Response to Patrick Cerra's February 7, 2024 letter to the Peninsula Pulse
Dear Patrick,
I saw your letter at https://doorcountypulse.com/letter-to-the-editor-rekindling-our-commitment-to-oaths/.
You describe the Nicene Creed and the Ten Commandments as being oaths. I checked the book and found no indication there or elsewhere that former Rep. Liz Cheney describes these as oaths; I am not sure how you came to categorize them as oaths.
This is a discussion on the subject of creeds versus oaths, which was written for a website trying to attract search engine traffic. It gives a good description of the differences: https://thecontentauthority.com/blog/creed-vs-oath
The Ten Commandments are part of the law of Moses. Laws are applied to people being governed no matter whether they personally consent to it or not, while an oath is stated personally, in the sense of promising or cursing somehow. Laws and oaths are both more formal or solemn than everyday communications, but they are different things. An oath could be spelled out within a law, such as with the example you stated from the Constitution, but for the most part laws do not consist of oaths. Maybe you thought the Ten Commandments counted as an oath since, along with the rest of the Mosaic law, they were accompanied by a blessing and a curse in Deuteronomy 11?
You describe honor as being tied to oaths, which is how things are supposed to work. However, people who keep oaths may be shamed anyway, such as how jurors get spoken of when others disagree on a trial’s outcome. Likewise, government employees and officials who refuse to follow unlawful orders could be put to shame by being fired or otherwise sanctioned; the oath of office does not protect them legally. Employees and officials might personally regard themselves as honorable for upholding the oath of office, but such a self-assessment of one’s personal disposition could be difficult to maintain while being shamed.
The Boy Scout vespers reads, "Have I kept my honor bright? / Can I guiltless sleep tonight?". There are variants to this, and it is possible that you were experienced something different. The standard form of the song touches on two differing moral systems. The counterpart to honor is shame, while the counterpart of the moral condition of guilt is that of innocence. Depending on the circumstances, atonement, forgiveness, or pardon could also be contrasting moral conditions to guilt.
Honor and shame describes an externalizing morality, while guilt and innocence describe conditions not dependent on other people, rather they are experienced internally in the conscience. By referring to both, the lyrics are trying to refer to both externalizing and internalizing moralities.
Not everyone appreciated Cheney's book as much as you did; there is a critical review at https://thefederalist.com/2024/01/06/cheneys-memoir-offers-warning-about-ruling-class-not-trump/
The reviewer, Tristan Justice, characterizes a particular line of Cheney's rhetoric as "assassination prep". The book is its own situation and motivations may vary, but overall when people are driven by honor and shame, they tend to be more aggressive.
Your letter did not mention the Hippocratic oath; the unabridged form of it includes:
I will not give a lethal drug to anyone if I am asked, nor will I advise such a plan; and similarly I will not give a woman a pessary to cause an abortion.
Compare this to the material placed on the Democratic Party of Door County website, under " Click on a Topic to see the Democratic Party position"; https://doordems.org/human-rights/ includes
We believe in freedom of reproductive choice, family planning, and the individual’s right to choose death with dignity including physician‐assisted end‐of‐life.
This means gutting conscience protections. Currently, Biden's HHS is near the end of a rule change process for weakening conscience protections for healthcare employees opposed to assisted suicide, abortion, and other things: https://thefederalist.com/2022/04/19/biden-administration-wants-to-force-nurses-to-murder-babies-even-if-it-terrorizes-their-souls/
In 2021, a nurse was forced to participate in an abortion, and the HHS refused to enforce the law protecting her: https://fedsoc.org/commentary/fedsoc-blog/hhs-proposes-rule-modifying-healthcare-conscience-regulations
If a for-profit nursing home requires their staff to convince elderly people to "choose" death, would the HHS likewise decline to enforce conscience protections?
A lack of enforcement for conscience protections leaves professionals the choice to violate their consciences or lose their jobs. Having said an version of the Hippocratic oath at the end of medical school which encompasses the issue of conscience won't improve the legal situation at all.
You describe concern that people may be losing interest in honor and oaths. Google search trends indicate an overall flat level of interest over the years, with a recent increase in both terms: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=honor,oath&hl=en
Do you think that with stronger religiosity, these lines would tick upwards more sharply?
Wouldn't a church whose members repeatedly learn about salvation from the Nicene Creed regard questions of individuals' honor and shame as less important than questions of guilt and atonement? Jesus willingly experienced dishonor for our sake. One Baptism for the forgiveness of sins; not for accumulating honor. Christianization has helped to make guilt a more important consideration than shame. If an externalizing morality still prevails within a particular church or household, some more Christian influence could change the situation.
Posts relating to honor or shame:
https://doorcounty.substack.com/t/honor-or-shame
Posts related to protecting unborn babies:
https://doorcounty.substack.com/t/protecting-unborn-babies