Moral Foundations : Why the Other Side is Crazy

Have you ever been in a conversation with someone and wonder how the heck they could say the things they are saying? Recently, I was introduced to what is called "Moral Foundations Theory" which has given me some language to better understand myself and perhaps even some of the motivations of my sisters and brothers. 

The theory argues there are values that lay the foundation for what we count as right or moral. There are at least six major foundations humans use in order to determine what is moral and what is not. The following definitions are taken from Wikipedia: 

1. Care: cherishing and protecting others; opposite of harm.
2. Fairness or proportionality: rendering justice according to shared rules; opposite of cheating.
3. Liberty: the loathing of tyranny; opposite of oppression.
4. Loyalty or in-group: standing with your group, family, nation; opposite of betrayal.
5. Authority or respect: obeying tradition and legitimate authority; opposite of subversion.
6. Sanctity or purity: abhorrence for disgusting things, foods, actions; opposite of degradation.

Perhaps you see these and they make sense to you. Perhaps some of these foundations make more sense to you than others. Moral Foundations Theorists make the case that while most people are sensitive to the fairness foundation, conservatives are also equally sensitive to the other five foundations. However liberals are more sensitive to fairness and care than any other foundation, while libertarians are sensitive to fairness and liberty. 

Why this is important to consider is that conservatives will have more things that they deem as wrong and liberals will have fewer things they will deem as wrong. You can see this divide in the conversation around the ordination of members of the LGBT community. For conservatives the ordination of LGBT individuals may support their sense of fairness but it might also violate their sense of authority and/or sanctity. Liberals cannot understand why conservatives are not supportive of LGBT ordination since to not ordain them would violate their sense of fairness and care. 

Conservatives put more equal weight on each of the foundations while liberals put more weight on two foundations. This may be why the other side is crazy, we each have different and yet, overlapping, moral foundations. 

Read the Bible as Fiction. Please.

I have always wondered why when I ask people to tell me what the most important or formative books they have read in their lives, nine times out of ten a person says it was a fictional story. For instance, when Goodreads users what are the most influential books they have read, fiction is all over the place.

The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human is a fantastic book and it is the first source that I have encountered that addresses why fiction is more influential on people than non-fiction. 

Here is a short summary of one of the arguments to the power of fiction:

"Green and Brock’s research shows that the more absorbed readers are in a story, the more the story changes them. Fiction readers who reported a high level of absorption tended to have their beliefs changed in a more “story-consistent” way than those who were less absorbed. Highly absorbed readers also detected significantly fewer “false notes” in stories—inaccuracies, infelicities—than less transported readers. Importantly, it is not just that highly absorbed readers detected the false notes and didn’t care about them (as when we watch a pleasurably idiotic action film); these readers were unable to detect the false notes in the first place."

The author goes on to say:

"And in this there is an important lesson about the molding power of story. When we read non fiction, we read with our shields up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story, we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally, and this seems to leave us defenseless."

The Church teaches that the Bible is Truth that you can shape your life around. Which gives the impression that the Bible should be read as first and foremost a historical document that is trying to convince the reader. 

The Bible, on the whole, is a collection of writings that are not trying to convince people's minds but trying to shape people's hearts. And the more we read the Bible like it is all non fiction the more we read "with our shields" up to the point that we are cynical and discount the Bible in what it is really trying to do. 

No one reads Frankenstein with their cynical shields up. Rather, we read and it shapes our hearts to consider the ethical dilemmas Shelley is trying to raise.

The Bible is a great collection of books. Many of these books are fiction and others are "based on a true story" sort of non fiction. But either way, can we get back to a point where the Church teaches Christians to read the Bible as non fiction and not be threatened by the Bible losing credibility or authority? 

Put it another way, can the Church get away from trying to convince people's minds and get back to Jesus' desire to shape our hearts*?

---

*Ever wonder why Jesus used fictitious parables rather than non fiction tales? 

Cleanliness is next to Godliness? Science Suggests Maybe Not

Many religious rituals involve a washing or a bathing. This washing/bathing symbolically connects the physical cleanliness with a spiritual/moral purity. Washing is a powerful symbol for a number of reasons and Christianity uses this symbol in baptism, in telling the story of Jesus' last supper and even at his trial. When I was working for the Catholic Church I would help the priest symbolically wash his hands before celebrating communion and even as a minister today, I put hand sanitizer on my hands prior to communion. 

While the Church has long understood the validity of the sacrament does not depend upon the moral character of the minister (which is why I will not re-baptize you) we still hold onto the connection between physical and moral purity. 

Dr. Thalma Lobel writes in her Sensation: The New Science of Physical Intelligence about a study about bathing and honesty. Here is the set up:

People were given a test and when the time was up, the answer sheet was given to each person to "check their answers". The people were to use the answer sheet to mark on their own pages the number of incorrect answers they gave. They found that some people used the answer sheet and changed some of their original answers and gave themselves a better score.

Some in the group were asked to take a shower prior to the test and others were not. The assumption was that those who took the shower before the test would be physically clean and thus influenced to be morally clean when it came test time. However the study showed that those who were more likely to lie or cheat were those who took a shower prior to the test.

The reason? The researchers suggest that those who took the bath "felt clean" (both physically and morally) and thus felt they had a little more "room to get dirty". 

Clergy are constantly in a position of being physically clean. We go into hospitals and must wash a our hands. We perform rituals that require a physical washing as a part of the ritual. We are expected to have clean clothes and look "professional' and "put together", and if not then we question the if the man who looks disheveled is a very good clergy person. Clergy expectation/stereotypes involve descriptors like being "squeaky clean", using "clean" never "foul" language", and avoiding the "dirty side" of life (such as smoking and drinking and rated R movies that deal with the macabre). Could these expectations of clean clergy ironically, contribute to clergy feeling more like we have room to "get a little dirty"? 

Maybe this is in part why Jesus was not in favor of his disciples washing their hands before eating?

“Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’”

— Mark 7:1-5