5. Doing wrong for "a good reason"

[CBC]

5. Serapia considers killing her father to save his soul, but later realises this would have been wrong. Do you agree with her conclusion and why?

This question was provided by Corinna Turner.

[Manuel]

Doing wrong for "a good reason" is another way of stating that the end justifies the means, the famous dictum attributed to Niccolò Machiavelli. Although most politicians think this is true, the Catholic Church has never accepted it.

Killing someone may be a lesser evil, therefore justified, as in the case of self-defense, but not for this reason (saving their souls).

There is a novel by Jane Lebak (The Wrong Enemy) where the same situation appears, as a guardian angel kills the boy he is guarding to save his soul. In that case it's clear from the beginning that he did wrong.

[Fonch]

Manuel wrote: "Doing wrong for "a good reason" is another way of stating that the end justifies the means, the famous dictum attributed to Niccolò Machiavelli. Although most politicians think this is true, the Ca..."

We must distinguish between Machiavellianism and a Spanish movement called Tacitism, to which belong these writers Justus Lipsius, Andrea Alciato, Scipionne Ammirato, Trajan Boccalini and, in the Hispanic sphere, authors such as Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, Arias Montano, Alonso de Barros, Mateo Alemán and Diego Saavedra Fajardo. Tacitism has some Christian components, but I consider the theories of Machiavelli and his disciples to be evil. The end does not justify the means. I have always been closer to Baldassare de Castiglione than to Machiavelli and his disciples.