I was reading Live Actions response to its critics here. For the newbie, Live Action is a Pro-Life group that has undertaken sting operations against Planned Parenthood. These sting operations, done in different states in different clinics, have revealed a callous disregard for the law in Planned Parenthood clinics. Such patterns are failure to report statutory rape to the authorities, failure to notify parents when the law stipulates, and most recently, the aiding and abetting of sex-trafficking of minors.
Seeing as the president of Live Action, Lila Rose is a Catholic, Catholic moral theologians have weighed in on the ethics of these sting operations. At the heart of this discussion is the Church's Magesterial discussion of the morality of lying. Essentially, Holy Mother Church teaches that lying is intrinsically immoral. This means that no matter the reason, lying is wrong and is never an acceptable course of action. The question then becomes, what is lying? As Dr. Christopher Kaczor (in the piece referenced above) points out, throughout the Christian Tradition, lying has always been condemned, but hasn't been easily definable.
Below are some private reflections on what constitutes a lie...from my own experience, either things that I have done, or have been done to me.
1) Making a statement that is false, knowing it is false, with the intention of deceiving another into thinking it true...for personal gain. For example, say I was delayed in coming home from work because I was taking my time or chatting with colleagues for a while. When I got home late, I told my wife that I had some important business that needed my attention before I left, knowing that was not true. That is a lie. I would have knowingly made a false statement, hoping that my wife would believe the false statement was true. What tops it all off is that this deception is not for some altruistic motive, but because I don't feel like being accused of not caring about the family over some people at work (or something similar, depending on the situation).
2) Keeping quiet on pertinent information in such a way that a false impression is made...for personal gain. For example, you are offered a job teaching, but you have a couple classes to go before you are certified, and you are scheduled to take those classes in the fall, when you start teaching. You accept, but purposely leave out the fact that you are not taking those classes, because you are afraid you won't get the job then. That is lying. You presented a case to the employer (you have your classes taken care of, and will be certified by the end of the school year) which was in fact not true purposely, because you wanted the job.
3) Knowingly breaking a promise or pact made, but secretly...for personal gain. For example, you have a particularly unhealthy habit, say drinking too much soda. You've made a pact with someone close, say your best friend, that you won't drink any when you two aren't together. Knowing this pact, you indulge anyway. Afterall, they won't know, will they? This is a lie. You made a pact with someone you care about, and you purposely broke it for some personal pleasure. What makes this a lie is the fact that you knew of the pact, and yet proceeded to break it in such a way that your friend wouldn't find out. Truth is a separate reality, and by breaking the pact you made, you have knowingly and purposely presented a false truth to your friend, who has no reason not to think the pact is upheld. That makes it a lie.
4) Presenting a minor detail or secondary reasoning for an action, knowing that there is another greater detail/reasoning...for personal gain. For example, your employer lets you go, saying that your services are no longer required because they are combining your job with someone else's. However, that is not the REAL reason. Sure, they are combining your job with someone else's, for now, but that is not WHY they let you go. The real reason might get them into trouble. So, rather than tell you the real reason, they provide a secondary reason, something they probably did to cover up their real reason. That is lying. Look, in this case, the employer found a way to get rid of someone they could get rid of otherwise. They made up an excuse, which in the long run saved them from legal action. That is lying.
5) Saying something to someone and then, without consulting them, knowingly acting contrary to what you told them...for personal gain. Example: you tell this employee that he'd be a perfect fit in a certain position, especially because he's got the zeal and the desire to remain there long time and bring stability to the position. Then, when new leadership enters into the situation, and your track-recod is on the line (you know, because extravagent administration gatherings at a posh resort in the midst of a huge budget crisis aren't wise), you decide to cut the guy you hand picked loose...because it makes you look budget conscious. To top it off, you don't even tell him the discussion is going on until you decide to let him go, thereby catching him totally off-guard and uprepared. That is lying. You let the poor soul do his job, thinking he'd be there for a while, when you are undercutting the message you gave him. You are allowing him to think he's secure, when he's not, because you have your own hide to worry about.
It is important to remember that some of these actually happened to me...thus, the pain felt from those might cloud my thinking. I mean, are 4 and 5 technically lying? Having had those happen to me, I'd like to say yes.
However, for a more cogent analysis, I think it obvious that the "common denominator" for all the above examples is the personal gain. In numerous Examinations of Conscience, we are asked if we've knowing told a lie, with the intent to decieve. I think, again this is experiential wisdom as opposed to intellectual wisdom, that MOTIVE is hugely important here. Who benefits from these actions? Is it us? Is that what we want? I mean what if the company (or diocese) in Number 4 wasn't looking to protect itself from lawsuit, but rather a particular individual, whom the company was afraid the employee might target? Is that really, then a lie? What if, in Number 5, the individual in question wasn't doing it to save his own skin, but because he was told to by his superiors, who know nothing of the conversations the individual had with the employee? (Although, you'd expect that individual in that case to inform the employee of the discussion). What about in number 2, withholding pertinent information not to save yourself, but to save someone else from slander or worse?
In sum, I agree whole heartedly that all lying is intrinsically immoral, and never acceptable. However, the mere statement or presentation of a falsehood as truth is not a lie...motive helps define a lie. In this regard, I think there is a comparison with abortion:
An abortion is a procedure with the intent purpose of killing a pre-born baby. To reiterate, the sole purpose of the abortion, the motive, or intent, of the action itself, is to kill an innocent baby. Thus, performing a hysterectomy on a pregnant woman with uterine cancer is NOT an abortion: the motive of the action is to remove a diseased organ, but just like an abortion, the baby will die. This is what makes abortion so evil: we are engaging in a behavior for the sole purpose of killing someone. With lying, we see a similar situation. In lying, we knowingly present a falsehood as truth for our own benefit. However, in other situations, falsehoods are knowingly presented as truth for other reasons. An example of this is in the movie Bells of St. Mary's, when Father O'Malley tell Sister Superior that she's been transferred, and lets Sister think he requested it because of differences they had. This had been agreed upon because the doctor thought she might give up if she knew she had TB. Father allowed Sister to believe this, hoping it would help her. That is not lying.
The same could be true of Live Action's sting operations. Sure, Lila Rose and her partners knowingly presented falsehoods as truths to Planned Parenthood staffers. However, who benefited from this action? Surely not Lila Rose or Live Action. Unlike my friend Mark Shea, I do not think this is a case for consequentialism, which essentially argues along the lines "Hey, I don't care how she did it, but she got PP defunded! Great!" For this to be true, you would have to classify what Lila Rose did as a lie. I'm not sure I can do that.
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