Welcome 5THEO2-K124 of Holy Angel University Class 2007-2008!
This blog is being created, through the idea of Prof. Bonnadelbert "Sir Bon" A. Antonio, primarily for the postings of his lectures and other important notes for our references in 5THEO2. I hope that everyone would regularly visit this blog and actively participate in posting not just the required papers, say a reflection paper, but also in sharing your thoughts and ideas in making class K-124 more lively and intact.
Bryan M. Lamar
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CONSCIENCE
As the objective standard or norm of morality is the will of God, as that is perceived by right reason, so the subjective norm for each individual is his own conscience.
In the last resort each man must decide for himself what is right or wrong.
This decision is called conscience.
Conscience is an act of practical judgment of the rightness or wrongness of particular actions.
In this it is distinguished from synderesis on the one hand and moral wisdom or prudence on the other.
SYNDERESIS is the name given to that faculty whereby we make the broadest judgments on the most general moral issues.
It is little more than our awareness of the distinction between right and wrong, which may be called our moral sense. The kind of judgment that is made by synderesis is "Good should be done, evil avoided", "One ought to be just, and not unjust". This very general aware¬ness that one ought to do what is right and avoid what is wrong, is the spark which fires conscience to order right action in the future, and the "worm" of remorse which gives sting to the condemnation which conscience pronounces against a past wrong action. Moral wisdom or prudence is speculative and not practical. That is to say, it is not necessarily concerned with my actions past or future, but with moral problems; it considers and determines the morality of different classes of actions, or even of particular actions, solely from the point of view of their objective rightness or wrongness, without reference to their per¬formance by any particular person at any particular time. It is the quality of the "expert in morals" or the good moral theo¬logian.
But conscience is the act of determining that I ought to do or not do this action now, or that I was right or wrong in perform¬ing that action then.
It is a determining, an act of judgment, for it is my reason making a moral judgment.
It is practical, that is, it is not the abstract question of morality with which it is concerned, but this action here and now, as something to be done or not done. From this dictate or judgment of conscience the individual has no appeal. For it is his own reason declaring to him what is, here and now, the will of God. This being so, it is everyone's paramount duty to obey his conscience, for in so doing he is obeying what he holds to be the will of God, and in disobeying he is going against what he holds to be the will of God. It is in this sense that conscience is said to be the subjective standard of morality and to be always binding. For to disobey conscience is deliberately to choose what is recognized as wrong, and to obey is to choose what is recognized as right. We praise those who obey their consciences, we blame those who do not. Indeed, praise and blame are confined to this single point. We praise the will that chooses what is presented to it as right, i.e. obeys conscience; we blame the will that chooses what is presented to it as wrong. All else, tempers, dispositions, feelings, we may approve or disapprove, but because, or in so far as they are involuntary, we neither blame nor praise. Only conscience, the deliberate obedience of conscience, is the proper object of praise.
Since, then, conscience is the standard for each man of morality, and every man merits praise only for obeying his conscience, it is of the utmost importance that the dictates of conscience be true. For it is clear, and only too often proved by experience, that conscience may err, and pronounce this action to be right, when in fact it is wrong. Every man, therefore, has a clear duty to keep his conscience alert and informed. This he does by refraining from adopting any attitude of indifference to moral questions, or from acting as though it were a small matter whether his actions are right or wrong. Again, he takes reason¬able care to learn the rules of morality; among Christian families the general and necessary knowledge is gained from parents and schoolteachers in the course of growing-up, but this should be supplemented by reflection on the principles that underlie the moral rules that have been taught. Further, each man, when he finds himself in doubt, should take advice and learn, either from books or from persons whose opinions he has ground to respect. Prayer also is the great instrument for the enlighten¬ment of conscience. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." He who waits on God, and asks for wisdom, will not go unrewarded. Lastly, a man must, so far as possible, avoid the temptations and the consequent darkening of counsel which arise from strong passions, evil habits and bad companions.
That it is a man's duty to obey his conscience when it is true, and that he merits praise for doing so, is clear enough.
But what if his conscience be false?
Here also it is binding.
