It's funny how we go about morality in a subjective manner. As humans, we are all moral beings given the idea that we have the power to discern right from wrong. But we have different definitions of what is right and what is wrong. A person who robs a bank could justify his actions by saying its morally right. This is because morality is defined through culture as to what culture believes is right and wrong. But beneath it all, if everyone has some different sense of what is moral then the culture's perspective of morality is permeable and manipulable, giving in to the law of the jungle stating that whoever is in power has a say of what is moral.
An example of this situation came to me just recently. Last week I took up a job buying back books from students on campus. My main intention in doing this job was to make people happy and serve them in a loving way. So I researched one of my books for class with the bookstore and found that they were buying back the book for a cheaper price than I offered. So I emailed my whole class and told them that I was offering a better price and that I would just sit outside the final and buy their books from them. Well one person, unaware that I was telling the wholesale price of the book at the bookstore and not the market price, sought to react to my email in a bad manner. He said that I was screwing people over. Now here are the two clashing moralities: I, wanting to help and serve people, and the other person, wanting to react to injustice. Both sides are serving an ultimate good, but one side goes about it in a malicious manner.
But if we doused this situation in the standard of morality that the Gospel and the teachings of Jesus presents, we find that they not only serve an ultimate good, but a beneficial good. We both could have gone about this situation in a more loving manner and build each other up rather than seek to tear others down.
There is a new moralism (as Pope Joseph Ratzinger calls it) that is taking precedence in culture today. This new moralism can be defined by belief in a greater good by the standards of culture and promoting ideals such as love, justice, peace, etc. etc. As this new moralism is taking precedence it is still man-made which allows it to be fallible enough to allow for the preaching of a gospel of hate rather than a gospel of peace and love. In the mentioned situation we were both trying to create a peace endowed with justice but in doing so preached this gospel of hate.
How does culture's morality affect the Advent season?
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