Avant-propos - Studia Moralia

THE BASIC GOODS THEORY AND REVISIONISM 197
The whole morally significant content of one’s action must be
intelligible, since one is responsible only for what one understands.
For this reason, proposals one adopts by choice never are morally
particularized by unique, unrepeatable, material, contingent factors.
The really unique aspects of one’s action make no difference
whatsoever to the morality of what one does. 81
FINNIS also acknowledges revisionism’s use of this passage
from AQUINAS. He asserts that revisionism makes “much play”
with this statement to show “that derived moral norms, since
they involve contingent particulars, hold not universally but only
generally (ut in pluribus), subject to exceptions (ut in paucioribus).”
82 FINNIS points out, however, that while many positive
norms admit of exceptions, there are negative absolute norms
that apply “always and everywhere without exceptions.” 83
What can be said of this seemingly interminable debate between
revisionism and the BGT and their conflicting interpretation
of tradition as to whether or not the ordinary magisterium
has taught infallibly specific natural law norms that belong to
the secondary object of infallibility? There are at least three
methodological differences that shape each school’s hermeneutical
lens for interpreting tradition. The first entails what each
school considers to be the moral realm. In their responses to revisionists,
neither GRISEZ nor FINNIS (who specifically cites FUCHS’
article, which we discussed earlier) consider the distinction of
moral truths, i.e., goodness and truths of salvation or rightness
and the fulfillment of human well-being. The distinction between
these terms and the norms that correspond to each reflect
a more foundational view of the moral realm itself.
Many revisionists evaluate the rightness or wrongness of an
act in terms of the human person adequately considered and
how the act impacts its dimensions, aside from the subjective
motivation or moral goodness of the agent choosing the act. 84
81 Ibid. (emphasis added).
82
FINNIS, Moral Absolutes 90.
83 Ibid. 91. See also, GRISEZ, Christian Moral Principles 269.
84 See LOUIS JANSSENS, “Artificial Insemination: Ethical Considerations,”
Louvain Studies 8 (1980) 3-29.