Is Lying Always Wrong? Fr Gregory Pine Vs. Dr. Janet Smith Debate

Dr. Janet Smith and Fr. Gregory Pine (bio's below) will debate the morality of lying. We will be taking questions from super chatters and patrons.
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🔴 BIO's of Debaters
Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. is a doctoral candidate in dogmatic theology at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland). He served previously as Assistant Director of Campus Outreach for the Thomistic Institute. Born and raised near Philadelphia, PA, he attended the Franciscan University of Steubenville and entered the Order of Preachers upon graduating. He was ordained a priest in 2016 and holds an STL from the Dominican House of Studies. He is the co-author of Marian Consecration with Aquinas (TAN Books) and has published articles in Nova et Vetera, The Thomist, and Angelicum. He is also a regular contributor to the podcasts Pints with Aquinas and Godsplaining.
Janet E. Smith recently retired from Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit, MI. She is the author of HumanaeVitae: A Generation Later and A Right to Privacy. Self-Gift is a volume of her already published essays on HumanaeVitae and the thought of John Paul II. She edited Why Humanae Vitae right: A Reader, Life Issues, MedicalChoices (with Christopher Kaczor) Living the Truth in Love: Pastoral Approaches to Same-Sex Attractions (with R.Paul Check) and Why Humanae Vitae is still Right. Prof Smith served three terms as a consulter to the PontificalCouncil on the Family and also served as a member of the Anglican RomanCatholic International Commission, III for 8 years. She has a regular column in the National Catholic Register. She has received three honorary doctorates and several other awards for scholarship and service. She has appeared on the Geraldo show, FoxMorning News, CNN International, CNN Newsroom, Al Jazeera and has done many shows for various series on EWTN. More than two million copies of her talk,“Contraception: Why Not” have been distributed. Her materials can be found at janetsmith.org. Free copies of her talks are available there.
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[@PintsWithAquinas]

What an amazing debate, huh?

[@YouthApologetics]

Awesome debate!! Love Fr. Pine and Dr. Smith did well!

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@YouthApologetics, not only did she do "well" but she assuredly defeated his nonsensical, illogical and fallacious arguments.

[@PringleDinglesonThe3rd]

Hello, I am a fellow Protestant for what I know so far, I’ve been considering Catholicism for a little while, but also leaning heavily to Orthodox as well, but I haven’t become a catholic for a few reasons, I would like some guidance on them, firstly, I can’t seem to reconcile praying to angels, is there hidden information that I don’t know about that we SHOULD pray to angels? I also can’t reconcile praying to mortal dead men, if praying to angels were to make sense in SOME way, humans are way different because we are subject to sin, the angels aren’t (at least the holy angels) I’m also confused on how salvation works according to Catholicism can you guide me on that as well? Thank you God bless

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@PringleDinglesonThe3rd, how can you be "eternally-bound" to Lord Jesus, when He died THOUSANDS of years ago?

[@PringleDinglesonThe3rd]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices Just means that nothing will separate me from Christ

[@ryannafziger5158]

I wrote my final Ethics essay on lying after watching this discussion! Fantastic!

[@jocelynchau7452]

Fr. Gregory is brilliant

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

A brilliant example of a DELUDED religionist. 🤪

[@logansweet4190]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices And you are a brilliant example of someone wasting their time. If you are right and we are deluded why do you care? Leave us alone in our delusion.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@Ojibwe T kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@logansweet4190 That is rather PRESUMPTUOUS of you, wouldn’t you agree, Slave? Presumption is evil, because when one is PRESUMPTUOUS, one makes a judgement about a matter, despite having insufficient facts to support one’s position.

[@logansweet4190]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices What am I presuming exactly? That you are wasting your time? That is just based on your point of view. From your perspective we are deluded, but overall harmless to you, so there is no point in being here other than being annoying. Which does have some humor value I guess, but I am sure you can find better ways to entertain yourself. Go watch a Dave Chappelle special. You will find it funnier than trolling here trust me.

[@mkhw5572]

I feel like I just had a great mental and spiritual workout! Thank you for this. So valuable and thought provoking.

[@30Salmao]

I was needing this conversation since my childhood. This question about lies is a fundamental one to me.

[@christopherwhiting3756]

Absolutely Brilliant debate! Great content Matt ....I actually started out on Dr Smith's position, but over the debate I found myself drifiting over to Fr Gregory's side especially his response at 45:00, Really eloquent and it very much resonated with me.

[@CedanyTheAlaskan]

How in the world did I miss this? I've been waiting for this all week lol. Can't wait to watch!

[@rcabert70]

Absolutely amazing debate! Loved it! Thank you all for making it happen!

[@jennashlock6032]

Amazingly awesome! Thnx again Matt for bringing up what’s on our minds and in our hearts!

[@relentlessrhythm2774]

Such an interesting debate that I've been looking forward to for days!

[@marysalmond5273]

Wonderful! More of those on just about any subject, and I'd be hooked. Thoroughness, clarity, and non-argumentative debate leads to unintended conversion! Thanks!

[@johnpaulhumphrey2981]

maybe the three thumbs down were from people who thought it was OK to lie about how they felt about the video :)

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

Or those who saw one deluded religionist debating ANOTHER deluded religionist, both of whom had a far from perfect understanding of objective morality.

[@johnpaulhumphrey2981]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices #IWasTryingToLookOnThePositiveSide.

[@matthewmayuiers]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices Get outta here, that’s irrelevant to the debate, if you got problems with the classical view of Gods existence take that to a video on Gods existence, not a video on Ethics. You’re just raging out, irrelevantly replying to every comment with an objection to theism. Find a way to spend your time and energy that makes sense, you’re making objections in the wrong place and at the wrong time.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@JC-pl5bh Good Girl! 👌

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@Kevin Cobb “Truthful words are not beautiful. Beautiful words are not truthful. Wise men do not argue. Those who argue are not wise.” Tao Te Ching 81

[@christopherus]

Fr Pine: Classical Speech vs. Quantum Speech and its effect on humor. Well played.

[@texastess]

A fascinating deep dive into this topic. I greatly enjoyed it!

[@louiewop8330]

Killing it with the intro song!! Hope everyone is having a blessed Lent🙏🏾

[@sharondavidson7412]

I'm trying to find out what it is, but so far I haven't gotten a response back to my inquiries I really like it.

[@fragwagon]

@@sharondavidson7412 I'm pretty sure I heard it on another podcast, I think it must be free music that KZbin lets creators use that won't give them a copyright strike.

[@FFunez]

@@sharondavidson7412 Have you tried shazam?

[@sharondavidson7412]

@@FFunez Actually I intended to do that, but I keep forgetting. I’ll do it now!

[@sharondavidson7412]

@@fragwagon That thought had crossed my mind. Thanks for your input.

[@AugustinesHeart]

Hey Matt! Great podcast as usual. Just remember to include the topic of debate in intro lol... it took me some time to figure out what exactly was being argued for or against. Thanks for all the great content!

[@Trwanddon]

This was excellent. They only spoke over my head a few times, so I learned a lot. Glad I don't have to declare a winner, because both provided great arguments. One thing I did wish they would have addressed more is the lie of omission.

[@annmarie3573]

Fantastic job by both! Such an interesting topic!

[@bradyandjodi1]

Simply beautiful. Poetry in motion to watch two brilliant theologians have a rigorous debate. I had been looking forward to this since Matt announced it would happen, and it certainly did not disappoint. I don’t know on whose side I fall, lots to continue to consider. Thanks, PWA!

[@patrickmcauliffesr.85]

phenomenal. epic. and all that sort of stuff. many accolades to all three. thanks matt for arranging this!

