This
morning on LBC the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested that African Christians
will be killed if the Church of England accepts same-gender marriage. Andrew
Brown, writing for The Guardian, reports,
‘Speaking
on an LBC phone in, Justin Welby
said he had stood by a mass grave in Nigeria of 330 Christians who had been
massacred by neighbours who had justified the atrocity by saying: "If we
leave a Christian community here we will all be made to become homosexual and
so we will kill all the Christians."
"I have stood by gravesides
in Africa of a group of
Christians who had been attacked because of something that had happened in
America. We have to listen to that. We have to be aware of the fact,"
Welby said. If the Church of England celebrated gay marriages, he added,
"the impact of that on Christians far from here, in South Sudan, Pakistan,
Nigeria and other places would be absolutely catastrophic. Everything we say
here goes round the world."
I do not
doubt Justin Welby’s experience. As noted in a previous blog post I have lived
in a country which criminalizes homosexuality. Changing Attitude and other
organizations have consistently flagged up how very dangerous it is to be gay
in the majority world.
In this
blog post I want to examine the underlying logic of the Archbishop’s claims and question and problematize them. I apologize if my reasoning seems blunt and crude. I am
currently fasting as part of EndHungerFast and my mind is not working at full
tilt. Equally, I am very open to comments which help sharpen up my thinking in
this area.
As I read
it, the Archbishop’s argument again the C of E accepting same-gender marriage
follows the pattern below:
‘Organization/Institution
A cannot commend /accept ‘x’ because to do so would necessarily and logically
lead to ‘y’, which is both an unintended consequence and actually constitutes a
much worse situation. And ‘y’ is such a terrible thing that it makes ‘x’ seem
reckless, wanton and deeply unwise.’
I know that
puts it starkly and dramatically, but I do this in order to reveal the clear
consequentialist structure of the argument. When put in such stark terms and before
adding any content to this logical structure, the consequentialist case can
seem both plausible and beyond question.
The power
of Welby’s consequentialist thinking lies in our tendency to focus on what
might be called a ‘narrow range’ of ‘defined’ consequences. Let me see if I can
explain.
Let us
suppose for a moment that Welby’s claim is incontestable. That is to say, let’s
accept Welby’s claim that if the C of E accepted equal marriage, Christians in
Nigeria etc would be killed in great numbers. (Let us be clear, no one actually
knows if that would happen.)
The logic
of the argument is that even if action/activity ‘x’ has good consequences (e.g.
social justice for some, improvement in church’s standing eamong some
communities) those consequences will be outweighed by a further consequence
‘y’,’ which is the unnecessary death of large numbers of people.
The deaths
of large numbers of people, on this argument, surely has a greater hold over
our sense of moral responsibility than the social goods that might be generated
by adopting ‘x’.
I suspect
that if this reasoning is appealing it is so only because of assumptions that
are dangerously sloppy.
One of the
problems created by consequentialism is how we assign value to the terms involved. It sets
up the argument on competitive grounds – that is to say, the referent terms of
the argument are assigned competing values and a calculation is then made on
the basis of those terms. So, in the current case, ‘the social and cultural
(positive) value of equal marriage’ is set in competition with the ‘the
(negative) value of the deaths of Christians.’ We are then invited to calculate
the competing moral worth of the referents.
Again, at
first glance, various reactions might be called forth – firstly, that when put
in such stark terms, it only adds weight to Welby’s claim. Why? Because surely
human beings are always worth more than a ‘social value’ or ‘social good’. Secondly,
it invites a troubling question: By what criteria can one ‘measure’ the value
of a social good against that of a human life?
‘Human
beings are always worth more than a social/cultural/religious practice or
value.’
I am
suspicious of what is called ‘common sense’.
Yet many will share the instinct that, even if we cannot and indeed
should not ‘quantify’ the value of a human life, there is a profound sense in
which the lives of human beings are more significant than any social and
cultural values or law, even if that value or law seeks to add to the human
good. However, there are a number of considerations which problematize this
claim.
