

I have admitted before that there is no proof and that we cannot prove to another person that God exists. There are (in my opinion) good reasons to believe that God exists, but at the end of the day, no proof. We are still taking a leap of faith.