For in obeying his conscience a man chooses to do what he holds to be right: if he were to disobey his conscience, he would be choosing to do what, at the moment, he holds to be wrong. The resultant action would, in the circumstances, be materially right, i.e. would produce the change in the situation which is objectively right and what God desires, but would be formally wrong, for it would be the result of an act of the will choosing what was presented to it as bad. We must therefore hold that a man is always bound to obey his conscience, whether his conscience be true or false, and that, in consequence, he is always to be blamed if he disobeys his conscience. This is the meaning of St. Paul's phrase "whatsoever is not of faith is sin", i.e. whatever is done against conscience, against a belief or conviction of right, is sin.
Ignorance
At this point a further question arises.
Granted that it is always blameworthy to disobey one's conscience, even when one's conscience is in error,
is it always praiseworthy to obey one's conscience, even when it is in error?
Or, in other words, does the sentence "a man is always bound to obey his con¬science" mean that a man can never be rightly blamed if he obeys conscience?
This raises once more the question of ignor¬ance, for error is a form of ignorance.
The classical answer to this question is given by St. Thomas (I, 11, quaest. xix, art. 6).
It turns on the distinction between vincible and invincible ignor¬ance.
Where the error is in any way voluntary, directly or indirectly—that is to say, when the individual either deliberately refrained from learning better, or carelessly omitted to do so —there the error is no excuse for the wrong act. So that he who is thus in a state of vincible ignorance is to be blamed, whether he obeys his conscience or disobeys it. Normally we should find it difficult to accept a position that makes it necessary for a man to be in the wrong, whatever he does. Where a man is thus "perplexed", i.e. convinced that either of two actions, one of which he must do, is wrong, we generally say that in these circumstances one of the two actions is in fact right, or else that he who chooses what he believes to be the less of the two evils is not to be blamed. But in this case of a vincibly erroneous conscience, a man is not genuinely "perplexed", as St. Thomas points out, because he can get rid of his error. This, it must be remembered, is the case of the man who "neither knows nor cares". Sometimes he is actually doubtful, but will not bother to find out; sometimes he is, indeed, in no doubt about his course of action, but a little reflection would have been enough to show him either that the matter was not so clear as he thought or that he was definitely wrong. And this degree of reflection is a duty for him. Thus in acting under the influence of an error for which he is himself responsible, he is to blame. He would be likewise to blame if he acted against his erroneous conscience. But where the conscience is invincible, i.e. caused by no fault or negligence on the part of the individual, there no blame is to be attached.
St. Thomas in his discussion clearly supposes that such in¬vincible ignorance can only be of some accidental circumstance; it cannot be of a moral rule itself. To be ignorant, he says, of something which one ought to know—quod scire tenetur—is always to be vincibly ignorant, for the ordinary rules of morality are so plain and easily learnt that one can only be ignorant of them wilfully or by gross negligence. The two examples that he gives make his point of view clear. If a man's conscience tells him that he ought to commit adultery, then he sins, i.e. is to be blamed, if he obeys his conscience, because the error arises from an ignorance of the divine law of which he ought not to be ignorant. But if a man thinks he ought to have intercourse with this woman, because he thinks that she is his wife and that therefore he owes it to her to accede to her request, then he does not sin, although, in fact, the woman is not his wife, because the ignor¬ance arises through no fault of his. It is clear from this that St. Thomas is only thinking of an ordinary case of ignorance, and not of one of conscientious conviction. This invincible error is one that is indeed invincible at the moment, but one that subsequent enlightenment and information as to the actual facts will always immediately dispel.
A much greater problem is raised by the condition of error about a moral question even after long discussion and reflection; is it possible, for example, for a man to be invincibly ignorant that adultery is wrong, to take the case which St. Thomas him¬self instances? We have already glanced at this problem, when speaking of the precepts of the natural law and of the possibility of ignorance in regard to them. For St. Thomas, fornication was a thing so obviously wrong that no one could think it right, unless he were wilfully blind to facts and deliberately negligent in considering what is his duty. In the case of polygamy, he did apparently recognize that backward peoples might fail to see the reasons for its condemnation, and might conscientiously approve its practice. In other words, the wrongness of polygamy is not immediately obvious as that of fornication is. In general, tradi¬tional moral theology has assumed that invincible ignorance is possible where the matter in question is obscure or doubtful, but impossible in regard to actions that are obviously wrong. Yet even here it is recognised that exceptions are possible. St. Alphonsus, in discussing the matter (Lib. I, Tract n, cap. 4, sub. i, no. 171), quotes Gerson as saying that on occasion there may be invincible ignorance of even the primary principles of the natural law, as when someone is convinced that he ought to tell a lie in order to save his friend's life. And he gives his own opinion in these words, "I have never been able to understand how a man sins, when, after taking all proper steps to inform himself, he still labours under invincible ignorance" (no. 173). He therefore recognizes, it would seem, that, even after long investigation and reflection, a man might arrive at and hold an opinion about the morality of an action that is at variance with the truth. When this happens, the ignorance is invincible, and that not only when there is ignorance that there is any other point of view, as in the cases imagined by St. Thomas, but also in the full face of all the arguments; and face obedience to conscience then merits no blame.