It is
tempting to present ‘social goods’ like freedom or justice as abstracts, but
they are also part of our lived reality. If someone claims that ‘equal
marriage’ might be a social good, but it is not as significant in value as the
lives of [x] numbers of human beings/Christians it ignores the reality that
equal marriage is part of a social nexus which affirms and celebrates human
lives and changes actual societies and cultures. That is to say, something like
‘equal marriage’ is not an abstraction, but something which (keeping with the
logic of consequentialism) has actual positive human effects and may
(consequently) lead to less prejudice, less violence and greater human
flourishing. Quite how one might reductively ‘quantify’ them is open to serious
question.
The argument
above indicates that it may not be possible, under the logic of
consequentialism, to provide a precise and comparable measure between something
presented as a social good and what is presented as a human tragedy.
Consequentialism is predicated on the idea that a situation/event/act etc can
be measured/assigned a value according to controlled circumstances. Yet, it is
not clear by what criteria one might assign a definitive value to ‘x’ or ‘y’.
Equally, the very notion of ‘unintended consequences’ suggests that it may not
be possible to undertake an analysis that is sufficiently controlled.
The problem of unintended consequences.
One aspect
of Welby’s claim concerns what might be called the problem of ‘unintended
consequences.’
The logic
works like this:
Group A
think that Action/Practice ‘x’ will have the following positive
consequences
‘y’, but (because consequences cannot be controlled) ‘x’ may also have the
following unintended consequences ‘z’. ‘z’ is so terrible as to make ‘x’ and
its positive consequences ‘y’ anathema.
+Justin
might acknowledge that ‘accepting gay marriage’ would (in broad terms) have
good consequences for the church, for UK society and even send out a positive
message against homophobia’ Etc.
BUT, these
positive consequences are nothing compared to the unintended negative
consequences – the deaths of hundreds and possibly thousands of Christians at
the hands of those who conclude that the Church of England’s support for gay
marriage makes all Christians anathema.
Can the consequences
of any action/policy/process be controlled? Crudely, I suggest, ‘No.’ That –
alas - is the nature of consequences.
When the Archbishop makes a statement on LBC can he control the reaction
and effects of that statement? Not in any obvious way. One of the reasons most
sensible people give some thought to both their intentions and their actions is that we recognize that actions have
consequences, many of which may be quite unintended. (It should be noted that
this consideration of consequences is not of itself a reason for not acting.
Indeed, it is impossible not to act.)
To give a
very humble example, the House of Bishops (HoB) made a Pastoral Statement on equal
marriage. One assumes they intended that statement to be received with grace
and love and understanding. They would not have intended it to lead to anger
and conscientization among many previously inactive congregations and clergy;
Nor would they have intended the further consequence that clergy and
congregations have, in reaction to the Statement, become proactively in
favour of becoming inclusive congregations, started to examine the
possibilities of blessing gay unions and become active dissidents. The Bishops’
statement might lead to expressions of dissent among gay and straight clergy
that were never intended. These could (who knows? One can’t completely control
consequences…) lead to face offs and legal challenges etc etc.
One
supposes that the HoB did not intend these consequences.
And, of
course, consequences breed consequences. Perhaps one unintended consequence of the HOB statement is to signal to both our government and, more terrifyingly, to governments like the
one in Uganda that the C of E is prepared to make sacrifices of LGBT people in
countries that already were exploring the greater penalization of homosexuality
ahead of the HoB Statement.
Yet, one
assumes that the HoB came to their mind and decision to publish because they
believed that to make the Statement was right and was required by their
faithfulness to Christ and God. The unintended consequences, which at the same
time might reasonably have been anticipated, were not seem as sufficient reason
not to do what they thought was right. In that circumstance 'unintended consequences' as and of themselves were not considered sufficient to prevent them from acting for what they believed was right.
A consideration
of consequences will always be a factor in decision making at a human and
corporate level, but given our inability to actually define the nature and
extent of the consequences of human decision making, it cannot be the only one.
