Augustine on the Order of Caring

[F]irst, that a man should harm no one, and second, that he should do good to all, so far as he can.  In the first place, therefore, he must care for his own household; for the order of nature and of human society itself gives him readier access to them, and greater opportunity of caring for them." City of God 19.14

I agree with Augustine.  There is an order of caring.  One is to care about one's neighbors' children, but one is to care for them only if one's own children are appropriately cared about and cared for.  But in addition to having readier access and opportunity, one's children belong to one's family. My children belong to me as their father--not in the sense of property ownership but as a gift ultimately from God. God has given my wife and I the responsibility to care for these gifts.

Suppose I don't think of my children as a gift from God.  It might be natural, then, to think of them as wholly the creation of my wife and me.  Is there a non-theistic reason--beyond prudential reasons--for not selling my children after they were born?

I'm unsure, but the only plausible reason I can see at the moment is that the baby becomes attached to the mother and might undergo stress from maternal detachment (perhaps some additional stress too from no longer hearing the voice of the father). But if one were to run a utility calculus, and the mother and father did not want the child and felt burdened by it or by poor finances, it's hard to see why selling one's small children is unjustified.

Church Sign in Town

Several days later...

The Rogers must feel loved (and perhaps liked...a few days ago).

Can one be loved without being liked?  It seems so.  I could love you in the sense of promoting your well-being without liking you.  If I love my enemies, I can will to promote their good even if I do not like my enemies (because, for instance, they are evil and unjustly desire my destruction.)

Can one be liked without being loved?  This is less clear, but, again, there seems to be a type of love which admits of a lack when one is liked.  Perhaps I like you because you are friendly and have amiable qualities, but I do not will your well-being.  Maybe even though I like you, I am selfish and care more about myself than you. Or perhaps I am confused and, even though I have a loving affection towards you, I fail due to ignorance to act in a way which promotes your well-being.  You are liked but not loved (at least according to my outward actions.)

Much more can be said. At any rate, better to be liked and loved than either liked or loved (in the exclusive sense of "or".)

Is Hatred Ever Appropriate?

According to John Duns Scotus, to love something is to will its goodness; and following Augustine, goodness and being are coextensive.  Something is good to the extent that it has being, thus something that is completely evil would not exist.  The more being the more goodness.  In loving one wills the being of something or the being in a certain way.

To hate something is to will its non-existence.  So, for instance, a murderer might commit the murder out of hatred wanting the person no longer to exist (but perhaps one could kill one's pet out of love). Or if one hates pinball one wills that pinball machines cease to exist.

I take it as a doctrine of Christianity that no human is to hate another human.  Instead, one is to love (love taking on various forms in various contexts).  So is there ever an appropriate object of hatred for humans?

Sin seems like a prime example, ("Love the sinner, hate the sin.")  But on the Augustinian view (which Scotus also holds) sin is a privation, a lack, an absence.  Now if there are lacks or privations in one's ontology, then one has an appropriate object of hatred ready to hand: sin.

But suppose one holds to a sparse ontology which admits of no lacks (no holes in the pavement, etc.) Then statements about sin are true ("murder is a sin") though we should not think that sin has being (and thus goodness on the Augustinian view) in virtue of which such statements are true.  Rather the statements are true because there are things which lack goodness, things which are disharmonious with the way they should be and the like.

So are there any other candidates for appropriate hatred?  Here are three:

1. Sinful thoughts, beliefs, ideas--those thoughts, beliefs, etc. which lack truth, goodness, etc.  One should want them eradicated and replaced with true and pure thoughts.

2. Sinful desires, intentions, and actions--actions which are evil and not as they should be.  One should want them destroyed and replaced with one's which are better or the best.

3. Finally, the sinful states of affairs produced by sinful beliefs, desires, etc.

Love Me for Me

When I hear people say "Love me for me" what I often hear is, "Love me because I'm really awesome in spite of everything obviously bad about me."

Can we love people without loving something about that person?  I sometimes jokingly tell my four-year-old son that I don't love him.

Johno: "No, Dad, you love me!"
Me: "Why would I love YOU?"
Johno: "Because I'm your son!"  [or sometimes "I don't know.  But you love me."]

Loving my son because he's my son is loving him because of something about him--he's my son.  Could I love my son Jonathan stripped down of everything about him?  What would that be like?  It would be like loving a haecceity. But one can't cognize haecceities (if there are such things) for there is no "aboutness" to them.  And one presumably can't love what can't be cognized.

Loving someone because of certain qualities, though, shouldn't be confused with loving those qualities.  It is someone with certain qualities that I love; I might love certain of those qualities as well, but one loves the person with qualities and the person is not a mere collection of qualities.