While I honestly sympathize with your intent here, it really is not necessary to lie to the Nazis in this case. A good end does not justify an evil means. But the Nazis have no right to the truth here. If they ask you if you are hiding Jews, you can rightly use a broad mental reservation and just say "no," meaning "no" as far as you are concerned. They ought to have enough sense to realize that is all you need to give them. If you make up a full cock and bull story designed so that they cannot help but be deceived, that would be a strict mental reservation and what we call a "lie."

We use broad mental reservations all the time. You pass someone you know on the street and they say, "How are you doing." You say "fine," because they don't really expect you to tell them about that headache you had last night or the trouble you had getting your car started. It isn't a lie. It is a social convention.

As Ludwig Wittgenstein maintains, we engage in "language games" all the time. It isn't lying. It is just how we use language in different situations. And telling someone who asks you for money on the phone that you don't have any money for them should be understood to mean either that you are broke or that you don't intend to donate to them. They have no right to know which you mean and you have no obligation to tell them.

The ethics of communication and lying is both complex and extensive.

So while the parts of your essay that make claims about the inherent harms of lying are fine in themselves (albeit built on a foundation of things that aren't real), you haven't addressed the issues raised by the thought experiment at all, and the 'strict Catholic edict against lying' isn't looking too great at the moment (noting that other Catholics, and possibly the catechism, disagree with you on the strictness of this edict).

Assuming that we accept your claims about the inherent harms of lying, it would be awesome if you could explain why you think these harms are always going to be less desirable than whatever harms come from telling the truth in a given situation. You're a virtue ethicist who just caused the death your Jewish friend- why is this okay? Screwing with telos or whatever might be bad, but is it as bad as people dying? Though it's not even clear at all from your post what you think the best action to take in the thought experiment would be.

"The telos of humanity is to be healed of all divisions. The wounds we have inflicted on ourselves or on others will be closed up, and it will be possible to be wholly united with each other and with God."

Um, citation needed. Did god tell you this? Is this in the bible? If so, what passage?

I understand that Catholics find using contraception and engaging in homosexuality as morally wrong in some way. I do not. I see no harm to humans, in any way direct or indirect from these things in and of themselves.

420, I hope I am not derailing the conversation off topic. Do you have examples of topics that "humanists" and Catholics contradict (and think its because its in bible only - no rational ideas)? We probably cannot discuss them here, but just asking you for a list :)

Some Christians (and other theists) do have that stance. As Catholics, we believe morality can be achieved through critical reasoning (What we call Natural Law). The church teaching and the bible do help us in discerning moral issues, but they are not contradictory to what reason can lead us to. This is of course evident in atheists that understand moral issues and are good people.

This is not to take away from the stance that perfect objective morality exists (and it could be used to support theistic ideas). We still firmly believe that. We just think that you can reach it through reason alone (I think this is a stronger appeal to "perfect objective morality" if it is universal and not subject to religious belief).

I am interested to know if you think that morality is objective or not.

"My issue though is that the "wrongness" of an act is a moral judgment.
It must come from outside the act itself; it can't be include in the
definition of a specific act."

What I call moral judgment is something that happens in my head, by weighing factors as best I can. I see no reason to accept that there is such a thing as a moral judgment that is not a thought or brain state in humans. I say something is immoral once it has been shown to me to be an unjustified harm.

I would therefore say that non-consentual sex is always immoral, because I cannot imagine a situation in which this could be justified. I am inclined to be absolutist on this but in this context I recognize I could be wrong. Same for unjustified killing of human beings.

There is no doubt that theists and atheists overlap. It is the distinction that I am interested in. I would never accept something as immoral simply because it was commanded. I think this is the distinction. We both apply humanistic morality, but Catholics are also restricted by the text of the bible whether or not it is moral on the humanist side.

"It is not at all difficult to list things that are wrong by definition. For example, would it make sense to debate whether any of the following are sometimes not wrong: arson, assault, blasphemy, calumny, embezzlement, fraud, gluttony, larceny, libel, slander, defamation, vandalism, trespassing, robbery, harassment?"

But those are not particular acts; those are categories used to describe *kinds* of acts. Read carefully what I said: "the "wrongness" of [a particular] act is a moral judgment."

"To repeat an example I gave earlier, no one disputed that George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin. The job of the jury was to determine whether what Zimmerman did met the definition of murder or manslaughter."

I agree. My point, though, was that even *after* we answer the question of whether Zimmerman justifiably shot Trayvon, or whether it was an unwarranted killing, we still must answer the moral question: is it *objectively* immoral to shoot and kill and innocent person without warrant?

We assume it is, both as individuals and in the courts. But my contention is that the atheist has no ground for such an assumption. While Christians root this position in the character and commands of God, I don't see how murder can be objectively wrong on atheism. If an atheist *does* think the unwarranted killing of an innocent person is objectively immoral--wrong for all people, in all places, at all times--he must offer reasons why this belief is morally binding on everyone.

"Of course, consensual/nonconsensual is the reigning standard of the day, much to the chagrin of people who believe that most consensual sexual behavior you can think of between consenting adults is immoral, but standards do change."

Help me better understand your position. Are you saying that consensuality is merely a subjective trait of moral sex? Do you believe that some day humans may decide that consensuality really doesn't matter and so it's completely moral to force women and children to have sex against their will? Or do you hold that rape is objectively wrong, regardless of what individuals or cultures believe?

"Shouldn't the question be, "Is the killing of a human being always immoral"? You have slipped two moral terms into the question."

No, I asked the question the way I intended. What I'm trying to determine is whether we can agree some specific acts--like non-consensual sex, or unjustified killing, or perhaps lying--are objectively immoral. This means they are wrong for everyone, everywhere, regardless of human opinion or consensus vote.

If an atheist is unwilling to grant this, then several things follow. First, he cannot say any act is truly "evil." He can only say "that particular act disagrees with my subjective definition of right and wrong--criteria that may change in the future." Second, the problem of evil essentially vanishes since objective evil would only be an illusion.

If an atheist agrees with the Christian on this, then a discussion about what *grounds* that objective morality necessarily follows.

By the way, Leah Libresco's case against lying is not a Catholic argument. It is basically utilitarian.

The strict Catholic edict against lying also springs from an awareness of our audience as people, moral agents, or adopted children of God (however you’d like to phrase it). Deceiving is choosing to make it hard for your target to understand the world around them. You’re introducing noise and bias into their signal, interfering with their ability to perceive and respond to the world and people around them.

The Catholic argument against lying is that the God-given purpose of speech is to communicate truth, and it is an offense against God to lie, not a disservice to fellow human beings. Her argument isn't that one may not do evil (lying) so that good may come of it. Rather, she is arguing that no good will come of lying. It is interesting that those who pummeled Deacon Jim Russel for allegedly misrepresenting Catholic teaching did not notice that Leah Libresco's arguments are basically utilitarian and consequentialist.