Natural Law: God Commands What Is Good

Natural law is summarized in a few words: God commands what is good.

Luther emphasized natural law in his writings. For those of us who survived the 1960's, natural law is the medicine to cure many ills of society.

The Sixties began the Long March of radicalism through society. God's Law was viewed and taught as oppressive, evil, and traumatic for free souls yearning to express themselves.

People do not use their brains well under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Suddenly those who operated in a haze became cool. Self-destruction was not enough. Taking over institutions was the real goal.

Now we live in an illegal drug culture. The price of crossing over from Mexico to Arizona includes carrying a large bag of drugs to sell. Human mules carry contrabrand for American consumption. But that is OK for people in their free time.

Natural law means that the government is formed to reflect what God has commanded. The U.S. Constitution is not a theocratic document, mandating religion, but it does assume religion. The Declaration of Independence names freedom as a God-given right, self-evident.

When Judge Bork was being borked (a verb created to show how Ted Kennedy and others treated him), he rested his hand on the Constitution. Bork sinned against the radicals. When he was teaching at Yale Law School, he opposed a move to deny recruiting rights to any law firm that discrminated against homosexuals. The radicals never forgave him for this; they could not let a distinguished legal scholar help turn the nation back to natural law.

Some implications of natural law:
1. Marriage between men and women is good, and the complete family is the backbone of society.
2. Children need both parents when growing up, because God created the family as the best way to nurture the young.
3. Self-destructive behavior (like drug abuse) is bad enough to be punished by society, and even more to be punished and restricted when it affects others.
4. There will always be deviations from the norms of natural law, but there is no hope when deviations become the norm and traditional ethics are punished.