This writer sees the eyes roll when I suggest I am writing this column to support and rehabilitate the word “good”.  The more interested people who contest this approach ask me if I am promoting the all out relativity of good and implying what the individual feels is good is always good.  That is when I point them to the Good Decision Model for while the model requires one to do an individual gut check (for your own health matters) The model is also a community, political democracy, and service check.  The Good Decision is designed to seriously challenge moral relativity to the point of elimination before deciding on what is actually good for the individual in any set of options.

Lets take two national issues right now.  The vice-president righteously asserts that family is important and good.  Who could disagree with that? But when the administration decides that child care supplements should be biased toward two parent families and not provided equally for single parent families, suddenly something “not good” and perhaps even evil has crept into the position.  Self righteous cold morality almost always gets it terribly wrong.  Punishing poor children under the cover of “good” is a ticket to having the millstone tied around your neck as the teacher Jesus mentioned when it comes to abusing the innocents. This Project supports life, but the Pro-life movement sunk itself when some states began passing legislation that punished young mothers married or not, rich or poor.  Suddenly a miscarriage could be a crime and having children at all became a brush with the law. These not so subtle assaults on the word good helped inspire The Good Decision Project. 

Modest proposal for protecting Good

Religions exist because people need to congregate.  Connecting through congregation is important, but is it good? Not always,  Belonging to the Nazi party allowed for massive congregation, but we see how that turned out.  Being a Denver Broncos football fan carries no weight in Kansas City but both cities congregate around their teams. Good as we are talking about it here only becomes meaningful at the next deeper level.  Christianity is framed around the Greatest Commandment: loving neighbor as yourself.  Buddhism is framed around reducing suffering for yourself and the world.  Religious traditions and very deep personal contemplation put the muscle in the word good.  If you don’t love your neighbor (including the stateless, the immigrant, poor mothers and children) what can you call yourself?  Certainly not Christian. If you don’t first act to reduce suffering what is the point here?  This project calls “good” a muscular word because you have to be morally strong to sustain the character of good.  Lets stop this assault on good and get this flaccid political world in shape regardless of your religious tradition.  That would be good.