Faith, Power, and Moral Responsibility in the Age of Dehumanization
Abstract: This contribution examines the relationship between faith, moral responsibility, and power, starting from Nietzsche’s well-known proclamation of the “death of God,” understood not as a denial of the sacred but as a crisis of human ethical responsibility. Through a philosophical and historical comparison, with particular reference to Thomas More and the humanist tradition, the article investigates the processes through which religion, from a space of questioning and meaning, can be transformed into a normative and exclusionary device. The analysis highlights the risks inherent in the sacred when it becomes a political identity or an instrument of moral domination, underscoring the need for a form of spirituality grounded in human dignity, freedom of conscience, and empathy as an antidote to contemporary fundamentalisms.
Keywords: #Philosophy #Faith #MoralResponsibility #FreedomOfConscience #Power #HumanDignity #Sacred #Humanism #ReligiousPluralism #CritiqueOfFundamentalism #ValentinaLilla #EthicaSocietas #EthicaSocietasJournal #ScientificJournal #SocialSciences #ethicasocietasupli
Valentina Lilla is an art historian and art critic, holds a PhD in Cultural Heritage Studies, and is the director of the Académie Vitti Museum in Atina (FR). A cultural project designer, she works on heritage, contemporary art, and performance languages, with particular attention to the themes of memory and identity. She has curated exhibitions, heritage enhancement projects, and publications, collaborating with museums, universities, and cultural institutions.
THE DEATH OF GOD AS A CRISIS OF RESPONSIBILITY
“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.” With this statement, Friedrich Nietzsche was not proclaiming the end of faith, but rather denouncing the end of human moral responsibility before what he calls God [1]. His is not a theological operation, but an ethical one. It is an accusation directed at a humanity that has ceased to question the meaning of its own actions, delegating to the sacred the justification of evil [5]. Since then, every time religious reference is used to legitimize hatred, exclusion, or violence, that symbolic death is renewed [3].
PLURALITY OF FAITHS AND HUMANITY AS A FOUNDATIONAL VALUE
As early as the sixteenth century, Thomas More, in his Utopia, imagined a society in which religious plurality did not constitute a threat but a resource [2]. In that ideal model, each individual could profess their own belief without fear of exclusion, because the founding value was not orthodoxy but shared humanity. More understood—and history continues to confirm—that when a religion seeks to impose itself by force, it ceases to be faith and is transformed into dominion [6]. The utopia did not consist in the absence of God, but in the absence of fear.
WHEN FAITH CEASES TO QUESTION
There is a moment in the history of human societies when faith ceases to question and begins to command. It is a silent passage, often imperceptible, yet profoundly destructive. From that moment on, the sacred no longer consoles: it selects. It no longer accompanies: it judges. It no longer loves: it condemns. This occurs when a religion perceives itself as the exclusive custodian of truth, when doubt is equated with weakness and individual conscience with heresy [7]. In this context, obedience prevails over compassion, and God is no longer an open question but a sentence.
THE SACRED AS AN INSTRUMENT OF POWER
In the name of spirituality, humiliation is justified; in the name of “values,” moral violence is legitimized; in the name of the family, the individual is sacrificed; and in the name of life, suffering inflicted is accepted without trembling [8]. It is here that faith betrays itself. A spirituality that ignores the human being is not elevation, but power. And power, when it dons the sacred, becomes untouchable, impermeable to criticism, deaf to pain [6]. One speaks obsessively of natural order, of roles, of what is right and what is wrong, while empathy, mercy, and love disappear from public discourse [9].
FAITH, IDENTITY, AND FANATICISM IN THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD
In the contemporary world, these dynamics have not disappeared. Symbols and languages change, but the mechanism remains the same: a morally superior “we” is constructed, and a “they” to be corrected, redeemed, or expelled [10]. Women, LGBTQ+ persons, nonconforming individuals, and critical consciences become guilty of existing outside the prescribed scheme. In this way, religion is no longer a bridge, but a boundary. When the sacred becomes political or tribal identity, the step toward fanaticism is short [3], as demonstrated by fundamentalisms of every latitude and by the obsession with controlling bodies, choices, and intimacy [8].
GOD, DIGNITY, AND FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE
No divinity worthy of this name can demand the dehumanization of human beings [7]. If God is perfection, He does not need aggressive defenders. If God is love, He does not fear diversity. If God is justice, He cannot be founded on humiliation [9]. The problem, then, is not faith itself, but the use made of it. For this reason, today it is necessary to break the silence: not with insult, but with thought; not with violence, but with culture; not with hatred, but with the courage to affirm that a spirituality without humanity is nothing more than a well-decorated cage [10].
THE WORD AS AN ACT OF FREEDOM
Truth does not ask for permission. It is spoken, even when it disturbs—especially when it is branded as provocation, scandal, or heresy. History teaches that every system that fears questions already has something to hide [1]. There is no authentic spirituality that demands silence, nor any faith that feeds on fear. There is, instead, human responsibility, the dignity of the individual, and the right to dissent without being branded as an enemy [4]. And if saying this means being uncomfortable, then let us be so fully. For it is not words that divide human beings, but the lie accepted for the sake of quiet living.
LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK
The critique of the instrumental use of the sacred finds solid grounding in contemporary constitutional principles. Freedom of conscience and religion is recognized as a fundamental and inviolable right, in particular by Article 19 of the Italian Constitution and Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights [11]. These provisions protect not only the right to profess a faith, but also the right not to profess any, as well as the right to dissent from dominant religious interpretations without suffering discrimination. The principle of substantive equality (Article 3 of the Constitution) and respect for human dignity (Article 2 of the Constitution) require the State and civil society to prevent religious convictions from being used to justify degrading treatment, social exclusion, or arbitrary limitations on personal self-determination [12]. From this perspective, religious pluralism is not a concession, but a structural condition of the constitutional state governed by the rule of law.
NOTES
[1] Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1974), §125.
[2] Thomas More, Utopia, trans. Paul Turner (London: Penguin Classics, 2003).
[3] Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007).
[4] Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (New York: Viking Press, 1963).
[5] Paul Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, trans. Emerson Buchanan (Boston: Beacon Press, 1967).
[6] Max Weber, Economy and Society, trans. Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978).
[7] Jürgen Habermas, Between Naturalism and Religion: Philosophical Essays, trans. Ciaran Cronin (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008).
[8] Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989).
[9] Martha C. Nussbaum, Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006).
[10] Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: Vintage Books, 1977).
[11] Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, art. 9.
[12] Italian Republic, Constitution of the Italian Republic, arts. 2 and 3.
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