It is of the greatest importance, however, to know whether the ignorance is truly invincible or not.
The first and most revealing test is given by the question "Did any doubt, at any time, arise?"
If the answer is truthfully "No", it is probable that the ignorance is invincible.
This is the case of those brought up in a closed environment where certain moral rules are taken for granted and never questioned. If the answer is "Yes", all depends on what steps were then taken. For the ignorance is clearly vincible through negligence if, in spite of a recognised doubt, nothing was done to arrive at the truth. The easy sup¬pression of a doubt by reference to the practice of many con¬temporaries, and the refusal to enquire further, is evidence of moral levity. If, on the other hand, anxious enquiry followed, books were read, due care and attention was given to the opinions of authoritative persons, due respect was paid to traditional Christian teaching, and a certain, though wrong conclusion finally reached, then the ignorance may be judged invincible. Though any individual must hesitate long before he can assure himself that he is right and the world is wrong, yet it is possible for him to arrive at that conclusion in all honesty. I may, after anxious thought and consultation, decide that it is my duty to commit a murder (others, that is, call it a murder, I do not. For murder is ex hypothesi wrong, but I adjudge this act in these circumstances to be right, a justifiable homicide), and in that case my error, if it be an error, is invincible, and I am not to blame if I proceed to action; on the contrary, I deserve blame if I refrain from action.
Such conscientious divergence from an accepted rule of morality raises a special problem for those in authority. On the one hand, the facts of the case forbid them to condemn one who is, in good faith, obedient to his conscience. On the other hand, it is their duty to prevent the spread of error, and to put down wrongdoing. If they take no action against the conscientious dissident—if, for example, they do not arrest and hang him whom they and their subjects alike hold to be guilty of murder— they give ground for the opinion that they do not hold the act in question to be wrong, and others will come to regard it as legitimate. In this way the authorities fail in their duty to con¬serve society. If, however, they take action, they punish a man as a criminal who is in fact an honest man of good will; one who has obeyed his conscience and who would have been blame¬worthy if he had not performed this action for which it is proposed to punish him. Yet the good of the whole is superior to the good of the individual. In the interests of society the authorities must take action. Yet any action that they take is not rightly regarded, in these circumstances, as a condemnation or punishment of the individual. He, indeed, merits nothing but honour for his conscientiousness. It is purely and simply a con¬demnation of the action. It is declaratory that the action was wrong, unlawful, and injurious to society. It is a warning to others not to suppose that this action is right and may be done with impunity. It is a forceful, dramatic and public reaffirmation that the traditional moral judgment in this matter is the true one, and that of the individual false.
This distinction between a condemnation of the individual and a condemnation of his action underlies and justifies many acts of excommunication pronounced by ecclesiastical authori¬ties. A sentence of excommunication may mean that, by reason of his persistent wrong-doing and obstinate refusal to make amends for actions which he knows to be wrong, a person is adjudged unfit to receive the sacraments, or to enjoy the fellow¬ship of his fellow Christians. It is hoped that by being thus excommunicated he may be brought to realise the heinousness of his conduct and be moved to repentance and amendment of life. This is the aim and meaning of the excommunication of a man in bad faith. But a sentence of excommunication may also be pronounced against a person in good faith. In this case it carries with it no stigma whatever. It does not imply that the Church thinks the person thus excommunicated to be a man of evil living, a sinner, and guilty before God. Being in good faith, obeying his conscience, the Church has no doubt that such a man is guiltless, and merits only praise for his loyalty to his duty as he sees it. But his conduct in some particular respect is such that if the Church were to take no action it must appear that she approved it, whereas in fact she is certain that his conscience in this matter is in error. She has her duty to make it clear to her members and to the world at large that the true will of God in this matter is other than that which the person excommunicated thinks it to be. She excommunicates as part of her duty to bear witness to the truth. The excommunication carries with it, in these circumstances, no stigma, because it is only the proclama¬tion that there is here an honest difference of opinion about a moral truth between two parties, both of which are equally de¬voted to the truth and loyal to conscience. It does not rule out the possibility that, of the two parties, it is the ecclesiastical authorities that in fact are in the wrong.
