Natural Law versus the BBC
Going hand in hand with the TV’s destruction of the natural environment is the destruction of the moral and spiritual environment. As Catholics we believe in Natural Moral Law. Of this St Thomas Aquinas says ‘The natural law is nothing other than the light of understanding placed in us by God; through it we know what we must do and what we must avoid. God has given this light or law at the creation’. 1 Therefore as Catholics we know in our hearts what is true and what is false, and there is a responsibility for us to act in accordance with God’s law. If we see that there is surfeit of views and themes expressed on BBC or any other channel that are contrary to Natural Moral Law can we support it? The answer of course is no, we cannot. However, another question will be asked of us:
Q: Surely we need to watch the television in order to know what they are up to.?
A: Using the Thomist sense of reasoning we can say we know what they are up to for anyone who has watched the TV or listened to the radio for even just a few days will know. It is the inversion of God’s Natural Moral Law; therefore should we place ourselves within an occasion of sin in order to gain a knowledge of themes that are good and evil? 2 Satanic TV puts good and evil on the same level and make good seem evil and vice versa.
Q: What are these issues and themes supported by the BBC that are contrary to God’s Natural Moral Law?
A: Sin.
Q: What is sin?
A: Sin is an utterance, deed or a desire contrary to the eternal law and therefore an offence against God.3
Q: What specific sins are you talking about?
A: All sin; but, in particular, the BBC in its support of abortion, contraception, euthanasia and homosexuality etc. is inverting natural law and therefore, together with the positive depictions of adultery, fornication and even occasionally pornography has made the TV an occasion of sin.
Q: Aha, aha - you are being judgmental and you lack charity?
A: The most charitable act is to point out where a person is in grave sin for not to do so would be negligent and a cause of my own sin. There are ‘sins that cry out to heaven’ like sodomy4 and the blood of Abel, killing. 5 St Paul says to the Galatians ‘Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like. Of the which I foretell to you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God.’ 6
Q: But where does love come into this? and didn’t St Paul say the greatest virtue is love7 - shouldn’t we love the sinner and didn’t Jesus come to save sinners?
A: Following St. Thomas, a better word for Christian love is charity, for love on its own can be selfish but charity is a love that is giving. We should love the sinner but hate the sin. And God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son8, sent as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.9
It is the unchaste selfish love that has been championed by the BBC that demands human rights but forgets the rights of God. The left-liberal tribe of the politically correct broadcaster has abandoned natural law for a sort of rough justice that is neither reasonable nor charitable. To proclaim this message we have BBC radio. You really cannot miss this for it almost completely dominates the airwaves particularly the spoken word, - radio such as Radio 4 and Radio 5, with World Service to bring the ‘best’ of these stations to the world.
References:
1, St Thomas Aquinas, Dec. Praec. 1. Quoted The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 1955
2, Cf. Genesis 3:5 3, St Augustine, Contra Faustu. St Thomas Aquinas and CCC 1850. 4, Genesis 18:20 5, Genesis 10:4 6, Galatians 5:19-21 7, 1 Corinthians 13:13 8, John 3:16 9, 1 John 4:10 - Douay-Rheims Bible
Excellent initiative!
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