Outline the Main Features of Situation Ethics

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Outline the main features of situation ethics (21 marks) Situation ethics was an ethic that was created by Joseph Fletcher. It is a method of ethical decision making, that you must consider agape when choosing what to do and that a moral decision is correct if it is the most loving thing to do. By making this ethic, Fletcher was hoping that by adapting the bible to the modern society and make it less religious, that everyone would follow it no matter their religion. He said ‘’morality of an action depends on the situation’’ and Robinson said ‘’man come of age’’ to show what he was trying to create. That everything that is done no matter how cruel it may be to some, can be justified. He was trying to invent something that would help develop and lead man into a new age. One of the basses of situation ethics are the 4 working principles. These include, Pragmatism, relativism, positivism and personalism. Situation ethics works towards a successful end goal which in this case is love, this is pragmatism. The ethic is relativistic which means that there are no fixed rules when choosing what to do but whatever is done must stay relative to the Christian love of agape, making it simple and easy to make decisions accordingly. Positivism is where faith statements are made and people act in a way that is reasonable in the light of these statements. Reason isn’t the basis for faith, but it works within faith. Situation ethics depends on Christians freely choosing faith that god is love, so giving first place to Christian love. Therefore echoing the sentiments of the bible. Finally, situation ethics puts humans first along with their concerns. This is unlike laws that seem to go around a person’s wellbeing, putting that first. Showing how the ethic is neither legalistic nor antinomian. A example of these being demonstrated was when Jesus healed someone on the Sabbath. He says
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