Formal cooperation with evil, is the willing and knowing commitment of an evil act, and it is never allowable.129
Material cooperation with evil is the unwilling assistance in committing the evil, and may be of two types:
Proximate material cooperation with evil is the
unwilling, but knowing provision of an essential
element in the evil act. It is a close, even though unwilling assistance of some type that makes the evil
possible. There is likelihood that this type of material
cooperation is not allowable, and the cooperator will
incur venial or mortal sin.
Remote material cooperation with evil is the
unwilling, but knowing provision of an non-essential
element in the evil act. It is a remote, and unwilling
assistance of some type that makes that contributes
to the evil. There is likelihood that this type of material cooperation is allowable, and no personal sin
is incurred.
A delivery man delivering general medical
supplies to a euthanasia clinic would not be a decisive
factor in the act, which makes him a remote
cooperator. The duress of losing his job is a separate
but significant matter.
129 ‘Formal’ refers to the spiritual form of an act, which is different from the material form of an act. Punching a man is the material act, which is morally undefined, we need more details. Punching a man out of exasperation is bad ‘form’, it is formally evil. Punching a man in reasonable self defense does not suffer from bad form, and is morally allowable.
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Evaluation of the allowability of material cooperation with evil is often not simple, or even certain. A package delivery carrier can be reasonably certain that sooner or later a package that he delivers to an abortion clinic will be essential to an abortion. He is considered a remote cooperator by reason of proportion, his job is not significantly dedicated to package delivery to an abortion clinic, and he does not know what is inside the packages delivered. Again the duress of losing his job is not a matter of proximate or remote cooperation, but it is significant.
Reasonable knowledge of the evil of an act is a necessary
element for culpability, in any circumstance or act.
Necessity or duress are certainly factors. A gun to the head makes most acts into non-moral acts, since the element of reasonable free-will is removed. Necessity of a paycheck lessens moral culpability, but it may require the worker to seek a more morally acceptable line of work. The illegitimate demands of one spouse upon another has a certain quality of duress because of the marriage.
Degree of evil is a factor. To give material cooperation in falsifying construction inspections at a nuclear power plant is a greater evil than falsifying a history test grade.
Moral support or denouncement after the fact makes a difference. It is also possible to be a passive material cooperator.
Our moral instincts tell us that a cashier with a gun to his head is blameless in giving money to someone not entitled to it. Here the cashier is making material cooperation with evil.
If this same cashier were to knowingly accept a bribe to sell alcohol to an underage person, he would me making formal cooperation with evil, which is a morally evil act.
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In theology, “formal” means ideal or spiritual, it refers to the idea or spirit behind the material being.130 Of course a thing may have no material nature, and remains an idea or a spirit, with a formal nature but no material nature. ‘Formal’ is derived from the English translation of the ancient Greek idea of immaterial forms, or the spiritual framework of a being, (remember, being is anything that exists). If one desires evil, while sharing somehow in a good or evil act, then ones ideals and actions are the same, and the person has made formal
operation with either good or evil. To make formal
cooperation with good or evil, one must act alongside someone else (or something, like a written command); one must cooperate. Formal operation of evil is an individual act, formal cooperation with evil involves more than one person, who may not even be physically present.
‘Material’ refers to the physical act alone. In the case of the cashier handing over money under extreme duress, the act has little or no moral component, because the cashier has little or no reasonable free will in the matter. The cashier would be making material cooperation with evil.
It is virtually impossible to live life without at some point making material cooperation with evil, and it is not usually as dramatic as a gun held to our head. Commonly occurring situations are usually at work or in the family; a spouse who 130 Spirit is intangible but as real as matter; and it has real effect. Spirit is immaterial being. Being is anything that exists: a rock, an idea, energy, emotion, logic, a person. Patience, respect, hate, reverence, morality, memory, free will, are all spirit, and all have real effect in our world. Spirit is the underlying framework of all creation, and corruption of the wil ed moral virtues degrades the operation of all creation. Spirit forms matter, spirit forms spirit, spirit forms events. Consider that anything that can be described in terms of logic, will, virtue, act, emotion, mathematics or physical law has these same immaterial spirits or qualities as its foundation.
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insists on the other using contraception is a common example.
An employee who is expected to act immorally for the sake of profit or to keep the secret of a supervisor is a classic example.
Material or formal cooperation with evil involves two actions, (two people) producing one evil result. It may also be a case of the cooperating person following an unjust law, rather than cooperating with the unjust action of another person.
The principle of double effect described in the following
section involves one action producing two (or more) effects, one good and one evil.