When the problem is in here, not out there

Josh McDowell is a legendary figure in speaking to parents and teens about making choices on what is right or wrong. My son spent a year with him in his early 20's and was profoundly affected in a positive way. As a pacesetter in the current Christian worldview movement, the culture is identified as the main culprit. In his most recent message, McDowell focuses his audience to the latest cultural influence on how teens make choices: it's no longer what I know to be right, or think is right, but what I feel is right that matters.

Here are some points he makes from his recent book, "Set Free to Choose Right":

1. "It's moral relativism that sets the human conscience adrift."
2. no doubt we feel a "formidable competition from our pervasive culture."
3. kids feel as long as no one else is hurt, I can choose what I feel is right.
4. "In today's culture, much of our moral concerns for our teens center on sexuality."
5. "Teenagers emotions develop far ahead of rational thinking."
5. "Confronting and understanding these issues will lay the solid foundation from which we can set our kids free to choose right."

Yet at the same time, McDowell notes that beginning with the fall of Adam and Eve, the human condition desires to be the arbitrator of right and wrong. He points to Paul's focus on sexual immorality pervasive in the culture of the early church. In fact Biblical accounts of dysfunctional choices (such as David and Bathsheba) and recent observations of moral conflict in adults of all ages suggests something more than recent shifts in culture and child development stages that put teens at moral risk.

Certainly the developmental facets of a person's brain until adulthood have implications for learning. Yet, the idea that emotional dominance over cognitive activity is associated with teen developmental factors and cultural degradation discounts what is within all persons warring against moral choices.  While Josh's work to raise awareness of these is helpful, it does not put anyone in the best position to "confront and understand the issues" related to how teens make choices (or anyone for that matter). 

What is often mistaken for emotion is basically deep seated biases or core assumptions that sit squarely in the heart of each person, young or old. We seem to explain these influences on our choices by how we feel because the effect of core assumptions on our thinking operates below an awareness that we are actually "doing thinking." It seems as if it must be our emotions, but in fact it is much more stable and substantive than a feeling. As a side note here, psychology has not been able to actually separate affect (feeling) from cognition (thinking).

Core assumptions are endearing beliefs (that's the feeling part) that we never question but trust (the thinking part) to "prove" everything else, The core assumption that leads to moral relativism, is actually an absolute. It is a universal obsession with justice. Sages of antiquity, Greek philosophers, and contemporary psychologists all recognize the basic influence of justice on humans' idea of virtue.

Judging whether an action is fair or rightfully deserved is what sits front and center in all emotion and thought. Without much awareness, this obsession has affected moral choices from the beginning of time and for all ages. If you don't think teens have developed this fully, just reflect on what is the most common response of teens to their parents, "Mom/dad, that's not fair."

The human condition does not make moral judgments about an action itself, but rather the fairness of the action. 

In summary, here is my thesis.

Everyone actually agrees in a moral absolute. It's that the absolute everyone accepts as true virtue is justice. The varying cultural influences across time and place affect how people perceive what is just. Its judgments people make about what is fair from their own perspective that is relative.

This is a big and complex topic when understanding "moral choices" and is not a criticism of Josh or other worldview leaders. While legends like Josh McDowell have a lot of things correct in their research and writings, this is a piece critical to fully understanding moral absolutes that I find is missing. Moreover, the absolute obsession for justice and the relative effects of culture is what confuses Christians of all ages and creates doubts about the worldview message of moral absolutes. I think and feel it should get some attention.

I'll just let you ponder this. You might begin to see what is going on way down deep in the human condition. I feel it's a bit unfair to blame what is outside us (culture) when there is plenty blame to go around with what is in us (human nature) .......