National Debate II: The Discussion Continues

Whether we (or politicians) like it or not, God is a part of the process of any national debate on morality. This was the consensus of the second Jesuit Institute-University of Johannesburg discussion held at Holy Trinity Church at Braamfontein, Johannesburg, on Wednesday 9th June 2010.

Naturally, how one understands God’s role and the extent to which this role can be articulated in explicitly religious language remains a point for ongoing discussion.

Archbishop Buti Tlhagale OMI of Johannesburg presented a strong Catholic case for religious engagement in the public sphere. He drew on principles of natural law common (it is generally assumed) to all reasonable people and expressed the need for a clearly articulated ground for moral consensus. Rooted in natural law, Catholic Social Thought holds to a number of key themes that have direct bearing on public morality – the common good, respect for persons, subsidiarity and the option for the poor. None of them are specifically Catholic in content and can thus be used very effectively in finding common ground.

The Archbishop was fiercely critical of the widespread corruption he saw as part of contemporary South African public life. It was challenges like these that made a national debate on morality essential, he said.

Distinguished political analyst Professor Steven Friedman holds a joint post between Rhodes and Johannesburg universities and is a regular preacher in a small Reform synagogue. He acknowledged that while it was necessary to bring a strongly religious presence into the moral debate, it was by no means easy. Within religions as much as between them debates can be acrimonious. He told a highly amusing Talmudic tale of how, during a dispute, God tried to convince a group of rabbis that one of their number was right – and got told off for His trouble!

Despite this, Friedman argued, religious persons need to take a clear stand on public issues. This was particularly true when faced by a tendency to see public life as a means to feather one’s own nest. The sheer greed of politicians disturbed Friedman. One of the challenges facing religious communities today, he said, was reminding corrupt politicians that “enough is as good as a feast.”

Having been tortured in the 1980s by a deacon within his own church, Frank Chikane was all too aware of how internally divisive political issues can be within religions. Yet, he argued, we certainly need a more publicly engaged Church in this new era. Like the other speakers, Chikane clearly saw the need for a debate on national morality that moved beyond the narrow confines of parliamentarians’ private lives.

The corruption of public office, he said, flew in the face of the ‘revolutionary morality’ that was part of the culture that he and many other activists had imbibed during the struggle. There was a need for a new struggle and a return to what he called a ‘conservative revolutionary morality’ based on a contextual reading of the Christian Gospel.

Debate was once again quite robust. A number of the audience raised the point that since 1994 many of the public figures who had led the moral struggle against apartheid had disappeared from the scene. The role of the Church had in some ways faded into the background. Other respondents felt that the nature of the public debate had changed so much that a new language was needed to continue the engagement. It was no longer enough for the Church and religious community to simply ‘protest’.

One problem that was raised by the floor was that of moral relativism. By talking about ethics in context was one simply saying that there was no such thing as right or wrong? None of the panel wanted to accept such a claim, even though they equally were unwilling to see simplistic one-line solutions to complex problems.

For a number of participants, the questions that have been raised by this and the previous conversation on the ‘national moral debate’ need to continue. What the conversations have shown, I think, is that a significant part of the South African public is open to discussing matters that move beyond narrow ideological or sectoral interests.

Among the guest speakers there has been a strong common feeling that public morality cannot simply be expressed according to particular and institutional religious doctrines, but must reflect a broad basic consensus between and within religious traditions. In this respect, there is clearly a ‘space’ for God in the public debate.