Moral Quandries and the Core

My Trotskyite friends were appalled. My unrepentantly capitalist friends were openly contemptuous. What had I done to provoke this deluge of condemnation? Not much. I had simply announced my decision to pursue graduate work in theology.

A (safely) gregarious friend, for whom a vow of chastity is too hideous to even contemplate, wondered erroneously, (while surreptitiously checking my palms for stigmata), whether this enterprise involved vows of poverty and celibacy. My high school friends from St. Josephs Convent gently reminded me of the rigors of life there and the reflexive crushing of attempts to depart from accepted doctrine.

I'm not going to take the veil, I snorted. My conviction that a successful law school career requires and examination of the theological origins an underpinnings of the law for a more comprehensive understanding and application has been growing. On a more pragmatic level, fashioning a hybrid of theology and law also seemed to be a canny professional move. I had cut loose any religious moorings during adolescence, succumbing only occasionally to bouts of Proustian introspections and Zen austerity. I had neither subscribed to the common Harvard utopian fantasies which too often involve communal dining on trestle tables in drafty halls nor seriously considered a life of contemplation.

None of us choose our moments of epiphany. I wish that mine had occurred while I was poring over Hesiod's Theogeny or Wittgensteinian tracts. Life unfortunately is not often subtle; its punches are direct and (if you emerge unscathed) illuminating. Earlier this autumn, I was in front of an upscale Manhattan emporium, an indigent family, authentically caked in grime and clothed, literally, in rags, a stark contrast with the bored impolitically furclad matrons streaming out of the store. (Yes, the Dickensian parallel is deliberate.)

This tableau and its variants are common features of the urban landscape in contemporary America and I had become inures to it. Indeed, I have mastered the art of adroitly stepping over the assorted homeless persons who populate Harvard Square. This particular scene however was almost surreal, a chilling miniature of the theoretical exposition of inequality.

I must confess that I didn't offer the family money or food or the coat off my back. But their faces and the awful poignancy of the scene remain with me. What should I have done? Was this a temporary frisson of guilt? What was my moral responsibility if any?

The Moral Reasoning requirement at Harvard is supposed to help us formulate questions about and fashion a response to the moral dilemmas which face us. It is specifically designed "to show that it is possible to reflect reasonably about such matters as justice, obligation and personal authority." Yet there seems to be very little real opportunity for Harvard undergraduates (en route to comfortable lives) for a consistent, rigorous formal analysis of moral dilemmas, unless of course one chooses to concentrate in philosophy and the subjects which fall under that rubric.

"The intellectual and theological origins of the College are well documented," observes Rev. Peter J. Gomes, Plummer Professor of Morals, "it was for the purpose of providing for a succession of learned ministers that the College was founded." The triumph of secularism, though important in a country where there is no state religion, has been accompanied by an unfortunate reluctance to face the social ills which abound.

A number of ethical, religious and theological controversies demanding resolution occupy center state. Some of the more compelling issues include the admission of homosexuals to the armed forces, euthanasia and that hardy perennial, abortion. Another is that of the ordainment of women in the Catholic Church. In the ardently debated Pastoral Letter on Women's Role in the Church, while liturgical inculturation was encouraged, women were still barred from the priesthood. Can women be expected to be content in an organization which does not allow them full participation?

In the face of these quagmires, I suggest a more rigorous Harvard requirement for the study of ethics and related subjects. I am not suggesting mandatory detailed exegetical work or a focus on biblical archaeology, but rather an examination of the journey of discovery and acknowledgement of the correlative duty between realization and action. The study of theology and ethics are important in critical thinking about contemporary dilemmas as well as the emergent issues of pluralism, multiculturalism and inclusion. Its focus should not be on orthodoxy but on pedagogy; secular voices should be welcomed.

Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote that the "life of religion is not the logic of theology but the rending of human experience." We can apply the formalistic aspects of theological study to the moral dimensions accountable to the societies in which they function and thrive. We can apply our findings to the study of the relative merits of cooperation and competition, while examining notions of equality and inequality. What do the industrialized nations owe less developed countries? What do we own the less fortunate?

These are a range of problems to be addressed. At Harvard, we are uniquely situated to acknowledge problems and find solutions, if not out of some sense of noblesse oblige or of the fundamental realization of each other humanity, then, of the sheer challenge of solving formidable intellectual problems.

Perhaps some sort of obligatory community service should also be a requirement for graduation. An authentic life requires a certain among of contemplation. I'm not suggesting that we become solipsistic navel-gazers, but we should be substantially implicated in the moral life of our society, committed to sustaining it, not eroding it. If not us at Harvard, then whom?