It should not, however, be inferred from all this that it is the duty of the ecclesiastical authorities to excommunicate in every case of conscientious disagreement, nor yet that, in every case, deference should be paid to good faith and invincible ignorance, and no action be taken. Every case must be judged on its own merits. In general, persons in good faith should be left in undis¬turbed possession of all their rights as members of the Church, for they are conscientious and obedient to God. But in particular cases scandal, offence to other Christians, and the need to witness against a growing error, justify the excommunication of such meritorious members.
They are meritorious because, as has been said, they are but obeying their consciences, which it is their duty to do, and which if they did not do, they would sin. The gravity of their sin, the degree of their guilt if they had not obeyed conscience, is in proportion to the gravity of the sin that they think they are committing. For example, if the conscientious total abstainer who thinks that to drink a drop of alcoholic liquor is a grievous sin, nevertheless on some occasion drinks a glass of beer, he is guilty of a grievous sin, because he has consented to an action represented to his conscience as grievously wrong. Or again, a man who is honestly convinced that on this occasion it is his duty to steal, sins as gravely in not stealing as the man who steals knowing stealing to be wrong. It is therefore important that actions should not be represented as being more wrong than in fact they are; that people should not be told that things that are trivial or even indifferent are "mortal" sins. It is often a temptation to preachers to magnify the wrongness of certain approaches to sin, in order to prevent people from com¬mitting those sins. This is to "set a hedge about the law". Thus we are sometimes told that it is "a sin to go to the pictures" or to the theatre, because of the danger that cinemas and theatres may corrupt our morals. Or, in order to build up that habit of regular constant prayer that is so vital to the Christian life, we may be told that it is a "mortal" sin to omit our prayers on even one occasion. But this practice is dangerous and defeats its own end. It lays on people an unnecessary burden, and exposes them to unnecessary risk of grave sin. For persons who have taken this teaching to heart, and are convinced in their con¬sciences that the actions prohibited are indeed all of them grave sins, are guilty of grave sin if they commit one of them.
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Conclusion
We may sum up this section thus.
Conscience is each man's guide to morals.
He must always obey it, even if it is in error.
If the error is invincible, not due to gross or deliberate negli¬gence, he is in no way to blame, but is rather praiseworthy.
If the error is vincible, it is a man's duty to get rid of the error by taking the appropriate measures.
Though the invincibility of the error is always suspect where it concerns a matter of ordinary morality, and the error in such cases more probably arises from indifference or bad habits, yet in particular, difficult, circumstances such error may indeed be invincible.
Invincible error, or conscientious nonconformity, is not sinful, and although authority may take steps to make clear its own disapproval of the particular action dictated by the erroneous conscience, such disapproval implies no condemnation of the agent himself, and carries with it no stigma.
The duty of obeying an erroneous conscience is such that he who disobeys sins as gravely as he who disobeys a true conscience and incurs the guilt that he thinks he is incurring.
All this discussion concerns only a conscience that is certain.
That is to say, we have only considered the man who, rightly or wrongly, is convinced and clear that this or that is now his duty.
But the majority of moral problems arise from a conscience that is not certain.
There can be no one who has not experi¬enced the mental discomfort that comes with doubt as to where duty lies. Moreover, a man only acts rightly, or con¬scientiously, when he acts with a clear and certain conscience. A very little reflection is needed to show that this is so. If I perform an action while I am still in doubt as to whether it is the right thing for me to do or not, and if, though I am able and have time to get rid of the doubt, I make no effort to do so, it is clear that I do not really care whether it is right or not, and that I should be equally ready to perform the action even if I knew it were wrong. Again, as long as I am in doubt, I do not know but what this action may be wrong. If nevertheless I do it, I put myself in immediate danger of doing wrong. All action while the conscience is still doubtful is thus precipitate and im¬prudent action. A great deal of moral theology is accordingly concerned with the means of converting a doubtful conscience into a certain one. The many systems of moral theology, tutiorism, probabilism, probabiliorism, etc., are so many answers to this problem. What these various systems are will be explained later.
