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In the encyclical Humani generis, Pius XII criticizes existentialism for rejecting “the immutable essences of things” and focusing only on the existence of the individual. The pope expresses indignation that existentialism and similar philosophies did not give due respect to the authority of the magisterium: “It would indeed be unnecessary to deplore these aberrations from truth if all, even in the domain of philosophy, showed proper reverence for and paid attention to the magisterium of the Church which has the divinely given mission not only to guard and interpret the deposit of divinely revealed truth, but also to watch over the philosophical sciences lest erroneous theories harm Catholic dogma.”7 In a radio message on March 23, 1952, Pius XII criticized the proponents of the new morality for removing the individual conscience from the authority of the Church, which they described as oppressive and too insistent on the rigor of the law. The advocates of the new morality proposed the law of freedom and love as the basis for morality. The pope saw this rejection of objective moral norms and the overemphasis on the freedom of the individual’s conscience as the main weakness of the new morality. Commenting on the pope’s message, Ford and Kelly wrote: “It was to the Church, and not to individuals, that Christ gave His revelation, ‘of which moral obligations are an essential part’; and it was to the Church alone that Christ promised the divine aid required for avoiding error. The unstated conclusion of this is obvious: it is only through conformity with the teaching of the Church that the individual conscience can have security from error. The ‘autonomy of the individual conscience’ cannot be reconciled with the plan of Christ and can produce only ‘poisonous fruits.’”8 Challenging the claim of situation ethics that the conscience was free to judge for itself the morality of human acts, the pope declared that there were acts that were intrinsically evil, which objective moral norms would prohibit without exceptions. He listed a sampling of twenty acts as gravely forbidden by God regardless of circumstance. The list included not only the traditionally acknowledged grievous acts such as fornication, adultery, blasphemy, and idolatry, but also acts reflecting social concerns within contemporary society, such as monopolizing vital foodstuffs, unjustifiably increasing prices, and fraudulent bankruptcy . Pius XII declared that “all this is gravely forbidden by the divine Lawmaker. No examination is necessary, no matter what the situation of the individual may be, there is no other course for him to obey.”9 The Objective Moral Norms and Situation Ethics 107 pope insisted that persons were obliged to obey prohibitions against such acts and were not, therefore, absolutely free to make their own choices as situation ethicists would claim. Ford and Kelly noted that situation ethics was expressed in a variety of forms, ranging from a general rejection of objective norms to simply a minimization of moral prohibitions. They pointed out that the pope’s statements referred at different times to various forms of situation ethics , and they identified four characteristics of situation ethics. The first was an attitude that limited or even rejected the authority of the magisterium to impose moral norms. The authority of the magisterium was restricted to the religious sphere of human life, leaving politics , economics, science, and the arts to be governed and judged by their own laws. Ford and Kelly responded to this attitude by quoting Pius XII in Humani generis, who insisted on the competence of the Church to speak on the morality of every human activity. Some carried this logic further and dismissed the magisterium’s authority outright, appealing instead for a new morality governed by prudence and charity. Situation ethicists argued: “If the early Christians could serve Christ without the rules laid down later, why cannot we do the same?” Ford and Kelly insisted that the development, interpretation , and refinement of the moral law were necessary for the growth of the Church and for the ongoing formation of the consciences of the faithful.10 Second, they made a distinction between existentialist and Protestant situation ethics. The existential form rejected moral principles, while the Protestant form maintained a Christian view of the moral law while allowing for the higher law of love and the individual’s direct relationship with God to overrule the moral law in concrete cases.11 Ford and Kelly expressed their concern that Protestant situation ethics, which separated God’s law from the moral law, had begun to influence...

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