Be Discreet in Your Confessions (satire)

Regarding the confession of sins before the clergy by a church member, I find that what a person does in his or her home should not be aired in church, even when such a confession might be warranted in private.

This article is about confessions of sin in religion. If the gentle reader is not at all religious, then this article is still useful as a guide in being discreet when being candid with a trusted family member, friend and even a coworker or a work supervisor.


From what I have been able to understand, the clergy believes moral responsibility implies that they should pressure their members and their children to suppress natural human desires in order to enjoy a utopia in the afterlife. Additionally, some of them would pry into the privacy of one of their members, using the ruse that confession of sin is good for the soul while sometimes using the private information revealed to them unethically.

Personally, I feel that what people do in the privacy of their home is their responsibility. Airing one's dirty linens in a confessional risks the sinner being subject to invasion of privacy and needless shame. It also opens a whole ball of wax, because it's more socially acceptable to be sincere about keeping the faith than to be totally candid about personal privacy.

Indeed, a few unscrupulous clergy may have used their position of authority to make a vulnerable member compliant to what amounts to emotional blackmail, which is a violation of the sanctity of confession of sins.

It is truly unethical for the clergy to take advantage of a church member who is candid about his or her sins. Indeed, it is morally irresponsible for the clergy to force a member to do something against his or her will through the use of emotional blackmail to keep them quiet.

For this is devilish of clergy to behave in such a way, especially when it is excused by declaring that it is done for the member's own good i.e. ensuring one's destiny in the afterlife.

By exercising power and control over a church member in such a manner, the clergy certainly is not behaving ethically, regardless of any justification made.

So I would caution church members to be careful about what sins they confess before clergy. For personal privacy means that any member is free to maintain her privacy about personal questions that the church has no business asking.

Am I suggesting that a church member lie? No, if the questioning gets uncomfortable, then the church member should sincerely declare that she is not there to air her dirty linen without a supportive witness present.

It also is unethical for a witness for emotional support to side with the clergy should the member be candid about her sins. That witness' role is to provide emotional support, not gang up on the sinner.

Even so, it requires much prayer before being candid about one's sins. The clergy is actually practising a form of psychological abuse when demanding a full confession of sins with the threat that lack of candidness means a trip to Hell.

Indeed, warrantless emphasis on the destiny of the wicked as 'damned to Hell' without presenting the strong case of mercy by a loving God through repentance is itself a kind of sin that equally damns anyone else. For it is indeed devilish to needlessly frighten a church member into compliance.

This is why I would caution church members to be ever vigilant when in an interview with clergy or a member of high standing, so as to not complicate the confession process needlessly.

It is far better to confess privately to God your private sins, and pray for forgiveness than to confess about them with clergy, unless you trust them to keep your sins secret and to remain morally responsible in light of your confession of sins to them.

I am sure this is why we are selective about who we confess our errors to, lest the empaths try to shame us into repentance, which is different from freely repenting.

We are not perfect, being human. Yet there might be some unscrupulous person to abuse their moral responsibility by violating their sense of professionalism and turning sociopathic, if only to "teach us a lesson".

So be discreet about what you confess to a confident who you trust, and always be open to repentance.

Situational Ethics (poem)

I listen to my reason,
with this heart of mine —
Oh, good and evil
is judged by situation,
not by absolutes and God.

This truth is denied by people,
since each of us sees
the usefulness of splitting
good and evil — Ah!
We like to pick sides with care.

Yet good and evil
are both sides of the same coin —
Each situation
ought be judged by its merits,
not by a false dilemma.

Proof that Situational Ethics Promotes Harmony

Recently, a person talking loudly on her cellphone for 16 hours led to her removal from an Amtrak train. Why? Because she was talking on the quiet car, which is reserved for people wishing to travel in peace and quiet.

The rules enforced in the quiet car are: keep conversation to a minimum out of respect for other people's wish to have peace and quiet.

When other people on the car objected to her loud talking, she didn't stop talking on her cellphone. She instead chose to get belligerent, which led to conflict between her and other passengers and eventually the conductor getting involved.

To avoid conflict with other people in the quiet car, the rule of thumb is simply to assume that the person talking loudly is ignorant of the rules governing the quiet train.

"Of course, like in any conflict, much depends not only on the type of person you confronts, but also on the way in which you communicates your message. As evidenced in the example above, by the time the annoyed passenger speaks up, he/she has already decided on a storyline. Often, people’s default assumption is that the passenger in question is arrogant as opposed to ignorant. Psychologists call this the fundamental attribution error, which refers to our tendency to explain other people’s perceived negative behaviour as derived from their personalities rather than the situation." — http://roiword.wordpress.com/2010/12/31/conflict-and-the-quiet-car/

The key point is that a person's perceived view of other people's negative behavior is dependent on the situation i.e. talking loudly on the cell phone in the quiet car.

Thus, situational ethics applies in most situations to eliminate the fundamental attribution error, which often may lead to cognitive distortions.

Attributing other people's perceived negative behaviour to the situation helps to reduce the risk of such cognitive distortions.

'My approach, ever mindful of the fundamental attribution error, is to get up and say, “Excuse me, I am not sure if you know, but this is the quiet car.” By giving people the benefit of ignorance, I find less defensiveness and greater willingness to cooperate.' - ibid.

Meditation on Friendship

Friendship transcends personal cliques. Indeed, a good friend is more likely to support unrelated friends of good standing than that unrelated person's group of fair-weather friends, some of whom might assure him of their undivided loyalty and devotion, only to lose their support when their devotion and loyalty is called into question by circumstances.

If we had no friends, then even our mothers would abandon us. For the friendless are the odd Johns of society, and few people tolerate them.

Yet I can tolerate all people, because I believe strong that to deny an offer of friendship based on who you (don't) know, one would have to have only the potential to understand the concept, not the ability to "be a friend to all and enemy to none".

In order to be a good friend, one ought to keep the ancient adage at heart: "Keep your best friend at arm's length, and your greatest enemy nearby."

Karma is not the same as kismet

Speaking at the Cannes Film Festival last week to a Hong Kong TV channel, Stone, 50, said: “I’m not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans because I don’t think anyone should be unkind to anyone else.

“And then this earthquake and all this stuff happened, and then I thought, is that karma? When you’re not nice bad things happen to you.”

Karma is not like that at all.

What Sharon Stone is referring to is what is commonly known to Muslims and Arabs as kismet, and what the West knows as predestination i.e that a previous sin will lead to a trial similar to what tested Job. It could also be seen as destiny, because that implies that one's choices influences one's destiny, and that one's bad decision leads to punishment by God.

Specifically regarding karma, it is NEUTRAL, but humans judge a particular situation as bad or good arbitrarily. However, each situation calls for a code of ethics to be followed according to the circumstances.

It only feels right to say wrong action in the past begets bad karma in the future. Why not just use the term "destiny"? Or "kismet?"

Anyone who views karma in terms of an absolute "one-size-fits-all" code of ethics is totally missing the point of Buddhism and Hinduism.

Karma actually works within the framework of situational ethics i.e. under these circumstances, these past actions end up in passing on karma by our actions which is like setting up a row of dominoes, die by die.

Just like dominoes falling, the mishandling of a situation may result in a future result as the karma of the previous action is passed on, but only man judges it to be good or bad, according to his whims.

Therefore there is no such thing as "bad" or "good" with respect to karma.