[@cachinnation448]

This debate was BRILLIANT and so very much needed - thanks

[@catholicdisciple3232]

The 1992 Catechism definition makes the most sense. By lying to the Nazi's, you are doing them an act of charity and you do not break social cohesiveness (see Justice), but actual work to establish it. So, I think it is okay to tell a falsehood in those situations.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

Not only is it "okay" to lie in such a case, but it is, in fact, a HOLY and RIGHTEOUS act.

[@zekdom]

I can’t help but think of Rahab’s situation in Jericho. And to think, she’s listed in Hebrews 11.

[@jasoninkc]

Just have to say this is an incredible debate and discussion, one of my favorite episodes. Thank you to Dr. Smith and Fr. Pine for the excellent points made and Matt Fradd for bringing us such a great debate!

[@Nonnobisdomine77]

Thank you, this was amazing. More Dr. Smith!

[@JimCvit]

Dang, this was really good and thought provoking. Awesome topic!

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

Good and bad are RELATIVE. ;)

[@Qwerty-jy9mj]

I listened to this through the podcast, it was absolutely wonderful. I learned a lot.

[@FrancescoBorgogni]

absolutely AMAZING, these two are incredibly brilliant and have a deeeep knowledge.

[@revelinagarcia2539]

Excellent and exciting discussion. Truly enjoyed it.

[@marykurdys3288]

So good! Many thanks!❤️

[@tau7260]

Matt, tremendous conversation and insightful, skillful, intelligent guests. This is one of the reasons I so much enjoy your channel. Thank you.

[@defeatingdefeaters]

This was very good! Both of them!!

[@lillabalint6050]

Best debate I have ever heard. Period.

[@sjoycedsouza]

Oh my Gosh!!! This is such an excellent debate and at amazingly right time. I was having discussions with Catholic friends and that was going nowhere. This debate is such a blessing. I can't say who won but my conscience is definitely well informed. Thanks @MattFradd God Bless

[@WesNG]

This is the best discussion I have ever witnessed.

[@MikeLahey]

This play-in music is fire! Matt came on, and I just rewound it to the beginning!

[@renefrias3982]

This was such a great debate.

[@eoinginty2675]

There's a incredible book called "The Hunted Priest" which is the autobiography of Fr. John Gerrard which deals in some part on the topic of this debate. Fr. John Gerrard lived in England during the Elizabethan era and saw many people put to death because of the Catholic faith. Fr. John would bring the sacraments to his parishioners in secret and would stay in "priest holes" in his parishioners houses when the English soldiers were searching for priests. Fr. John exhorted the people hiding him not to lie to the English soldiers when they came into the house but instead he told his parishioners to answer the question in an indirect way, so that they did not have to lie and therefore to avoid committing a sin. For example, Fr. John recounts a story of soldiers coming into the house in which he was hiding and heard the soldiers ask "Are you hiding a priest?" to which his parishioners responded "we know what would happen to us if we were to be found hiding a priest here". In this situation, they did not lie nor did they sin and in fact they told the truth. The parishioners knew very well that would be killed if they were found to be hiding a priest. They answered the question truthfully (indirectly) but most importantly they answered the question without having to lie or sin in doing so.

[@cml2176]

Just a note that St. Thomas (as much as I love him) would also find this sinful--as it is telling the truth with the intent to decieve. So...if Thomas' (and Augustine) definition of lie is what we are operating on, this too is morally flawed.

[@johnruplinger3133]

@@cml2176 That's simply false. They don't answer the question and don't have to. There is no lie at all here.

[@cml2176]

@@johnruplinger3133 He says intent must be truthful.

[@gerihall8265]

Fr. John Gerrard ought to be a saint!✨🙏🔥

[@ransomcoates546]

I imagine this priest was a Jesuit.

[@zoraidaiglesias934]

Loved it. God Bless all of you

[@lindamiller6939]

I just listened to this and it was great!!! The thought that kept coming to my mind was from a class on the Virtues by St. Thomas where I first heard of the virtue of Epikeia.

[@catholicmama1572]

This is incredibly thought provoking. I would lean towards lying being always wrong, BUT I certainly don’t think I could necessarily defend my stance at this point because Dr Smith made some great points I’ve never considered. Thank you for hosting this, it’s awesome!

[@christophergilroy3275]

This was so epic. I too was nodding agreeably with whoever spoke last. This will have me scratching my head for a while!

[@aidanlisney5546]

This was awesome!

[@IAMFISH92]

Shut up, Aidan.

[@danielm1991]

Every thing Fr. Pine touches turns to gold

[@brigidcannon8130]

Thank you both for this great discussion. I know that I need to hear this again as there were many nuances. Being a Dominican Sister and knowing our Charism is Veritas. I continue to learn and need to integrate what I have heard. I do try to speak the Truth in love and yet I know like St. Paul, I have weaknesses and yet I rely like Paul on the Mercy of God. Blessings and peace in all your ministries to bring us to the Truth and give glory to God by not telling lies that I know is a lie. I have learned “Seldom affirm, Never deny and Always distinguish.” Gratefully, Sr. Brigid

[@kenkessner9594]

Fantastic debate!

[@deidrecollins7381]

Not only is Fr. Pine brilliant, but humble and BEAUTIFUL!!! I trust him completely; he has articulated what I have believed for 30 years but could never explain in argument. His closing argument is out of this world.

[@cml2176]

Dr. Smith is spot on. Lying and deception are essentially different (lying being saying an untruth to someone in word or deed to someone who has a right to know and deception being saying an untruth to someone who doesn't need to know) in the same way that Murder and killing are essentially different. Thomas is also very nuanced about the nature of stealing--it isn't merely taking what belongs to another--there is the hierarchy of goods, that a person's life is a higher good than the right of another to have an excess of food (Universal Destination of Goods). There is a more nuanced, yet essentially distinct answer to this. Parents often insruct their children to tell a stranger at the door that Mom is busy" when in fact Mom is at the grocery store. Moral imperitives are rooted in the Natural law--and decieving Nazi's at the door is avoiding evil. This is what makes deception a possible use of language under justice (as I am saying what the Nazis and hidden Jews both deserve). The human person's intellect is designed for truth, but not all people deserve to know particular truths--such as my children don't deserve to know about discussions/activities between spouses, strangers don't deserve to know the whereabouts of my children, my neighbor to have my bank account number. This all boils down to the nature of "Is telling a falsehood intrinsically wrong?" or "Are all falsehoods lies?" Father Pine and Dr. Smith don't agree on the definition of lie.

[@sherrymacaroni5916]

After listening to Fr Pine's opening position, I almost thought the matter was settled... that there would be no way Dr Smith could effectively counter it. Now, after hearing her well thought out reasoning which is intellectually satisfying, I am grateful for her courage in addressing this issue. She makes perfect sense and has convinced me that her position is correct.

[@masterchief8179]