At the moment it is necessary to say what is meant by "certainty" and "uncertainty".
TO: ALL THEO2 CLASSES OF MR. ANTONIO
RE: LECTURE ON CONSCIENCE
______
thIS IS SHORTER AND BETTER
CONSCIENCE
Saint Thomas in the prima secundae has no treatise on conscience. Conscience is an act of the practical reason, so whenever the role of reason is mentioned, in fact we are referring to conscience. The formation of the reason to issue appropriate judgments belongs to the virtue of prudence. Prudence in the mind of Saint Thomas is not just caution but it is the virtue which transforms the reason to issue judgments. Saint Thomas is studying the sanctifying presence of God in human action in the Summa. In the Disputed Questions Saint Thomas does have a study of conscience. The perspective of modern manuals stressing moral obligation and moral law, the conscience was to receive the precepts of the moral law and apply them to concrete situations. The entire modern moral theology dealt with the formation and appropriate functioning of the conscience so that it would be able to function in dubious situations (which was the focus of casuistry). We cannot ignore the conscience in our theme of morals.
The Bible doesn’t often use the term conscience. In the Old Testament, the term heart, kidneys, prudence, wisdom all substitute for it. In the Greek of the New Testament, we have the term syneidesis. In the popular language, it meant a persuasion, understanding that was common to someone else; it also meant a negative judgment in a moral sense, though the Greek philosophers preferred the term daimon. Conscientia in classical Latin meant conscience and common knowledge. Saint Paul in his use of the term syneidesis assimilated it with the Hebrew heart and precised the meaning to be a common knowledge together with God. Conscience is an observer which witnesses for God. Ever since the 13th century, theology distinguishes between pre-conscience, which has been called synderesis, and the actual conscience. The term synderesis derives from an error of a medieval copyist. In Ezechiel,[26] Saint Jerome compared the eagle to that which the Greeks called syneidesis, which he called conscientia. The glossa ordinaria misspelled syneidesis and created the term synderesis. A new term was born to which the scholastics attributed a special meaning.
Saint Thomas defines synderesis as an innate habit of the first principles of practical reasoning. There is a reconstruction of our reason as we are born. This habit states that good is to be pursued and evil is to be avoided. It is not yet the voice of the conscience, but is the necessary first step of the conscience. It gives us the first impulse. Saint Thomas says that just as in the speculative intellect there are the first principles of metaphysics, so in the practical intellect there is an innate inclination of the practical reason toward goodness. Not everyone agrees what good is, but everyone agrees that what is good is to be pursued. The distinction between the speculative and the practical reason doesn’t refer to two distinct faculties, but one which looks both to truth and to action. This same reason functions with different ends. So a habit of the practical reason inclining to good and evil is related to the speculative intellect which goes toward truth. But they are both tied. We can therefore say that antecedent to the impulse toward goodness, there’s the inclination toward truth and to follow it. This inclination to know and to follow truth is antecedent and not consequent to synderesis. So the truth of things elicits the conviction that there are goods to be desired. In metaphysics, we say that being, the good, and the true are interchangeable. But the practical intellect follows the speculative intellect. There is the primacy of the search for truth.
This synderesis, an innate habit of the practical reason, is immutable and infallible, urging toward to the good to be pursued. Saint Thomas says there is something angelic in it. Saint Jerome said it is an eagle which flies above all faculties looking at our actions from above. It is an innate habit, not a special faculty. It is not formed by exercise, because it is innate. Synderesis is a habit of the first principles of the natural law, and the conscience is a concrete decision or conclusion based on these first principles. Synderesis is indestructible in the nature of the soul. Both those in heaven and hell have it. The recognition of the light of synderesis may be blocked, due to sin or physical energy. The movement of the passions may be so strong that synderesis may not be applied. Saint Augustine had seen the inclination toward the good of man, but we couldn’t agree on it were not something prior was instilled in us. Cardinal Ratzinger suggests that synderesis should be replaced by anamnesis, because we have a memory of the good and the true ontologically. From his origin, man’s being resonates with some things and clashes with others. This anamnesis is not a store of retrievable contents, but an innate capacity to recall what is in accord with what man’s nature seeks. We don’t have arguments to prove it’s there, but it just is there. Ratzinger prefers this recalling.
