Moral Sainthood

This post was originally written for an assignment under a different name.

In her essay “Moral Saints,” Susan Wolf claims that moral sainthood is unattractive and a bad ideal because moral virtue does not cover all the things we value in a person. Moral sainthood, according to Wolf, would lead to dehumanization and less happiness in the world. Other aspects outside of conventional morality are worth striving for.

I disagree with every point Susan Wolf makes. She describes moral sainthood in a way that is totally baffling to me. She defines moral sainthood as striving to be as morally good as possible, far beyond moral obligation. She somehow describes this as a life of impersonal, meaningless altruism. She bases this description off of what she calls conventional morality or conventional moral values. However, her description does not line up with my understanding of anyone’s moral values. While philanthropy and direct service are certainly morally good and admirable, many other things are plainly morally good, but Wolf insists on calling them non-moral. Creating meaningful art, building social bridges, building physical bridges, improving oneself, learning skills to help others or to make their lives more meaningful, and so many other non-philanthropic things are truly morally good. I don’t think it is very controversial or contrarian to say these things are morally good.

She describes the moral saint as being unable to take up any personal pursuits because he would be too busy doing something philanthropic. I would not trust Wolf with my finances. That’s like saying I should not put money toward paying my mortgage because I need to put all my money toward my car loan, beyond the minimum payment. Why can’t a moral saint invest time in the future to try to do as much good as possible? She claims that the only way a moral saint can cultivate skills she is passionate about is to only become a moral saint after gaining these skills. The saint could then use her skills in order to do moral good. Hopefully I’m not the only person who thinks this is utter nonsense. Why can’t the saint invest in the future with the hope to do good.

Susan Wolf also describes human motivations in a very poor way. She neglects the idea that a person can have multiple legitimate reasons for doing something. Regarding my previous point, the moral saint can pursue learning a skill or art because she is passionate about it and wants to use it to do good in the world. She takes this failure farther when considering the Utilitarian moral saint. She draws a distinction between someone wanting to paint because they find meaning in it and the Utilitarian moral saint who might pursue painting in order to increase the general happiness. Why can’t the Utilitarian moral saint hold both motivations? The saint can both find fulfillment and bring happiness to himself and others through his work.