I was exactly on the opposite camp and I started to think Fr Pine’s position is the one correct here even though I wasn’t sympathetic to it at the first glance. Let me explain. I started more inclined to defend Dr Janet Smith’s position due to the fact that extreme evil simply exists and maybe some situations would demand us to adopt her approach, contrary to what appeared to be a moral rigorism. Her approach seemed also more naturally adaptable to St Alphonsus Maria Liguori’s moral theology, for example, a Doctor of the Church who is (in my humble opinion) the greatest moral theologian in history. As a lawyer as St Alphosus himself, I am always magnetically driven to his gigantic “Moral Theology” volumes (but I couldn’t find lying to save lives of the others in his pages though). But after the debate, I respected the Thomistic view on “lies are always wrong” much more than I thought I rationally would in the first place. What was decisive for me is that Fr Pine is emphatic in defending there is not one single human act in lying so as to protect the Jews from the Nazis but two acts, one appearing to be instrumental to the other: the saving of Jews from Nazis being the virtuous and charitable one; the lie as a means to saving people being the sinful instrument for it albeit the nature of sin couldn’t be but light and venial, since we can’t find grave malice in it. On the other hand, Dr Janet Smith seemed to presuppose our intellectual operations would come in one single simple act and therefore it could not be sinful to lie to save someone’s life. To what I question: are our operations of the intellect identical to God’s? What I started to notice is that performing things that are bad so as to achieve results that are good can be a very, very tricky position and maybe drive us to some kind of a cryptic moral relativism. Of course one would say that the thing is not actually bad (lying) since it is ordered to do good (saving the Jews from the Nazis) so the point is justly to say it is not bad or wrong in the first place. But isn’t it the EXACT argument Machiavelli used in his political theory and his controversial ethics? Isn’t he precisely saying the morality of the means can be justified by the virtue of the ends so that the ends will always justify the means? Wasn’t in fact Dr Janet Smith too dependent on this example of saving the Jews or other extreme ones to make her case? Maybe their disagreement was exactly into this, I mean, that one (Dr Janet Smith) sees one simple act and the other sees two distinguishable mental acts (Fr Pine), “act 1” in ordering the conscience - teleologically - to the savings of the Jews and “act 2” in ordering the conscience - instrumentally - to lie so as to achieve it. As an example, look at what Fr Pine says here: 1:15:25. I think I ended up much more attracted to Fr Gregory Pine’s argument to be sincere.

[@cml2176]

@@masterchief8179 Double effect. A lie is intrinsically evil/wrong--analogously, murder is intrinsically evil, stealing is intrinsically evil, etc. We can never, as Machiavelli suggests, do an intrinsic evil for a good reason. Dr. Smith is making a distinction that includes a "specifying feature" to the act of telling a falsehood to a person who doesn't deserve to know the truth (pertaining to the good being sought) and a falsehood. Her definition (which is in the Catechism originally and I have been teaching without knowing this portion was deleted!) is the only definition that answers all these questions (undercover cops, spies, espionage, military secrets, Santa Claus, etc.). It is a matter of justice.

[@masterchief8179]

@@cml2176 Still I dare to say it gets us somewhat very close to the kind of moral relativism that is implied in Machiavelli’s ethic and political theory’s position on moral philosophy: if the ends are legitimate, then the means are not to be morally condemned. That’s what I was afraid to conclude even though it is far more nuanced. Since saving the Jews is a good - and she adhere to the “implicitly clause” that says that this good is much greater than the magnitude of the bad in not conveying the truth “per se” -, then it is not that lying to save Jews from the Nazi’s Gestapo becomes a lesser evil but it becomes no evil at all. And the kind of definition of telling a falsehood (rather than lying) using the “specifying feature” of admitting it is not a lie if the person who gets the speech is not entitled to know the truth will eventually rely on a “hidden premise”: the assumption that a moral intuition, prior to the moral reasoning process, could make us achieve this kind of discernment. So the rationality by which we believe the (arguably bad) means to an (obvious good) end is justified relies too much on that kind of moral intuition Dr Janet talked about. Then I fear by strict coherence that Dr Janet can ultimate this reasoning by defending that the wrong evaluations on the core relations between means and ends ought NOT to be seen as a theme of intrinsic moral wrongness but as a matter of a bad moral intuition in understanding and deciphering the precise equation (of relations on means and ends). She explicitly said moral intuitions can be right or wrong in her final five minutes statement. To what I question if there is a real moral objectivity if we stretch things too much, or if it is aleatory to some considerable degree and we must then concede we will eventually stand on relying too much on our moral intuitions guiding those equations (of means and ends). So what I say here is that the Soviet Communists thought that practicing genocide from starvation in the Ukranian Holodomor was a means to achieve a greater good, namely the propulsion and the survival of the revolutionary processes and the propagation of the communist cause. So to the greater extent we should say it is not that practicing genocide is intrinsically evil (immoral, therefore sinful) but it was rather a problem of bad calibration on the moral intuitions on the part of Communist Party leaders and Soviet bureaucrats. I know one could say this Holodomor example is extreme in judging the morality of murder, but the same argument should be made in judging the morality of lying in the case of lying to save the life of the Jews from the Nazis. It was extreme too. Even acknowledging she specifically said murdering “innocent people” is always wrong, therefore giving adhesion to a premise she didn’t assume for lying, I fear two things here would necessarily follow (one, other or both): 1) one, that those assumptions in evaluating the moral differences in lying and murdering were maybe “a priori” and/or apodictic, an ‘accusation’ she happens to address to Fr Pine; 2) that by the same kind of reasoning she would adhere to some definition of “innocent” people, assuming the Soviets simply could say the Ukranian massacred people weren’t innocent, to what I sense we would admit there is space for arbitrarily define things if they fail to have an intrinsic moral consistency. I don’t have ANY doubt that a communist who says those massacres were legitimate due to the circumstances, despite being bad, to what he or she says the ends justified the means (and I have a friend just like that) simply will think it is much more fitting to say actually it was not intrinsically bad at all by virtue of the contextualizations and of “moral intuitions” that happens to be good or bad from time to time. I know murder is different but I couldn’t help but notice her argument somehow relied upon some sort of arbitrary “a priori” assumptions, I guess. But the problem for me is that it is exactly the encyclopedic definition for “moral relativism”. I am not saying that I agree entirely with Fr Pine’s position on lying, but Catholics should avoid moral relativism as the devil avoids the cross - and that made me reject the kind of argumentation Dr Janet used. And that’s what called my attention so deeply in the first place. I studied moral philosophy much more than I studied moral theology - and that thing didn’t cease to surprise me here when I finally thought it through.

[@morganandinggomes8485]

That contraception talk changed MY life 800 years ago too! I was only a teenager but it is SO powerful! And yup, we had the cassette tape! Listened to it in my mom's old van. ;)

[@zipppy2006]

Great video. I think it took a sharp turn in Pine's favor when Janet resorted to blatant consequentialism and then Santa Claus came up. I was deeply unimpressed with the way she just assumed that victims of well-intentioned lies would later thank those who had lied to them, and that anyone who found lies regarding Santa Claus objectionable must be psychologically imbalanced. I am glad Matt pushed back at that point, because these arguments from Janet were deeply impoverished. I was also unimpressed with her closing statement, which contained a number of strawmen. The content before Santa Claus was of much higher quality. It seems to me that Janet's claim about "the right to know the truth" broke down fairly quickly along the slippery slope lines indicated. Sure, you could claim that Nazi's don't deserve, but soon enough she was talking about dementia patients and children. At that point it was no longer about desert, but the liar was lying simply because he believed he had a good reason to do so. Neither dementia patients nor children are undeserving of truth. So I don't think her position even measures up to the 1992 catechism. Justifying lying seems to be little more than a matter of convenience. Finally, I think Augustine and Aquinas' point about "double-heartedness" transcends a mere slippery slope argument. The idea is that lies are intrinsically harmful to the liar and cleave his soul in two. The one who lies has to worry not only about forming a bad habit, but has also to worry about the significant harm that he has already inflicted on himself.

[@louisrochet7099]

Exactly!

[@tcideh4929]

So you should torture the dementia patient? You should answer fully in truth and let them feel the grief all over again? Also it sets up 2 sides. Truth is always good Lies are always bad If the Truth is always Good and people always deserve to hear it. Why did Jesus silences demons who were telling the truth? Luke 4:41 “Moreover, demons came out of many people, shouting, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew he was the Messiah.”

[@zipppy2006]

@@tcideh4929 First, Smith's argument is that some do not deserve the truth, such as the Nazi. Is the dementia patient undeserving of the truth? If not, then her argument is a non-sequitur, and amounts to little more than special pleading. Second, a duty not to lie is not a duty to always tell the truth. This is elementary, and Pine noted it clearly. We do not need to tell the Nazi the truth, but we cannot lie. You haven't listened to the debate, and you don't understand the positions.

