Redefining Morality

Member Group : From the Kitchen Table

The young woman was dating a very nice guy. They had gotten past first impressions and the fun-filled entertainment that fills the time in new relationships, and were beginning to talk about worldviews and possible permanence.

He was a smoker and she was not.

She actively practiced her faith and he did not.

The couple didn’t discuss smoking, but did spend many hours in conversation about the importance and effect of faith, or its lack, on their future lives. In the end, he decided that he did not want to become an active participant in a faith-filled life. In response, she opted not to continue pursuing a permanent relationship with him.

Both of them were comfortable with their decisions, and they have remained friends.

Her friends were appalled.

They could not understand how she could have tolerated his smoking. They told her that they could never be with someone who smoked, and that breaking up with a fellow over cigarette use was not only acceptable, but desirable.

But when she shared the fact that they had chosen not to move forward into a deeper relationship because of their different perspectives on the role of faith in their lives, her friends openly stated that she was being absolutely unreasonable, and that if she stuck to that decision, she would find herself alone – forever.

So faith is open to compromise, but smoking isn’t.

Welcome to the new morality.

There been much debate over the effect of removing God from the public marketplace. This is the generation that has grown up in schools where God’s name could not be mentioned, and the role of Christianity in creating western civilization could not be acknowledged. If the Church was referred to at all, it was always the villain in the story.

The textbooks were full of the Richelieu’s and devoid of the Maximilian Kolbe’s. Those whose lives were informed by faith were presented as intolerant, regressive, and mean.

At the same time, being physically healthy and attractive was touted as the ultimate good. And while being healthy is certainly a "good", and there is nothing wrong with taking care of one’s appearance, the final result of defining ultimate good in physical terms instead of spiritual ones robs us of the most important part of ourselves.

Many members of the young adult generation reflect the results of that robbery. Suicide rates among young people are alarmingly high; STD infection rates are rising annually; the number of teens being treated for depression is increasing; and self-

Can these trends be linked to the diminishing role of faith in the lives of our young people? MTV decided to find out if there was a common thread to happiness. They conducted a survey of young people, asking them if they were happy and then asking what factors were most important in their lives. They were stunned to learn that those who ranked faith as a major factor were twice as happy as those who didn’t. They could offer no explanation for this surprising result.

They should have consulted St. Augustine, who discovered and wrote, nearly 1600 years ago, that our hearts were made for God, so we would only be happy when we rested in Him. It’s not a new truth – it’s a lost one.

For the sake of our children, it’s time we find it again.