There are those among us that believe that appeals to moral authority are valid in making an argument.
That makes three presumptions, that are not necessarily valid:
- There is a God;
- That the person asserting moral authority is in fact moral;
- That the person asserting moral authority understands God’s will.
If any of these assumptions are wrong, then in fact there is no moral authority. None. Whatsoever.
Appeals to the moral authority of the church, any church is not an argument, or logical, it is an attempt to frame the argument in terms of “because the moral authority says X, you cannot question it.”
This is not a logical argument.
It is an emotional one.
In looking at an argument, if you take away the appeal to moral authority, is the argument a valid one with out it?
Shaming language, is shaming language, whether it is God saying it, or not. To say that the churches do not use shaming language, is to deny the reality. Of course they do, they shame people, or attempt to, all the time. That it is draped in Gopd’s authority does not change this reality.
Does the catholic or protestant churches speak with moral authority?
No.
They do not.
They do not recognize the nature of women, they place one gender over the other. They see one gender, men, as more fallen than women. They say it in their writings, they say it in their homilies, they show it in their actions. They hold one gender accountable, while giving the other gender a free pass. This is not moral authority, it is the opposite.
Does the church serve the community as a whole? Or does it serve on part of the community? If it is only a part of the community, than I say to you that they do not serve God, they serve that part of the community.
When they allowed pedophiles to become priests, when they hid it, when they moved the priests around to hid these facts, when they behaved immorally, the church abandoned its moral authority.
The major christian denominations have their foundations in sand.