[@jack_skeean]

This is probably my favorite debate I've seen on Pints so far! At the end, I found myself more convinced by Dr. Smiths arguments, but it was close. Fr Pine was brilliant as always!

[@inedanap6253]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices lol yikes, seems like you're the one who needs therapy here bud

[@benhutchinson9808]

@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices - mate, you may want to reflect on why it is you feel it so necessary to abuse Fr Pine online.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@peace-and-quiet kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️

[@frederickbecklo3227]

Pine is a consummate show-off, period,;and that’s my takeaway. Hell is filled with brilliant Dominican logicians. Frederick of Florence

[@youtubecharlie1]

@@frederickbecklo3227 ad hominem fallacy. How about you say something substantial?

[@MartySarmaidoff]

First off, best discussion you've hosted yet, Mr. Fradd. Love Dr. Smith. She really held her own here and probably then some. Your guests are the best. I know have more podcasts than I know what to do with. Keep kermit-ing it up. The host with the funny accent outlives them all. Secondly, what's up with Fr. Pine's face at 1:53:50. It's something like, I can't believe I'm not working on my dissertation to debate Santa Claus.

[@CatholicaTV]

Fantastic discussion.

[@justinmora9636]

By Dr. Smith’s definition of lying, it would seem that she thinks that lying is always wrong (if lying is telling a falsehood to someone who has a right to the truth).

[@serenity2228]

Wow, wow, wow. Incredible debate between two people who obviously want the truth and deeply respect one another.

[@laurenpatterson4681]

1:05:07 uniqueness of the calling of each member of the body- fascinating. Reminds me how Ignatius has a totally different pattern of discernment for one who is in/fighting mortal sin and one established in a life of grace

[@sherryperpetua]

So much nuance here, but after listening carefully and being sympathetic to both, I think Fr. Pine is actually thinking more deeply and with more depth of nuance.

[@chrisr8148]

This was great! Thanks for this. Side note, I think something might be off with the lighting or the dark color of the walls or something.... it looks like you have a floating head.

[@pedrogutierrez1547]

Teach it like Father Pine, do it like Dr. Smith. That’s my takeaway.

[@sheri6089]

Professor Smith, I would have adored being one of your students. You explain things both well and clearly-with real common sense!

[@Bergljotta]

Wow, this really clarified why lying is wrong. I wasn't sure to begin with and this was a long time coming.

[@Ca8tisawesome]

I also disagree with Dr. Smith that a joke is the same thing as a jocose lie. I disagree that the intent of a joke is to deceive. The intent of a joke is to surprise or shock, and often a person is led through deception, but ultimately a joke-teller doesn't want their conversation partner walking away from the conversation believing whatever falsehood they used to make the joke. I mean, when we make a joke and it's misunderstood, our immediate reaction is to clear up the misunderstanding. When we lie, unless we repent, we generally want the person who we've lied to to believe the lie indefinitely.

[@ClassicPhilosophyFTW]

Fantastic comment, very well-articulated.

[@cml2176]

She misspoke.

[@claymcdermott718]

That is very inconsistent. This is utilitarianism with jokes but not with saving lives. Your argument is that *ultimately* with a joke, though you intentionally deceive temporarily, it's okay cuz it's temporary and you wanna do something good (amuse). Couldn't I just as easily apply *everything* you just said to one of Smith's examples: the soldier who wants the Enemy to believe they'll be attacked at a different time in different manner? *Ultimately* he wants something good (beating Nazis) and it's only a temporary deception. See, Smirh says deceiving people who've a right to the truth is always wrong. No exceptions. Pine says any and all deceptions are wrong.....except for jokes. He------ he ~~~~ is the one making situational exceptions to the moral law; you just don't notice cuz his exceptions are absurd

[@taylorbarrett384]

Clay's answer is adequate.

[@Ca8tisawesome]

Honestly, I reasoned through this with an example of a joke and I think you're probably right. I was going to argue that because deception is the act of causing someone to accept something as true that is false, or valid that is invalid, a joke does not deceive. My argument was going to be that a joke sometimes entails one to speak falsehood, but the intent of the jester is not to deceive, but instead cause the person to recognize the falsehood and surprise them. Then I took an example: Bob: "I invented a new word." Amy: "Oh yeah, what is it?" Bob: "Plagiarism." I think it's fair to say that Bob was in fact lying because he spoke the first sentence with the intention to deceive Amy, even if only temporarily. Yeah, okay, I agree with you. Hmm, now I have to think harder on this, because you're right that in order to argue that lying is always wrong, you would need to argue that Bob sinned when he told that joke, but that seems intuitively wrong. This whole debate really boils down then to 2 questions I think: 1. Is lying inherently evil? If not, then lying is not always wrong. If yes, then... 2. Is it possible to intentionally perform an inherently evil act and not be sinning? If no, then lying is always wrong. If yes, then lying is not always wrong. The Church definitively says no to the second question in CCC 1755, so the only way for lying to be sometimes okay is for lying to not be inherently evil.

[@leoteng1640]

What a fantastic debate! I have to agree with Fr Pine that no one including the evil one should be derived from truth or prevented from knowing the truth. Our unwavering commitment to speak the truth must direct our deeds and when this is practised well, prudence will besiege our intellectual capabilities and it becomes much harder for evil to permeate our world. Deception is evil and using evil to fight evil or thinking that we can will evil is nonsensical from a logical deductive perspective. We should be polyanish in a certain way to live by the grace of God and by His providence set things right. We cannot decide what is right and wrong by our own intuition but by the precepts of God.

[@EssenceofPureFlavor]

Yes.

[@tstrong728]

Around 1:16:00 is where I hear the argument that convinced me that lying is always a sin... I began to consider that our already complex morality is being made more complicated when we lie, even for good reasons, when telling the truth might allow us to cooperate with God’s plan in the process of healing the broken-ness that entered the world at the fall.

[@fujiapple9675]

I am a Protestant viewer who is sympathetic to Natural Law, and other elements of Catholicism, and I found myself caught in the middle of the two interlocutors, agreeing with both Gregory Pine and Dr. Smith. Both made compelling arguments.

[@cml2176]

How cool of you to join the fun! Welcome!

[@VieiraFi]

Is there a common view on this particular subject in protestant circles? I've once met an interesting protestant fellow who never lied on anything even the most banal things, but I dunno if this is a common position.

[@declanhart1617]

Does anyone here think that Jesus would speak falsehood for any reason whatsoever? Or the Blessed Mother? Somehow I think Jesus and Mary would never speak falsehood. I realize this is not a highly intellectual statement, but in a catholic conversation it is worth asking.

[@sanjivjhangiani3243]

I doubt if either Jesus or Mary would lie, but that doesn't necessarily settle the question for the rest of us. These two perfect ones went above and beyond to set a good example for ordinary Christians. So, by analogy, Our Lord never used lethal force in His earthly life, but it might be the duty of a Christian to do so in one 's ordinary life.

