Limits and Moral Creativity

One

Some things you can never do

Because the Church teaches that some actions are intrinsically evil, it has, so to speak, a list of things that you can never do. For example, you can never blaspheme or try to kill an innocent person or engage in sexual activity with someone to whom you’re not married. So it’s true, the Church does have moral rules that you always have to follow, every day of your life, at every minute, in every situation.

And to a lot of people, that idea is hideously restrictive. They hate the idea of being burdened by all these rules. They would like, just once, to cut loose and do whatever they want, without having to think about the rules or the consequences. They feel so stifled by the rules, by the commandments that never let up!

So are they right? Are the Church’s universal moral precepts, the ones that apply all the time and in every situation, are they actually restrictive?

Two

No, they keep you from breaking yourself

The answer is: of course not. The Church’s rules exist to keep you from breaking yourself. 

If you have a goldfish, and the pet store owner says, “Now remember, don’t ever keep that fish out of water for a whole day,” would it make sense for you to say, “Hey, don’t tell me what to do with my goldfish. Stop trying to limit my options!”? That woud be a pretty silly reaction, since, obviously, that rule is just an articulation of the nature of the fish. The rule doesn’t add any restrictions, it just tells you how the fish works and what kind of behaviors will necessarily break it.

Now, of course, the rule might feel restrictive since tells you not to do something. But if you actually want to keep your goldfish in good working order, which is presumably why you bought it as a pet in the first place, then that rule actually enables you to do what you want. 

In which case, the rule is freeing. Even if it applies all the time and in every circumstance. And the same is true for universal moral rules, which keep us from breaking our bodies and souls. They don’t actually create restrictions. They express the truth of our nature so that we don’t break ourselves. And that, actually, is freeing, which is why Jesus said, “The truth will set you free.”

Three

You choose what to do for good

We should do good and avoid evil.

The good we can do is almost endless. We can eat and sleep, have good conversations, laugh, play, work, create, read, and experience life to the full. And if we don’t want to break ourselves and others, then we should avoid evil which is specified by the Ten Commandments. 

So the options to do good are almost endless and then there are a limited number of evil actions we should avoid. But that means you have to choose, you have to decide what good you are going to pursue at any given moment. The Church isn’t stifling. It just gives you the mission. The mission is to do good and avoid evil.

Which evil should you avoid? All of them. What good should you pursue? That’s up to you. Get to it!

Four 

Moral Creativity

So the Church’s moral teaching demands that you be creative. That you take the initiative.

It’s true you don’t need any creativity in applying the universal prohibitions. Those apply all the time, and the way you apply them is very simple: just don’t do things that are always wrong. But the positive precepts do require creativity.

We all have to spread the truth. But how? To whom? When? That takes a lot of creativity.

We all have to find time for prayer. But how? When? Where? That takes a lot of creativity.

We all have to be generous to one another and figure out how our gifts and opportunities can really help the people around us. And that pursuit of the good is the creative work of a lifetime to figure that out.

So trust me, the moral life isn’t restrictive. Sometimes it might be easier if it was. The moral life is the command to do some great good that was not there before. So what is the great good you are working on?

Five

The Prohibitions Allow for the Creativity

So the bulk of our life is about creatively pursuing good. But don’t forget that the prohibitions are what allow for that creativity. Nobody really enjoys any game until they’ve learned the rules. The rules are what makes the game possible, and then, if it’s a good game, there are limitless variations for people to play.

GK Chesterton imagines an island with high cliffs on all sides, and walls built high to keep people from falling off the edge. He imagines children running around on the island, playing, laughing, enjoying themselves. And then he imagines some self-proclaimed progressive coming to the island, saying, “What are all these walls doing here? Don’t you people know walls are restrictive? We don’t want restrictions. Here, let me liberate you!” And this foolish reformer tears down the walls and goes away.

But when that man came back to the island a bit later, he was surprised by what he saw: the children who used to play and run without fear, those same children were huddled together fearfully at the center of the island. And the man noticed that some of them were missing. Because some had fallen off the unguarded cliffs.

The point is: the prohibitions, the limits, the “Thou Shalt Nots” aren’t a block to creativity. They are what enable creativity. They are the rules that allow us to enjoy the game, enjoy the project of this very good life.