Conscience according to Saint Thomas is not a faculty or a habit but an act. Conscience is the application of our reason to a concrete situation. It is an act of the practical reason which applies a knowledge to a particular situation. Practical reason begins with the spark of synderesis and utilizing the light it receives from education and the instinctive moral law, and taking into account the concrete situation, the conscience makes a judgment about an action to be undertaken, or a judgment about an act that has already been done. Saint Thomas distinguishes three elements in conscience’s function: to recognize, to bear witness, and to judge. Even though conscience is not a habit, but it is formed by habits, the virtues of wisdom, knowledge, and prudence and by supernatural virtues. Conscience is an act of reason, not of appetition, which means that conscience belongs to the order of cognition and not feeling. We mentioned that in a healthy person the emotions support the judgment of conscience, that the emotions are well-integrated with reason. So there is an emotional aspect which supports reason, but conscience itself is a rational act. The feelings associated are secondary, though they support conscience. The extent and depth of the feelings depend upon somatic constitution. The feelings do not belong to the essence of the conscience. When we follow our conscience, we follow the judgment of reason and not our emotions. We can do the right thing even though we feel no satisfaction or even sadness. The neurotic person may feel guilty even though the reason says that they haven’t done anything wrong.
Conscience is an act of appetition, and not of feeling. In a healthy person, the judgment of conscience supports the feelings and the feelings support the judgment. The extent of the feelings depend on the somatic constitution of the person. When we follow our conscience, we follow the judgment of reason and not that of our feelings. It is possible that the judgment of conscience can be correct even though the feelings seem to tell us otherwise. Conscience is binding because it is tied to synderesis. Since the conscience is the conclusion of a syllogism in which knowledge is applied, we must distinguish between the act of reason in applying and the act of reason in issuing a free choice. There is the level of the judgment of conscience (what am I to do?) and that to do something. The error of conscience is an error of reason; the wrong choice can come from emotions, which may blind the reason. The free choice may be wrong if it chooses something the conscience told it to do. Conscience has an administrative and judiciary power but it doesn’t have a legislative power. It doesn’t create the norms. It conducts the interiorization of the objective norm, making it a subjective norm. Like a good administrator creative in serving his country, conscience must supply the arguments supporting why I should do this or that. When it is transformed by grace, it boost the free response taking into consideration the guidance of moral norms. Free choice still makes the choices. Conscience is always binding even when in error. We are of course obliged to inform our consciences so that it won’t be erroneous. We have no other rule but our reason. The Christian conscience is transformed from within by grace.
In modern Catholic theology, we see a further development of the teaching of Saint Thomas, that conscience is the voice of God. The working of God in the practical judgment causes our deeds to be the voice of God, when we’re open to the Holy Spirit. It is through the true voice of conscience that the voice of God manifests itself in practical decision making. Cardinal Newman in his letter to the Duke of Norfolk after the declaration of papal infallibility was very careful to distinguish the true voice of conscience from subjective ideas. When men advocate the rights of conscience, they often don’t mean the rights of the Creator, he says, but of their judgment and humor without thought of God. Conscience has rights because it has duties. Conscience doesn’t have a right to dispense with conscience. It is not the right of self-will. Conscience has to be rooted in truth. Newman rejected the liberal frame of mind which has no need for truth. Conscience is the voice of God in the heart of man, distinguished from the voice of God in revelation. There is a principle planted within us before there is any training, though training is important to the proper reception of the principles. Newman attributes to the conscience all of the attributes of the papacy except infallibility. We don’t have the same objective certitude as papal declarations. The rule of measure of the conscience is not utility, nor happiness of the greatest number, not fitness, not beauty; it is not selfishness, nor sincerity, but a messenger from Him who speaks to us from behind a veil. Conscience is an aboriginal vicar of Christ, a prophet in its information, a monarch in peremptoriness, a priest in its admonitions. He attributes the priestly, prophetic, and kingly office of Christ to the conscience.
