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In Reply to: insanity, empathy, character pathology & sin posted by anovagrrl on November 02, 2003 at 15:46:02:
Talk about having a deep sense of clarity!
I was reading this letter by Martin Luther King Jr, that he wrote while in prison. He was being attacked by the local clergy for 'breaking the law' as in the Bible it encourages Christians to obey the authorities.
Luther Jr. wrote an amazing answer and brought out clearly when should we disobey 'laws'. I quote
"Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is jut or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. As unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation stratutes are unjust because segragation distorts the soul and damges the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of infoeriority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philospher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I - it" relationship for an "I - thou" relationship and ends up relegating the persons to the the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation and existential expression of man't tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? This it is I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Surpremem Court, for it is moraly right and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances for the are morally wrong."
I probably don't need to explan how morally wrong the 'law of love' according to Berg was. How it reduced us to the 'it' factor. But i thought it interesting in that men like Berg and that terrible man you had to confront are so similiar, in that they have lost the ability to tell right from wrong. Morally darkened in their own souls, they have lost true empathy in the promotion of their own lustful satisfactions.
good on you for fighting against evil.
