Questions can be viewed here.
_____________
1. Joe did not commit suicide.
(1) He sought to save Bill's life, not to kill himself.
(2) Swimming in itself is an indifferent act.
(3) The saving of Bill's life is not produced by the evil effect of Joe's death, for if by some chance his life were saved, the good effect would follow just the same.
(4) To give one's life to save another's is a proportionate reason.
2. Yes.
(1) He sought first to kill himself, an evil act.
(2) This act is wrong of its very nature.
(3) The good effect: namely, the saving of Bill's life is produced by an eyil means - Joe shooting himself.
(4) The reason is the same as in the first case.
3. No.
(1) The good effect, the weakening of an enemy, is directly intended.
(2) Destroying a ship is not evil in itself.
(3) His own death is not the cause of the good effect, the destruction of the carrier.
(4) There is a sufficient reason for permitting himself to be killed.
4. No. He intends to murder his fellow prisoners in order to obtain a good effect, to save the lives of himself and his family. The fact that they are willing doesn't change the case, because they have no authority to consent to the unjust killing of themselves.
5. No. All the conditions are fulfilled.
(1) He intends the good effect, the destruction of the ammunition dump.
(2) This is not evil in itself.
(3) The death of the women and children in the maternity hospital is not the cause of the destruction of the ammunition dump.
(4) The saving of the lives of his fellow countrymen and the weakening of the enemy is a proportionate reason for the death of the people in the hospital.
6. No. The conditions are fulfiIied.
(1) She does not wish to kill herself but she does want to escape death by fire.
(2) Jumping out a window is not evil in itself.
(3) The good effect, escaping a horrible death by fire, is not brought about by the evil effect, being killed, because if she were caught in a fire net, the good effect would follow anyway.
(4) She is not putting her life in any worse danger than she is in at present and she is escaping death by fire.
_________________________
Adapted from The Queen's Work Magazine, January 1947
2 comments:
Some of the purported answers to the questions (which are here) are either astoundingly wrong (e.g. #3), or, at the least, need crucial additional information before an answer can be given (#1, 5).
Taking one's life indirectly is not suicide, and may be done for sufficient reasons. Indirect killing of self (sometimes wrongly called "indirect suicide") occurs when a man has no intention of ending his life but consciously does something which has two effects, one of which is intended and good, and the other a foreseeable but unwanted death. It is presumed that the good effect follows from the action as immediately as one's death. For example, an executive suddenly discovers that his entire investment in a corporation was lost, with no chance of recovery. He is now a poor man. So he turns a gun on himself and ends his life to escape the future. In this case, death is the purpose of his act; it is not the means to an end. Moreover, if a person were trapped in a sinking ship and to avoid the suffering he anticipates, shoots himself – he intends death directly as the means of escaping the pains of suffocation by drowning. In both cases, the actions are morally evil and forms of suicide.
On the other hand, if a pilot in time of war tries to approach and set fire to an enemy ship loaded with ammunition, he does not by that fact directly want to cause his own death. No doubt he foresees what will happen and may even be sure that the strafing mission will cost him his life. Were it possible, he would prefer to carry the mission out successfully and survive the ordeal. What he directly intends is to cripple the enemy, and to do this he allows (but does not desire) his own concomitant destruction.
In the same category belong such actions as a man jumping from a great height to escape burning to death, especially if there is some chance of survival. A woman may do the same to avoid being taken by a man who wants to force her by rape. However, sexual violation would not be sinful on her part, provided she resisted to the best of her ability and then withheld internal consent to the actual intercourse....
------------------
From the Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Archives, Moral Theology,
Chapter IV
Life and Bodily Integrity
Post a Comment