[@mrburr_teachchem]

This was fantastic. After listening, I'd love to hear more thoughts on whether it's ok to decide I prefer the definition of lying in the '92 version of the CCC. To develop that, what should a faithful Catholic's stance be in regards to the CCC? I was initially taught to love it (and I do). Then I starting hearing fellow traditionally-minded people speak ill of it. Finally, I've heard that some misguided individuals (I'm sure that's putting it too charitably) would like to see words like "disordered" redacted from some pretty important places. Add the option of preferring a previously unabridged definition of lying and, well, I wonder what sort of ground I'm building on here. The winds blew and the floods came! Also, I'd just like to say that seeing Fr. Pine piece together, e.g., a moral framework of humor on the spot is truly as enjoyable as watching a fantastically trained athlete. I'm in awe of the speed and precision with which he builds up a cohesive stance from well-ingrained research and fundamental principles. I put all this work into a comment only to just notice it's all 2 years old! Oh well, if you read this God bless :)

[@TotusTuus-jf7qz]

My low level of understanding is that the Catechism is "safe" without being ipso facto magisterial. It was promulgated by the Pope and sent to the Bishops of the world for approval several times. Everything in it can be safely believed by a Catholic, without it having magisterial weight *because of being in the Catechism.* It is a summary of what the Church teaches. Though it is worthy of note that the CCC itself backs itself up with Scripture and Magisterium! It should not be disrespected or denigrated in the manner you seemed to describe from the trads. John Paul II said: "It is a sure norm for teaching the Faith." A faithful Catholic (An ordinary lay Catholic with limited theological knowledge) can and should accept everything in the CCC at face value, knowing he is embracing a safe view. That doesn't mean it is beyond improvement or expansion. Obviously those who push for changing the wording on disordered appetites are undermining Church teaching. The Catechism does not merely state "X is objectively sinful" on its own authority: it says "The constant teaching of Scripture and Tradition is that X is gravely sinful." (And this is true.) For me personally, the Catechism is, after the Scriptures and the Liturgy of the Hours, the first place for spiritual reading. The Catechism is truly a treasure chest of Scripture and Tradition, where the faithful can find sure, safe and beautiful Catholic truth. For some it can be dense and wordy; but I think we just need to take our time and read through it more slowly, and when we give it time its true riches shine forth. I am convinced that it is one of the great masterpieces of Christian writing, up there with the Summa, The Theologia Moralis, the City of God, etc. And I also love the Roman Catechism.

[@laurenpatterson4681]

1:45:20 reminds me all of a sudden of one of my favorite movies, Life is Beautiful

[@ms.leclaire9017]

Two fantastic minds on a very difficult topic

[@gerihall8265]

Never lie to dementia patients. Your answer should redirect them to something positive, that they loved, while still staying on topic. Ex: “When is Harry coming home?”(the husband who is deceased). Caregiver: “You loved it when he came home, didn’t you? What was his favorite dinner you’d cook for him?” Through your redirecting questions explore all kinds of loved filled memories.

[@roseh9193]

I wish we had heard that from the caregiver support people when my dad was alive. They are constantly insisting that you have to lie.

[@jy7383]

Geri Hall i agree with you

[@gooseabuser5963]

Withholding truth and misdirection are still lying.

[@gerihall8265]

@@gooseabuser5963 I’m going on the assumption that she already was repeatedly told her husband has died.

[@sophiajohnson8608]

@@gooseabuser5963 No, that is not lying.

[@liscampbell3]

The best show I’ve listened to on here. I just had this example. I was confused because I lied about having direct knowledge on a church scandal issue. But the person asking I felt wouldn’t do good with that info. But I was torn if I discerned correctly because it felt like a lie. I took it to confession. The priest told me it wasn’t a lie. He said the person asking didn’t have the right to have that privileged information therefore it was not a sin. He said if the Church came to me during an investigation and asked me that then no matter how I felt I am obliged to answer that correctly because they have that right to know and should act on it appropriately. He explained it the exact way Janet did. Very timely show for me since I just had this situation.

[@paulc7]

Or you could have told that person to their face that it is none of their business and avoid lying altogether.

[@christopherus]

I also emphatically fist pumped when Fr. Pine reminded us (somewhat too subtly, I would say) that God and His Providence are still out there, and it feels like most of this debate forgets this fact. If we admit Fr. Pine’s argument about the absoluteness of truth and genuinely want to please God by never lying, do we have enough faith in Him to speak the truth (or Truth) if Nazis come around?

[@claymcdermott718]

That argument is only worth treating if we grant that he's right about it being God's will that we never lie. It is therefore not valuable to me, as someone who is not already convinced by him. This is why, to his credit, he only mentioned it in passing.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

There’s only one TINY little problem with what you wrote above, Sir.☝🏼 There has never been, nor will there ever be, even the SLIGHTEST shred of evidence for the existence of the Godhead, that is, a Supreme Person or Deity.‬🤓 It is high time for humanity to awaken from all INANE superstitions such as the belief in a Personal God which created the Universe, would you not agree, Slave? 😩 P. S. When I typed “There’s only one TINY little problem with what you wrote above”, I was obviously being sarcastic, since, objectively speaking, your inane drivel was fully inebriated with a plethora of nonsensical assertions and unverifiable concepts. 🙄

[@gerihall8265]

Lying inherently fractures relationships (not good). Also, lying sets us up to lie in the future, so that our first lie is validated or least not contradicted. Both of these points opens the door for the enemy to have a field day.

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

@@gerihall8265 Sings: “It ain’t necessarily so...” 🎤

[@taylorbarrett384]

Clay's response is adequate. "Begging the question."

[@Ca8tisawesome]

I'm really torn, but I'm leaning towards lying always being wrong. One thing I'd ask is whether or not bodily death of a human being is contrary to eternal law. I think the only way you can say that lying is always wrong, but killing is not always wrong is by saying that the expression of falsehood contrary to eternal law, but the bodily death of a human being is not contrary to eternal law. I think that makes sense though.

[@don7502]

Good point. I think the only way Dr Smith's position is defensible is if you define lying in the way the 1992 Catechism does. Not saying that definition needs to be accepted but I couldn't think of any reason to reject it either (especially considering that the side I'm leaning towards requires that killing is not always wrong but lying is). But you have provided a reason to reject the 1992 definition.

[@cml2176]

@@don7502 We need to consider that Aquinas was making philosophical observations (enlightened by Divine Revelation and Tradition) in the manner of theogians...he isn't spot on everything...so there is nothing delitorious about the definition of lie in the 1992 CCC.

[@don7502]

@@cml2176 The definition was revised so that says something.

[@arturo4673]

Keep videos like this coming! Thank you señor Fradd. Dr. Janet Smith, I have never heard of you but I think I would love to hear from you and the experience you have had over your life time. I intellectually side with Father Pine but Dr. Janet Smith made an excellent point in her closing remarks and I would say no, Jews are not in my home. Two days later and still thinking about this video.

[@l0I0I0I0]

Interesting to say the least. Fr. Pine and Professoe Janet Smith both did an amazing presentation. I'm still on the fence on the topic which I have wondered about for a long time. I've seen sincere theology students abuse the notion that YOU don't deserve the truth and tell silly lies and I've see the reality of telling the truth to the destruction of other lives. I've seen that sometimes telling the truth will lead others into falsify due to the understandable distrust in the world, and due to the inability of others to (either or both) trust or discern an honest person. I would love to see more debate on the topic but diving deeper perhaps including the spiritual reality of reality. Blessings!

[@thatguyzwife]

Regarding Santa Clause...I definitely believed whole-heartedly for too long. In Grade 7 I stood in front of my class and passionately defended my position against the rest of my class, explaining that I had personally seen him flying with his reindeer (I can still vividly remember seeing it?!). The fact that nobody else believed, however, seemed to sway my absolute belief at least enough to cause me to come up with a plan. One of the presents I received from Santa was a pair of shorts. Some time after Christmas I wore the shorts and casually asked my mom where she bought them. AND she TOLD ME! I gasped. She gasped. My world crumbled but we laughed and laughed. I still have fond memories of Santa regardless of my embarrassment but I typically embrace embarrassment easily so long as it's humourous. As a parent, I think I've struck a decent balance. I think I tend toward Father Pine and Matt's perspective so I try very hard never to lie. I typically turn the question back to my children and ask what they believe and would never tell them flat out, "yes Santa, as the world sees him now, is completely real." That being said, I love what C.S. Lewis had to say on the topic very very much...well sort of on the topic...when responding to a little girl about her concern over loving Aslan more than Jesus. In any case, 2 of my kids have figured it out, but they play along well under threat of "if you don't believe in Santa you don't get a gift from Santa *wink wink* *nudge nudge*" - haha!