MODERN CHALLENGES TO THE TRADITIONAL UNDERSTANDING OF CONSCIENCE
It is very important that we see the conscience as a window open to the truth. Saint Thomas in rooting the conscience in the synderesis, and in his understanding of the human intellect’s natural inclination to truth, perceives the dignity of conscience. Conscience binds only because it is opened to truth. The truth which conscience perceives binds, not the conscience itself. Exactly this is disputed today. The liberals today say that people can search for truth but a denial that the truth can be found. This is too demanding for the liberal. The liberal prefers an agnostic suspension, reducing the judgment of conscience to a mere subjective opinion. In the name of such a liberal approach, the dignity of conscience is raised in opposition to the magisterium. This means that the final and last resort lies with the subjective conscience. Veritatis Splendor rejects this. The theory of an infallible conscience far from elevating conscience in fact reduces conscience. If each individual conscience is held to be infallible, then there is the objective truth which is only general and incomprehensible, and the individual truth which everyone works out for himself. Conscience is reduced to personal sincerity. In practice, truth is replaced by social pressure, which means its fashionable. Such a vision of conscience is dispensed from truth, living in the realm of imagination. What is seen as truth is seen as a burden. The elevation of the individual conscience above objective truth attributes a justifying power to the subjective conscience. The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable hid behind the screen of his self-justifying conscience, unaware of the need of conversion, for his conscience didn’t allow a conversion. The conscience that ignores truth becomes a mechanism of rationalization. People who give up confession and arrive to confession after five years often think they’ve got nothing to confess. They feel self-sufficient. Even though someone in this state can’t name all his sins, the important thing to stress is his pride, is his self-justification.
Newman showed the primacy of truth over conscience. The martyrdom of saints shows that following conscience is not necessarily easy, like the martyrdom of Saint Thomas More. He followed his conscience to the end, and gave him comfort by his sense of humor. The road to truth is not comfortable. The retreat from truth to self and moral subjectivity doesn’t redeem us. The recognition of truth is not easy. The perception of what is real in moral value is not always clear. The fundamental inclinations of human nature can be recognized only with difficulty and admixture of error. The teaching of the Church brings to fruition the proper inclination of the conscience and natural law to bring out what is good in us. The Pope is the advocate of the Christian memory, according to Ratzinger. The pope doesn’t propose it from without, but elucidates memory and brings it out. Without conscience there would be no papacy, which is why we must toast conscience first. The papacy is a service to the memory on which faith is based.
The Church in her teaching authority aids in the building up of virtues which helps the recognition of the truth. There is a connaturality of man and the true good. The development of this instinct of truth pointing out the way requires the Church and the virtues. The common experience is that if we don’t act as we think we begin to think as we act. If we fail to have the moral vigor to persevere in what is true, we begin to doubt what is true.
The function of the moral law is to enlighten the mind so that conscience can properly choose. The education of the conscience avails itself of the written moral exhortations, but our interior instincts must also be awakened by this teaching. Veritatis Splendor says that the authority of the Church on moral questions in no way undermines the freedom of conscience, because freedom of conscience is not freedom from the truth but in the truth. The Church brings to light truths which it already ought to possess. The true teaching awakens the soul. When we speak about the freedom of the conscience, we have to distinguish freedom as an act of the will and freedom as an act of the intellect. This is what critics bring up in the proclamations of the 19th century to the teaching of Dignitatis Humanae.
If there is a seeming discrepancy it is the job of theologians to study the texts to see how they can be tied. The understanding in the 19th century of the liberty of the conscience was understood as the liberty of the intellect to ignore truth. In the 20th century, religious freedom is seen as an act of the will — is it licit to force another to do religious acts against his will. This is why there is a seeming discrepancy. Freedom of conscience meaning freedom from external pressure is certainly wrong. It is wrong to force Muslims against their will to go to Mass. This would be against the dignity of conscience. Freedom of conscience doesn’t mean freedom of the intellect, as if we could ignore the truth and if conscience could choose whatever "truth" it wanted. There are different traditions in the East and West in the approach to truth, whether by faith or by reason. For this reason, Veritatis Splendor rejects a creative character of conscience. We cannot mix-up decision and conscience. There is creativity in conscience, but not in respect to the moral norm. We have to be creative in life to be truly virtuous. We must make moral decision in concrete practical decisions. These decisions in which the conscience is active, if they lead to demanding acts of virtue, they must be creation, like Saint Thomas More’s joke while ascending the scaffolding. We need to be creative to ever to do anything new in life. The Christian life is undertaking of actions in charity. The acts must spring from a mature and independent personality capable of perceiving in a novel way the situation in front of him.