Consequentialism as non-Christian
Consequentialism
– in the form of utilitarianism – has always been attractive to the economic
and commercial mind, because it seeks to remove decision making from the
question of human judgment and character and assign a scientific value to
any problem.
It would be
cheap to suggest that this kind of thinking is at the heart of what Justin
Welby is saying. The man is very smart, sensitive and loving. I am sure he
would want to stand up for a Christianity that is not beholden to utilitarian
or consequentialist logic.
At the same
time, I sense +Justin ought to be cautious of the logic of consequentialism.
For ethics – Christian or otherwise – is hamstrung if reduced to a
consequentialist (so-called) ‘evidence-based’ analysis. Considerations of
conscience, intention and character as well as duty and principle will surely
always significant to any rich conception of ethics. The instinct that humans
are of fundamental value – a Christian conclusion for sure – is not based on a
consequentialist analysis, but (I suggest) on an onto-theo-logical claim.
Given that no
reasonable person would welcome the death of anyone as a consequence of ‘our’
actions, even when those actions are presented as good, it is very difficult
for a reasonable person to commend an action or set of practices that would
make a situation worse. Yet a community of character and love is invited, I
suspect, to demonstrate how the reductive consequentialist way of thinking is a
red herring and relies on a failure to appreciate how human ethical reasoning works.
Welby is
seemingly saying that if the CofE commended equal marriage it would have blood
on its hands, by proxy. We – the church - would be cited as the reason why a
group like Boko Harem would justify killing others. That this would be the
excuse for their repulsive behaviour.
Yet as
+Justin indicated in his interview, people are already being killed by the
likes of Boko Harem on utterly spurious grounds. And surely just because someone cites ‘x’ as a
reason for their actions does not mean that ‘x’ is either a reasonable and
justified basis for their action. A man might say that he commits atrocities
because his religious book/tradition/beliefs requires it, but that doesn’t mean
we treat it as a reasonable or justified reason for doing so. (It may not even
be the operative reason, that is, it may be the reason being cited but the
actual motivation for doing ‘x’ lies at a deeper level.) Nor – if we
are careful – do we blame the book/deity or tradition for the person or group’s
actions. The person or group is responsible.
Let us for
the moment rework the logic of the claim under consideration.
Justin
Welby strikes me as saying:
We will not
support or adopt ‘x’ because it will enrage/upset/lead to yet more morally
reprehensible behavior by group/person ‘a’ whose actions have already been
morally reprehensible.
In Real Politik
this happens a lot. Some governments and institutions, for example, chose not
to criticize Russia ahead of the Sochi Olympics because they didn’t want to
make things worse. Perhaps some of the same situation applies around Russia and
the Ukraine at the moment. Our own government and the EU do not adopt certain
sanctions and actions against Russia for fear of losing Russian oligarch money
or having gas disrupted.
The
intended consequence of this runs as follows: by not standing up publicly for
what is ‘right’/morally correct means we can control and manage a
group/organization/nation or individual we disapprove of, but are frightened
of.
There is
something seemingly irenic about this approach. Haven’t we all sought to be
cautious in complex, threatening situations in order to reduce harm? Haven’t we
done so in the hope of achieving something more reasonable in the longer term?
I shall not
bore you by outlining the questions raised by this approach. At various levels
we’ve all adopted this logic – whether with a work colleague, a PCC, Etc. Etc.
Yet this approach can lead both to paralysis and also, sticking now with
consequentialism, to some awful unintended consequences.
Our
‘policy’ of seeking not to make things worse runs the constant danger of ignoring the facts of reality: that, yes, we
might be trying not to make a situation worse, but that situation may already
be intolerable for those being persecuted by a morally reprehensible government
or group. We seek to control the morally reprehensible by not giving them one
more reason to be morally reprehensible. Meanwhile the moral reprehensibility
continues. All we have deprived group A or person B of is another spurious
reason to destroy people’s lives. All we
have sought to do is keep our hands clean. Yet, as we have seen again and
again, through history, culture and literature and indeed in the Christian
faith itself, there is no such thing as a clean pair of hands.