[@sherrymacaroni5916]

Blessed Migel Pro masqueraded as a street sweeper. Was that a moral wrong? Why would it only be morally wrong when verbalized, but not just acted out??

[@cml2176]

Msgr. Hugh O'Flarehty masqueraded to smuggled allies and Jews out of Nazi occupied Italy...and told many falsehoods in word and pen to Nazi officials. His determination eventually won over the commanding Nazi who ended up converting. I understand that lying is intrinsically evil, but telling a falsehood to one who doesn't deserve to know the truth is heroic. Telling a Nazi that there are Jews in my home doesn't convert the Nazi--it proves I am a coward.

[@EmmanuelGoldstein74]

Yep that’s the example I thought of too.

[@sherrymacaroni5916]

So, if you were asked if you knew where the priest was hiding and you responded non- verbally with a puzzled look and shrug of the shoulders, would that not also be a deception of communication???

[@thatguyzwife]

As a major Father Pine fan, it almost pains me to say that I think the wise doctor convinced me in her closing argument. It does seem more ethical to decide what is lying based off of who deserves to know rather than the effects.

[@telltale1235]

This was an excellent debate. Looking back, I think Dr. Smith's strongest argument was proposing the "pre- and postlapsarian" framework and asking why it is acceptable to kill an aggressor to save the life of an innocent but not lie to an aggressor to save the life of an innocent. And she made a strong case at the end about how Catholic teaching about the universal destination of goods should give a Catholic pause over whether lying might sometimes not be 'lying' in the same way that stealing is sometimes not 'stealing'. It seemed an important point she made about examining ourselves to avoid clinging to a fixed theory instead of being flexible to God. At the same time, when Matt later asked how her 'postlapsarian' approach paired with her contraception stance, I wasn't persuaded that her positions are consistent, and I do think consistency really matters. Another part of Dr. Smith's argument that I particularly hope she might tweak in future is when she talks about imagining God telling a person how "proud" He is of them for lying; to be honest, I found the way this was framed a little off-putting, especially since it seemed to imply that people who persevere in avoiding lies wouldn't receive the same accolade from God (as if they have poorer judgment or lesser love than she does). And none of us can speak for God -- I tend to get wary when people seem to too-casually think that they know God will judge them approvingly. straw man Beyond that, it seemed to me that she sometimes proposed things as 'intended to deceive' that just didn't seem, to me, to fit that category. For example, I just don't think it's true that anyone watching Hamlet on-stage is actually being intentionally deceived into thinking they're peering into some portal that's revealing real events: everyone is aware that what they are watching is not to be mistaken for anything-other-than-entertainment. Similarly, that split second as a joke lands, just before the incongruity resolves in the listener's mind, that she categorized as 'deception' -- that just doesn't seem to me to fit the genre of deception either. Since the point of telling a joke is that the other person 'get' the joke, the combination of incongruity and resolution is delivered as one coherent 'thing': as one packaged speech-performance the intention of which seems singular (to entertain, with (hopefully!) no interceding explanation necessary to resolve listener confusion, as good jokes shouldn't leave listeners confused and shouldn't need explanation). I was actually startled by just how many types of lies Dr. Smith turned out to think were not only licit but should be expected from people for the purpose of comforting others. I honestly think the examples started to get to the point where there were lots of alternative ways to comfort the people in the examples, without lying, and it started to seem like (apologies to Dr. Smith who really did bring a lot to this conversation, I'd probably point others to this video as an excellent debate) an argument from a lack of imagination. It just hasn't been my own experience that I need to lie to comfort people. To my memory there have ALWAYS been alternative ways to effectively and compassionately comfort people without telling any lie at all. I honestly can't think of any counter-examples (although I think the case of a dementia patient is the best counter-example and requires the most finesse -- but in the case of conversations with cognitively-affected persons I can actually imagine an argument that speech acts intended to guide a cognitively-affected person (say, through a drug trip or situations of impacted memory) don't count as 'lies' if you're operationalizing constructs within the subjectively distorted reality that is the only reality the affected persons have access to (like talking someone off a window ledge by telling them to walk towards the giant purple teddy bear they think is behind you), because even if only subjectively, those subjective concepts do 'exist' for that person within the context of their state of being mentally affected -- and maybe there's some application of that to the case of dementia patients convinced they're young again, or that dead people are just out at the store). But leaving aside the tricky dementia case which might be a rabbit hole with many different types of answers, it does just seem to me overall that providing alternative comfort methods is just a matter of creativity and sensitivity, and being willing to spend the time and mental/emotional energy to help someone without taking the shortcut of lying. And I'd personally be uncomfortable if I knew the person I was socializing with thought it was moral to lie to me to comfort me; I want gentleness, sure -- but not lies, not even lies intended to make me feel good. Gentleness and truth; 'truth' doesn't mean the harshest truth delivered in the most exhaustive, context-inappropriate way. Fr. Pine was excellent as always. He's a treasure. His only argument that I didn't find fully persuasive was the argument about Jesus's speech act about going up to the feast of booths -- but as Fr. Pine noted, he himself didn't consider himself to have a full answer for that question, and what he said was very brief (although he later seemed to suggest that maybe someone else's intervening action changed Jesus's action in between his speech act and travel action? which if so, I'd just like to have heard fleshed out a bit more). Because it seems to be the strongest and simplest argument put forward in favour of lying in the whole video, if Jesus lied. And Dr. Smith picked up on that very well. Apart from that, Fr. Pine was clear, generous, cheerful. And every point he made (the integrity of speech acts as a matter of justice; the misleading framing that sometimes limits this debate from seeing that multiple possible actions are available; the salvific witness value of truth to even the souls of aggressors) was a refreshing affirmation of the strongest case against lying. At least, it reflected my own thinking on the matter from before listening to the debate, and so it was good to see it reflected on the screen and not only be saying it in my head and frustrated that it wasn't represented.

[@EssenceofPureFlavor]

Fully agreed.

[@pisceanrat]

Good points!

[@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices]

Good and bad are RELATIVE. ;-)

[@jordanphillips9133]

Is it possible that the principle of double effect applies here? Seems like in the hard cases that keep being brought up the intention is protection, not deception. Since the intention is right, and the consequences are not intended, but foreseen, does the principle of double effect apply? Thanks for doing this Matt, I’ve been chewing on this for a long time. Great debate.

[@Anthony-qx1ps]

I do not think double effect applies in this scenario. I believe double effect is usually applied in the opposite way. So for example, ectopic pregnancies. Your intent is not to kill the child, but your act is also not directly killing the child. The act is the removal of the fallopian tube, not the murder of the child. I don't think intent is the only factor in the principle of double effect. If we were to say that the principle of double effect applies simply because of intent, so so many lies would be moral. Cashier asks something about your marriage? Telling a falsehood is licit because your intent is to protect the privacy of your marriage. These are my thoughts anyways

[@mattmackinnan8557]

Double effect cannot be used in cases where the object of the act is a moral absolute/ intrinsically disordered. So if we can agree about what lying is and if we can agree that it is always wrong, then double effect cannot apply.

[@youtubecharlie1]

What I’m starting to see now (and I don’t know if it’s because of this debate) is that people are saying that Jesus **lied** in John 7:8-10… It seems to me like people are going as far as saying that Jesus lied (heresy) to justify lying.

[@johnkeck]

Great discussion! We need more of such discussions in this world. I wish I could in the end agree with Dr. Smith, but I think Fr. Pine had the better argument.

[@defeatingdefeaters]

When I leave the lights on before leaving home, am I also being deceptive to would-be criminals who would otherwise ransack my home? In this case am I sinning?