We have to make the appropriate distinctions. Conscience doesn’t decide but judges, but in so doing conditions the decision. There is a double process of reason: the stage of judgment (strictly speaking conscience) — the simple judgment of truth; and the mutual action of reason and will in which the cognition of the conscience is applied to the act. It may happen that the judgment of conscience is correct but the free choice may be evil. The inadequacy of the will or the attraction of the senses may cause us to do differently than the judgment of conscience. The person errs in the election of the act, not in the judgment of conscience. The conscience doesn’t create truth in issuing a free act. In the joint action of the reason and the will, the act is created, not the moral value. Its quality is measured by its conformity to true goods, as perceived by the reason. It is possible to maintain both the creativity of moral acts and the objectivity of moral norms. Reason and will are only truly free when they apply to the inherent attractiveness of that which is truly good.
FORMATION OF CONSCIENCE
In the education of conscience, we have to develop the ability to choose freely and to perceive the truth. Some people manage to perceive the truth, but fail to put it into practice due to lack of virtues. Their conscience can issue true statements, but they fail to act in a moral way. In time, if this is not overcome, they will begin to question the standards conscience perceives. We are a composite whole and if we lack perseverance, in time we back out from truth. We can ask ourselves to what extent the prevalent subjectivity in culture is a result of the lack of moral vigor and the lack of sound philosophy. The lack of moral strength can be the result of the lack of a father figure in education. There may be the lack of a personal relationship with God which permits the overcoming of difficulties when we’ve failed, and by which we can let him pick us up and return to him and the moral standards. The lack may be caused by the failure to express the assertive emotions. In such cases, the judgment of conscience may be true, but very little will flow out of it. The divine image is manifested in the charity of the Christian and perfected by his free choice in accord with the truth we perceive.
Conscience has to be formed. What is involved? It must be formed so that it will be in accord with the objective truth of reality. The next step is that conscience must be certain, capable of influencing decision making. We must both be able to perceive the values and make choices with confidence and certainty. Some people fail to have confidence in the judgment of conscience, and always hesitate, which is a sign of immaturity. Traditional moral theology worked out several principles to aid the conscience in doubtful cases. The first was that in doubt, you’re free (in dubio, libertas). When there’s a doubt, use your brains. This is when there’s true doubt, not questioning about the justification. There may be doubts about whether the law applies. Doubt doesn’t apply if there is a question as to what reasoning led to the conclusion, there is no doubt. There’s no doubt about contraception, because the teaching is clear, even though some don’t see the argumentation. The second was that in doubt the condition of he who possesses is better. The third is that no one is required to do impossible things. The fourth is the obligations and punishments are to be interpreted strictly, whereas privileges widely. These rules were worked out in the times of casuistry to help people not to fall into fear neuroses.
An erroneous conscience has to be respected. We have no right to force people to act against their conscience. If someone is culpable for not finding out what he should and could have known, then he’s at fault, but not for following his conscience but for failing to inform it. The formation of conscience begins in childhood. The five-year old is capable of assessing he has done something wrong; therefore he has the right to have his conscience formed. It is wrong to say that children are innocent and angels, which is from the Enlightenment and is contrary to experience. They have a right to catechesis and sacramental confession. The education of the conscience should lead to a capacity to discern the work of the Holy Spirit. To educate one’s conscience it is important to know oneself and to perceive God within. The regular examination of one’s conscience to see the faults but also the graces is important. Spiritual direction should aid in the formation of a clear judgment of conscience, to make clear hidden motivations, and lead to an appropriate knowledge of oneself. We need a long process of purification of our faculties so that the beauty of the divine image will be manifested within us. Conscience should lead to sincerity, to the recognition of our weaknesses and our dependence in God. Supernatural means are necessary to form consciences: both the sacraments and contemplative prayer.
wow ang haaaaaabaaaa..
hehe
merry xmas and a happy new year everyone!!!
-mervyn aldana
(yung payat na matangkad sa harap)
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