In intelligent usage, “moral” and “immoral” do not admit of gradations. Acts are immoral or not.

When people jokingly profess that everything, they like is illegal, fattening or immoral, they do not really mean “immoral.” They do not think that their little vices are really immoral practices. They mean that what they are referring to as immoral has been erroneously thought to be immoral.

For people who speak carefully about morality, calling an an act already labeled “immoral” seriously immoral is a confusing redundancy. It is like saying the act is seriously a serious matter. I do not want to revise this feature of moral thought because it rests upon a fundamental feature of moral thought. This fundamental feature can be called the “over riding “ or “dominating” feature of morality. If an act A is obligatory, it ought to be done regardless of the consequences of doing A. If an act A is forbidden A ought not be done regardless of the consequences of refraining from A.

People who hold a consequentialist theory of morality accept the dominance of morality. Consequentialists accept that if act A has the best overall consequences, then A is to be done regardless of the consequences of not doing alternatives to A.

To appreciate the overriding implications of the concept of immoral, imagine someone saying, “I know it is immoral but what are the other reasons for not doing it?” We can rightly suspect that person of not understanding what is implied by admitting that an act is immoral. Admitting that an act is immoral is admitting that there is a sufficient reason for not doing it. Imagine further you ask, “What else do you want to know about doing it?” He replies, “I want to know how refraining from this act promotes my happiness.” Now, our proper response is, “If promoting your happiness is a standard you use in deciding on morality, you made a conceptual mistake in not considering promotion of your happiness before admitting that the act was immoral.”

So, it is inconsistent to talk of degrees of morality. Hence, if “moral gravity” is to be used consistently, it should not be used to speak of degrees of being immoral.

Moral Gravity is Not an Intrinsic Feature of Immoral Acts

Masturbation is intrinsically immoral. The purpose of male orgasm is procreation and the unitive bond of male and female. These basic human goods are never to be directly inhibited. Male masturbation and homosexual acts directly inhibit the procreative and unitive goods of sexuality. This moral judgment was reached independently of any consideration of the intention of the actors, the circumstances of the action or consequences of the action. So, they are always on the wrong side of being right. That takes care of intrinsic wrongness.

But how wrong? How grave? My Church, The Roman Catholic Church, teaches that they are always gravely wrong. I accept that teaching because I accept the teaching authority of the Church. But Church teaching about the gravity of an act is an extrinsic characterization of the act. So, the moral gravity of masturbation in Church morality is not intrinsic as is masturbation’s moral wrongness.

These observations about masturbation can be generalized to cover all of the Church’s judgments of gravity.
A major significance of a judgment of moral gravity for the Church is providing a mark of a mortal sin. In general, a mortal sin must be forgiven with sacramental absolution after confessing the sin in a sacrament of reconciliation. Judgment of how an act makes a person ritually impure is a judgment made apart from the characterization of the act for moral judgment. Ritual impurity is decided by reference to features about the ritual which are not part of the act.

So, Church teaching about moral gravity does not allow for intrinsic moral gravity. We have seen that in law and daily practice gravity is an extrinsic feature of immoral acts. See Gravely wrong So, it is safe to conclude that judgments of moral gravity are separate from judgments of rightness or wrongness.

This seems like a straightforward result. But it is has tremendous implications for moral theorizing.
Some, not me, may conclude that it shows that we should not distinguish gravity from immorality. That line of thought leads to consequentialist moral theories.

Here I want only to note for fellow Catholics that all immoral acts are sins. If the immorality is not grave, the sin is venial. However, a corruption of Catholic morality is to belief, perhaps unconsciously, that if an act is only a venial sin, it is permissible.

This post justifies use of the terms “intrinsically wrong” and “intrinsically grave” instead of “formally wrong” and “formally grave.”

There is some plausibility behind a proposal to use “formally.” The intrinsic wrongness is said to be based on a characterization of the act. For instance, the description of masturbation is allegedly sufficient for showing its wrongness and gravity. The description could be called presenting the form of the act. From a proper description of what masturbation is, it can be determined that masturbation is wrong regardless of any circumstances, intentions or consequences of the act. From the form of the act we can deduce, in the proper moral theory, that masturbation is immoral regardless of anything else. So, why not say that masturbation is formally wrong? What is added by labelling masturbation intrinsically wrong? And, does not “intrinsic” obscure the fact that the wrongness is derived from the form?

“Intrinsic” adds that the wrongness is not in the form itself but in the reality of the act with the form. Use of “formally” can mislead us to think that an act is only formally wrong but perhaps in actuality not seriously wrong on not wrong at all. We might hear :It’s formally wrong but is it actually wrong?” For instance, saying that masturbation is formally wrong can mislead one to think that in reality some acts may not be wrong. “intrinsic” leads us to think of the wrongness as being in the particular acts. So, there is wrongness -evil- in each and every act of masturbation. We want more than a belief that masturbation is an act of a wrong type as suggested by use of “formally”.

Intrinsically Wrong vs Gravely Wrong

I think that it is Catholic moral teaching that all intrinsically wrong sexual acts are gravely wrong. All sexual sins are grievous sins. According to my Church: If an intrinsically wrong sexual act is done after sufficient reflection and full consent, it is a mortal sin. It must be absolved through the sacrament of reconciliation before the sinner is worthy to receive the Eucharist. If an intrinsically wrong act is not gravely wrong, it is only a venial sin. The fact that the gravity of all sexual sins is taught indicates that there is a distinction to be made between intrinsically wrong and gravely wrong.

An act is intrinsically wrong, if there are no circumstances, intentions or consequences under which it is morally permissible. It is always and everywhere simply wrong. For instance, shoplifting a candy bar from a UDF convenience store simply because you want it, is simply wrong: No excuses. The shoplifting is in the same class of criminal acts as robbing a UDF at gunpoint simply because you want the cash. Imagine how you think of the act of a teenage son caught doing the shoplifting.Once we think about how we conduct our daily lives, we can recall all sorts of little acts of rudeness, carelessness and dishonesty that were simply wrong.

I hope these few remarks suffice to show that for those who concede that there are intrinsically wrong acts, intrinsically wrong acts are not necessarily gravely wrong acts. Indeed, even those who do not concede that there are intrinsically wrong acts should concede the conceptual distinction.

Moral theory can tell us how to distinguish between acts which are intrinsically wrong and those which are only accidentally wrong. Determination of moral gravity is, I think, determined by the consequences of the act. But what kind of consequences and how to weigh them is too complex to consider here.

We should, though, avoid the fallacious inference from “it is not gravely wrong” to “It is not wrong.”

In a later post, I argue that careful moral thinking has no place for talk of moral gravity. See Inconsistency of moral gravity.