[@renzolam6773]

Not an expert here, but correct me if i am wrong. it seems to me that this may not be a sin because this may count as ‘mental reservation’. There are several possibilities that a person leaves his lights on: 1) because he is at home, 2) he is not at home, but he forgot to switch off his lights, 3) he is just going away for a short while so he think it is troublesome to turn them off, 4) no reason at all, 5) because the house looks prettier, etc... In this case, the pedestrians do not need to know the reason for which you switch on your light. The criminal thinks there is a possibility that there might be people in the house, but that is just one of the possibilities, and it is very likely that the criminal knows that a house with lights may have people in it, but not necessarily. Also, there is sufficient reason to withhold the reason behind leaving the lights on to the criminal, who doesn’t need to know the reason behind your every actions. Perhaps looking up which type of mental reservation is permitted would be of help. Have a nice day!

[@danielballabani1232]

no deception is not a sin. lying is a sin. speech has its teological end for truth. To say something contrary to truth is a lie. An abuse of speech. but keep your lights on to decieve is not sinful in the least its wise. you haven't done anything contrary to the natural law.

[@iforbach4003]

I think that's kind of a good point and my take on this debate. An enemy has declared war on us. Subterfuge and deceit are part of warfare.

[@rafaelgvsmao28]

I was totally expecting Father Pine to win. But, now that I watched the whole thing, I'm glad Janet won. Totally shifted my perspective

[@tatooine13]

If lying is always wrong, why did (for example) St. Therese not attempt to make the truth be known about events that occurred wherein she was ultimately blamed when in fact the blame was rightly placed upon another person? I think there are times when it is okay for the truth to not be known at a given time. Yes, everyone has a right to the truth ultimately, there is also a timeline for such a thing. At the end of time, all truth will be revealed to all, and I believe, along with the points that Dr. Smith makes, that there are different times in which that truth should be made evident. If everyone is owed the right to truth at all times, then why does God not reveal Himself in all His Glory to us from the moment we exist? Because God knows when the best time to reveal Himself to each of us for each of us to have the best chance at spending all eternity with Him.... Would love to hear more of Dr. Smith and Fr. Pine's thoughts on this!

[@gregoryvess7183]

One thing is certain: it would be very nice for the Church to settle this question definitively.

[@ddedward]

Best debate ever! Both sides were articulate and respectful but Janet Smith came out on top... she was right on the money, very logical and her replies lined up with the moral sense of the faithful in that the church has not condemn just wars which necessarily includes soldiers in war lying when engaged in spying and subtifuge. Nor has church frowned on police undercover actions --moreover to contextually and metaphysical justify humor deceptions but to state misleading nazis is venial sin is logically incoherent in my view.

[@ForwardTalk]

Amazing debate. I agree with Dr. Smith.

[@elgusto5329]

This is why Grace is so crucial. To have that wisdom to act accordingly to God’s will. Life so hard for us mortals. Avail yourself to the sacraments as much as possible. Excellent discussion. Janet Smith is intelligent and Father Pine is on his way to a holy priesthood. Praise God!!

[@sherryperpetua]

I continue to reflect on this, and as I do, I become so aware of the pernicious and naive mistakes at work in the position that believes some falsehoods are moral. I also keep thinking that Father Pine mounted an argument, whereas Dr. Smith seemed to appeal more to emotion throughout and bounce around. I want to say not seeing the strength, beauty, and power of Father Pine's position is at bottom a failure to really grasp the nature of the fight we're in as fallen souls and as Christians. Other thoughts: the way to bridge the gap between the first version of the Catechism's teaching on lying and the current one, it seems to me, is that everyone, by virtue of being an image of God, has a right to the truth. This means there is no substantive difference between the first and second versions. That said, while I tend strongly toward Father Pine's position, the idea of mental reservation seems to warrant more thought. I think if one can reasonably assume the question from the Nazis at the door to actually be, "Are you hiding anyone [we want to kill]?", then saying "No" to that is the truth.

[@sherryperpetua]

@Ed I appreciate this response. I had seen your comment about this earlier in the thread. For my own part, I don't find Father Pine's position (which is also supported by saints and agrees with the Catechism) attractive so much because it is absolute and allows me to know what I as a subjective person ought to do in a hard situation. I find it attractive because it is such a sacrifice of pure love and pure faithfulness to the God Who is Truth Itself, made out of true and tender faith in God's power to bring good out of suffering. If one were in this position and refused to lie for love of God--Who, by the way, we are to love above neighbor, and for the sake of Whom we love our neighbor in the first place--the consolation would not be, "Well at least I am in a state of grace!" It would be, "Lord, you are my portion forever, I trust in You." I thought Father Pine's points about apostasy and the saints who refused to do so capture this same radical love and faith so well. My own patron, St. Perpetua, refused to deny Christ even though she had just given birth to a little boy and her father pleaded with her to do so so she could live. That Dr. Smith said she could be "persuaded" that even denying the faith as a lie could be permissible betrays much about the blindspot in this vision of what it means to love God and neighbor alike, for indeed, we never do more for our neighbor than when we sacrifice for love of God. (The movie A Hidden Life speaks to these themes very powerfully and beautifully. Every soul should watch it.) I loved when Father Pine brought up St. John Henry Newman's point that we should prefer the destruction of the entire material universe to the commission of a single sin. If only we knew how sweet and worthy Our Lord is of our all! As far as the idea that we should not celebrate the lying, but we simply tolerate it in some cases--this is not Dr. Smith's argument because this admits lying is a sin. She would say in some cases falsehoods are not the sin of lying, but are themselves morally laudable. How to square that with God's essence as Truth and Love Itself is impossible. But either position falls short of being Perfect Love even as our Father is. One more point: I have heard accounts of times Christians refused to lie in dangerous situations, and the Lord blessed their faith immediately. One account was of a man escaping from Vietnam. He was sneaking into a boat at night when guards came up and asked what he was doing out. He made up an excuse and lied, and when they walked away, he immediately confessed it to God and said he would never do that again. He ran into the guards later, and again they pressed him about what he was up to, and he told them the truth. Their response? They wanted to go with him! According to the source of the story, the man lives in CA now.

[@sherryperpetua]

