Published on
24 July 2014
As a right to die becomes the subject of yet another House of Lords debate it may be worth revisiting a matter upon which this blog has commented before here and here. The writer has recently seen a film about Virginia Woolf, and it may be of value to shape the discussion with reference to […]
Published on
11 March 2014
Liberty is a premise upon which physician-assisted suicide is routinely advanced. Some of those suffering from serious and incurable illness or distress seek to argue the case that their suffering is a bondage from which only death can free them. Such suffering is, of course, naturally subjective in the sense that what one person might […]
Published on
3 March 2014
To the delight of secularists and ‘animal rights’ activists the Danish parliament last week passed a law banning Kosher and Halal methods of slaughter on the grounds that these violate the rights of animals. Dan Jørgensen, the Danish minister for Food, Agriculture and Fisheries told Denmark’s TV2 that ‘animal rights come before religion’. Unsurprisingly, Jewish […]
Published on
18 November 2013
Posted in Conscience, Culture, Human Life, Human Rights, Legal Affairs, Moral Philosophy, Morality in Public, Virtue
‘In any legal system, whether a given norm is legally valid, and hence whether it forms part of the law of that system, depends on its sources, not its merits.’This working definition of ‘legal positivism’ has a certain notoriety, even while it provokes disagreement. This legal tradition is popularly understood, and with some rationale, to […]
Published on
28 October 2013
‘We don’t do God’ said Alastair Campbell. In an increasingly secularised world the idea that religion might play any constructive role in public life is ever more considered a relic of the past. Religious institutions are considered at best well-meaning repositories of old thoughts in beautiful buildings the like of which we shall simply not […]
Published on
23 August 2013
In one way or another the assorted strands of the wide Judeo-Christian tradition have always acknowledged divine revelation as the source of a duty to care for the poor and destitute. Islamic scholars and authoritative sources in many other religious traditions have also emphasised the importance of caring for the poor, arguing that as God’s […]
Published on
5 August 2013
Andrew Brown in a recent blog for The Guardian argues that Catholic attitudes to gay sex fail to account for human beings. Though his conclusions are different, in terms of argumentation Brown often seems to adopt an approach that is quite like that of Judeo-Christian moralists, so it is refreshing to discuss an issue while […]
Published on
12 July 2013
Posted in British Politics, Europe, Human Rights, Moral Philosophy, Morality in Public
In discussing the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) it is essential, given current wrangling over matters European, to emphasise that membership of the Council of Europe which drafted the ECHR, and assent to the treaty, are matters quite distinct from that of membership of the European Union. While David Cameron may want to present […]