Bishop Arthur J. Serratelli

Among the artwork adorning the walls of the Supreme Court are found the great lawmakers of history. Some, like Hammurabi, Solon and Confucius predate Christ. Others, like Charlemagne, Muhammad and Justinian, came after Christ. Prominent among them is Moses with the Ten Commandments. On each of the two oak doors leading into the Supreme Court, there can be seen a symbolic engraving of the Ten Commandments. Within the court itself, right above where the judges sit, there is another display of the Ten Commandments.

These diverse individuals haunt the halls of the highest court of justice in our land with the constant reminder that “There can be no peace without justice, no justice without law…” (Benjamin B. Ferencz, prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials). Without laws governing the common good, society itself would fragment along lines of personal opinions, personal prejudices and party rule. It would ultimately devolve into barbaric chaos.

Laws are a necessary element of the human condition. However, no law is a good law unless it is a moral law. Many things can be declared legal but remain immoral at the same time. Legislators do not determine moral goodness. They cannot arbitrarily decide what is right and wrong by the prevailing social opinions of the day.

For justice to be maintained, the criterion of right and wrong, of good and evil, must be objective. Otherwise, right and wrong will be subjected to constant change and confusion. What is good and evil, we do not determine, but discover. It is given to us by God. He implants within our hearts the natural law that indicates what is for our happiness. And, he has given us the Ten Commandments to help us avoid the evils that bring us suffering and to point us to those attitudes and actions that foster the well-being of individuals and of society itself.

From the day God handed Moses the Ten Commandments, these laws have been a sure guideline for understanding what is objectively right or objectively wrong. However, in the last 25 years, the very presence of the Ten Commandments in state capitols, parks, and public schools has been contested. As a result, monuments enshrining the Ten Commandments have been removed in Alabama, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, and Utah. This is highly indicative of the modern rejection of the Ten Commandments themselves.

Today’s secular culture refuses to accept an objective moral code. It holds that everything is relative. It teaches that right and wrong are determined by circumstances. But no society, no state, no public opinion can make what is intrinsically wrong into something good. At the heart of an ethical society is an objective morality. To reject the objective standard of good and evil is to forfeit one’s freedom. Without an objective standard outside the individual, society becomes enslaved under the tyranny of relativism and its citizens become the pawns of the state or the ruling majority.

What 50 ago was clearly seen as wrong in light of the Ten Commandments is now accepted as morally indifferent. Many today accept abortion, sex before or outside of marriage, living together as husband and wife without marriage, adultery, and same-sex partnerships. They judge these actions as merely personal choices without looking at the effects of these actions on society. But, this is far from the truth. Abortion kills the innocent and harms the parents. Sexual promiscuity diminishes the capacity for authentic love. Adultery remains a lie that destroys families.

Even the great philosophers of antiquity recognized that certain actions are always wrong. According to Aristotle, adultery, theft, and murder are always wrong. Circumstances do not change this fact. Thus, no state, no philosopher, not even the Pope himself, can say that murder is not wrong, that adultery is permitted because of human weakness or that robbery is a moral way to achieve economic justice.

Just as the manufacturer gives instructions for use of its product, God has given us his laws to show us how best to act in accordance with the way he has designed us, body and soul. A skydiver may jump from a plane and, for some moment, experience the exhilarating feeling of total freedom. But, if that person has no parachute, his joy will be short-lived. One cannot simply ignore the law of gravity.

So it is with God’s law. Someone may choose to throw off the bonds of marriage, but in the end, there is no ignoring the law of marital love that requires life-long commitment and constant sacrifice. Violating the way God has made us always leads to brokenness. God has given us the Ten Commandments not to restrict our freedom, but to help us gain the happiness lost by Adam and Eve.

The moral laws are neither extrinsic to human nature nor arbitrary. We are made in the image and likeness of God. And, all the moral laws simply reflect the very character of God who is Truth, Love and Fidelity. Keeping the objective morality expressed in the Ten Commandments makes us more like God and, thus, leads to authentic happiness.