@Ed Thanks for your thoughtful response. I agree that we are not truly ourselves, especially our redeemed selves, until we are free to love as Christ does on the Cross, and this fact is rooted in the very nature of our creation, and our new creation by baptism. At the same time, for some reason, the term "self-sacrifice" seems not the right term to employ in the present discussion--as in using "self-sacrifice" to equal "good", where we mean I end up dying, and all other forms of 'sacrifice' (as in someone else ends up suffering in some way following a choice we've made) as bad and not in themselves a form of self-giving/surrender/sacrifice. I'm feathering this out as I write, so forgive me if this lacks the clarity Fr. Pine is so readily able to bring! To me, refusing to lie in our hypothetical case is an immolation of self in the Divine Will for the sake of love, obedience, humility, faith, and hope. Why hope? Because we believe in the positive feedback loop (rooted in the Trinity and trinitarian architecture of reality) that giving ourselves and our souls over entirely to Christ will indeed be the best thing we can possibly do even for our neighbor, especially for our neighbor's soul. St. Perpetua is an amazing example of this. Her father did not beg her to deny Christ and live for her own sake--he begged her to deny Christ and live for the sake of her little boy. She refused, was killed, and her little boy was left here without her. And yet, in abandoning all to God in holy martyrdom, she actually did more for her son than she could have ever done by any other earthly act. She showed him the true way, the way to true life, in Christ, and she went to intercede for him in heaven. This is why when we act, I think we ought to "do all things as unto the Lord", and unto Him alone, and leave the fruit for our neighbor to His work. I think when we imagine our own control as playing too large a part in our neighbor's good, we actually end up doing harm to them and ourselves because we fall into a kind of Pelagianism that does not simply and singularly surrender to God in trust that He is the only One who can do anything of true worth. This is a fundamental mistake at work in so much false compassion today. For instance, the modern world imagines the compassionate doctor will euthanize the patient in chronic pain, or abort the child in the woman's womb who may be a threat to her bodily health, etc. But the Christian says suffering, and even death, are not the ultimate things to avoid. Indeed, they can be things to be embraced should the Lord in His goodness and wisdom call us to them. What we ultimately want to avoid at all costs is lack of love for God. Love of neighbor does flow out from this and is intimately tied to it since Christ is in our neighbor, but love of God in and of itself is the beginning and the end of all things. I'm not putting this well, but what I am trying to say is that it seems to me that there is a similar flaw in the logic that says we ought to "put up with lying" to show compassion to our neighbor and the logic that says "we ought to put up with abortion" to show compassion to our neighbor. Forgive me if that seems to be putting it too strongly, but I think when we really flesh out the theology of speech--that Our Lord is the Logos, that He speaks reality into being, that He is Truth & Love at once, divinely simple, indicating truth and love cannot be separated in reality--I think it is possible to see that there is something worth pondering here. I'm no philosopher, but to me, to imagine the Incarnate Logos uttering a falsehood is to imagine words that have no sense, like square circles. And if Christ would not do it, then we should not either. I also think implying that if we do not lie for the sake of the ones hidden, then we are guilty of sacrificing them is a non-sequitur. It seems to place the blame in the wrong place. I'm also wondering what to make of the notion that it is our duty, in an absolute way that informs the example we're using, to spare others, and the reality that the Father does not spare the Son or Mary, but He gives them over to suffering for the sake of love and His holy will (though here I am really getting into mysterious wonders!). Another thing I want to point out is that the Lord says, incredibly and with such sweet mercy, that unless we "hate father and mother" we are not worthy of Him. He also consistently called his Apostles to abandon all for Him, and the saints constantly talk about the need for holy indifference and detachment. Why is this the case? I think in part because we tend to do moral calculus very badly when we are attached to our neighbor more than to God, and we tend to develop a gorilla grip that seeks to manipulate and control situations instead of surrendering to God and leaving it to Him, without Whom we can do nothing. I say all this not to undermine the seriousness of the Second Greatest commandment to love our neighbor **for the sake of Christ** (people always forget that part!), but to underscore that the only way to love others is to love God with a singular and all-consuming love. These are just some thoughts, poorly put and not totally fleshed out. But I've enjoyed the chance to explore this with you! God's peace.

[@sherryperpetua]

@Ed I have not yet read your comment in its entirety, but I look forward to reading it and thinking about it soon. For now, I wanted to mention two quick things: (1) I think what I was trying to say about 'self-sacrifice' vs 'immolation' is simply that sacrifice of self to God in deepest love is a giving up of self for neighbor too, by its very nature. "Immolation," "surrender", etc.are terms that come to mind over "self-sacrifice" perhaps because the latter seems to lend itself to our ideas about the true good and our program of giving/altruism, where the former seem to lend themselves to God's mysterious actions rooted in love and abandonment. A friend told me the other day that a Protestant writer speaks of simply obeying the Lord and leaving the consequences (fruits) to Him. This idea grows more and more central in my own spiritual life as I seek to decrease so that He might increase. (2) The idea of mental reservation that I mentioned in my original comment--that making a reasonable assumption about the full question of the Nazi at the door and answering in accord...I keep thinking about that, and what I sense might be its overlap with the deep and tender mercy of using the true pronoun for the person confused about which belongs to him. I'll keep chewing on that and respond to your full comment after giving things some more thought. Thanks for being a companion down the rabbit hole.

[@mtocalcutta]

@@sherryperpetua Your response captures my heart in this matter perfectly. I just watched this episode and it was difficult for me because I wanted to tell everyone all the things in your response (before I read your response). I am consoled to read it. I’m thankful that a true response was given. I rejoice at truth being proclaimed even in a comment box. The Father was amazing. I would love to have conversations with him. He said everything Fr Ripperger had explained on truth. I’m sad to say I would never trust Dt Smith to give me advice. I trust no one who operated on feelings and unformed conscience. She is not a theologian and sadly people have called her that. She may be very holy in ways but a theologian no. I’m very disturbed to think she would entertain apostasy.

[@MaaFreddy]

Great programme, outstanding quality ! I was wondering what about omission ? To stick to the externe WWII example , Jews usually had to make themselves known to the authorities and register at the local town hall. Would omitting to do so be considered a form of lie by omission ? This is obviously an extreme case but you see the logic. Thanks for any views on this .

[@a_blueridgeCatholic]

If we all resolved to radically tell the truth, the human race would propel toward heaven. If we all resolved to lie only under good circumstances, I'm convinced that the human race would largely remain the same. Two things convinced me of this: 1) Fr. Pine's point of certain seemingly good lies being a response to (and therefore playing into) immoral structures like war, and 2) my own brokenness and how quickly I would exploit the latter resolution to ever-broaden my definition of lies that I consider good.

[@roseh9193]

Adam, How do you answer the dimentia question from the beginning of the debate?

[@gerihall8265]

@@roseh9193 I just wrote a response to that in the comments!

[@partydean17]

@Rose H I'm imagining my mom digging herself deeper and deeper into that fantasy about my dad being in the alps. If she ever had a point of temporary lucidity perhaps she would start to internalize my constant lie. Seems dangerous to guess what the best course of action would be when so many variables are in play

[@aiantenor9080]

one way of helping this channel is to NOT skip the Ads, maybe you can skip some..or mute. But it will help this channel if not, be a patreon

[@jayakare]

Amazing debate, Can i agree to both of them? I just trust that the Holy Spirit will guide me when I end up lying and causing injury to my own soul or another soul.

[@kathycarpenito]

Great debate………… sort of makes you think of what you say, in what context and how you say it.

[@tylercurll7819]

That was awesome. I have to side with Fr. Pine at the end, though Dr. Smith really forced me to think this through. Her position smells a little utilitarian.

[@ryannafziger5158]

It does seem utilitarian, although I think the response that Dr. Smith (who is not a utilitarian) would say that the apparent utilitarian weighing the good versus the evil conflicts actually don't exist because the lie being told is not an evil. I think that her argument cannot really escape consequentialism when applied, even if you could get out of the utilitarian appearance.

[@bethmedina9200]

If everyone always has the right to the truth, then when the neighborhood women asked me how much weight I gained or what it was like to be pregnant with twins, should I have told each and every one of them that I adopted my husband’s twins and then open the conversation up to more questions, in which i owe them the truth, especially when my kids’ adoption circumstances are really their story to tell & not mine?

[@laleydelamor1327]

Maybe I skipped something, but did Dr. Smith mention the distincton between restrictio pure mentalis and restrictio late mentalis? If so, can someone say in wich minute? Also I would like to hear what moral theology has to say about “clickbaiting”, I think nowadays is so important to talk about it. When yes and when no. GB🙏

[@GrahamDickins]

12:14 38:09 54:03 01:39:06 Definitions 24:52 55:14 01:50:02 02:05:20 02:12:06 ‘someone who has the right to know the truth’ 25:21 01:27:41 01:44:57 'they will thank me for [lying]' 27:43 01:13:41 01:34:08 01:36:15 02:09:09 Murder 28:23 01:14:53 Spies + undercover police 28:48 51:55 55:44 Military 29:12 ‘I'm not busy’ 30:06 Dementia 31:23 39:19 Venial sins 32:34 Mental reservations 33:07 01:59:26 'even if you speak the truth with the intention to deceive, that is immoral' 42:00 02:06:59 02:09:47 ‘[lying to save Jews] goes against all of our moral intuitions’ 44:58 'We shouldn't play the game' 49:14 57:54 01:03:25 Apostasy 52:36 58:39 01:39:29 Jokes 01:26:46 01:39:14 Acting (genre) 01:44:35 Children + Santa 01:54:03 02:01:03 John 7 Sorry this is incomplete -- just making some notes for friends and thought others could benefit.