Teaching on consicence

[peary]

The Church teaches that “a correctly informed conscience” is one that understands the reasoning behind the Church’s teachings in areas of Faith and morals. Once this understanding is reached, then the conscience is correctly informed and one is free to discern how his or her Faith and the Church’s moral teachings can be applied to everyday life. Sometimes there are no easy answers. But it is important for the conscience to understand why the Church teaches as it does and the bases of those teachings. A good Catholic Christian just cannot randomly opinionate that just because he or she doesn’t agree that one can reject it on that basis alone.

 

[Janet_S]

Many hear do not believe there is any concept of primacy of conscience. They of course see a great threat in it. Most, based on their replies and comments suggest to me they have an incorrect assumption of what it means, often likening it to “doing your own thing” or substituting their opinion to that that of the Church. Although this has been explained as untrue time and time again, some continue to make this claim.

After participating in 3 threads about conscience and reading several articles, The Catechism, encyclicals, and some Vatican II documents, I think I understand it pretty well. “Primacy of conscience” is not taught by the Church.

I would really like to see 1 example of a Catholic before the 1960’s who ever claimed “primacy of conscience” as a reason to dissent from Church teaching, especially regarding sexual sins. Maybe you can look that up, but I doubt you will find anyone who ever did before then. As a heresy, I am quite sure you can’t trace this one back any further than 1966.

And for the record, Fix and I both posted articles from Cardinal Pell; you never did. I don’t know why you would anyway since he denies the “primacy of conscience” doctrine too.

Conscience is supposed to be the voice of God. It’s strange how many people God is telling to have abortions, have homosexual sex, and to use birth control. It’s especially strange since He is telling His Church the opposite.

But if someone is determined to sin and blame it on his conscience, he is always free to do that.

 

[Janet_S]

I am 61 Catholic man way over my head in a lay ministry workshop for our parish. From time to time we get group questions to work on for our next workshop. As a “Cradle Catholic” I am lost in my research for finding some answers for these questions. My only relief is we can use the Internet or any other source as long as we mention the source in our discussion group. Here’s my question; In moral theology the church has
traditionally based much of its teaching on social and sexual ethics on the natural law. What is the natural law? (My question) What is the church’s understanding of the natural law and what is the concrete historical examples and what are contemporary application. Which one of these are attached to a) sexual ethics or b) bioethics. If you have an answer please submit and where would I get references for this question?

JPII’s encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, would be a good place to start:
vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_06081993_veritatis-splendor_en.html

The part about conscience starts here:

II. Conscience and truth

Man’s sanctuary

1. The relationship between man’s freedom and God’s law is most deeply lived out in the “heart” of the person, in his moral conscience. As the Second Vatican Council observed: “In the depths of his conscience man detects a law which he does not impose on himself, but which holds him to obedience. Always summoning him to love good and avoid evil, the voice of conscience can when necessary speak to his heart more specifically: ‘do this, shun that’. For man has in his heart a law written by God. To obey it is the very dignity of man; according to it he will be judged (cf. Rom 2:14-16)”.101

 

[Janet_S]

A good many things are cited as proof tjat all are required to follow the Church without question, but are cited out of context often times and mostly they ignore the constant use of the word “guide” in reference to the Church, which is hardly a order to follow as told. You may also wish to examine a well thought out argument by a moral ethicist linked from my blog of Dec. 9. That also contains a reference to Pell in the UK and his very different take on it which I included in fairness. Be careful…people do tend to cherry pick what serves their opinion.

This is from Lumen Gentium 25, which I have pointed out several times to you. You can read the whole thing in context, and the meaning doesn’t change:

.(165) Bishops, teaching in communion with the Roman Pontiff, are to be respected by all as witnesses to divine and Catholic truth. In matters of faith and morals, the bishops speak in the name of Christ and the faithful are to accept their teaching and adhere to it with a religious assent. This religious submission of mind and will must be shown in a special way to the authentic magisterium of the Roman Pontiff, even when he is not speaking ex cathedra; that is, it must be shown in such a way that his supreme magisterium is acknowledged with reverence, the judgments made by him are sincerely adhered to, according to his manifest mind and will. His mind and will in the matter may be known either from the character of the documents, from his frequent repetition of the same doctrine, or from his manner of speaking.

It’s not a mere suggestion, it applies to you too.

 

[fix]

The church’s traditional teaching on conscience is that individuals must always follow their informed conscience, even if such a conscience-based decision be a variance with the teaching of the Magisterium.

Where does She teach this?

 

[vern_humphrey]

Originally Posted by rgvalles98
The church’s traditional teaching on conscience is that individuals must always follow their informed conscience, even if such a conscience-based decision be a variance with the teaching of the Magisterium.

Where does She teach this?

Somewhere other than this planet.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Jospeh Cardinal Ratzinger affirmed the traditional view on conscience: “one must follow a certain conscience or at least not act against it.” source, as linked to above]. However, he is not saying that those who follow a certain but erroneous conscience in grave matters are justified in doing so. This distinction must be made very clear. In the same article, he affirms that Sacred Scripture precludes "a theory of justification by the errant conscience."

St. Thomas Aquinas affirms, “vincible ignorance is a sin, if it be about matters one is bound to know” (Summa Theologica, IIa, 76,2). Consequently, it must be made clear that following a faulty conscience in grave matters which was made erroneous by vincible ignorance or obstinacy may be as damnable as any other grave sin.

As Cardinal Avery Dulles noted, "A persons conscience can be out of phase with what is objectively right. In such a case, the individual will not be guilty for following the voice of conscience, but may be guilty for having failed to form that conscience by utilizing the necessary means. "

For this very reason, Pope St. Pius X affirms:

I agree with what you have pointed out.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

The Church teaches that “a correctly informed conscience” is one that understands the reasoning behind the Church’s teachings in areas of Faith and morals. Once this understanding is reached, then the conscience is correctly informed and one is free to discern how his or her Faith and the Church’s moral teachings can be applied to everyday life. Sometimes there are no easy answers. But it is important for the conscience to understand why the Church teaches as it does and the bases of those teachings. A good Catholic Christian just cannot randomly opinionate that just because he or she doesn’t agree that one can reject it on that basis alone.

100% right in IMO

 

[TMC]

The church’s traditional teaching on conscience is that individuals must always follow their informed conscience, even if such a conscience-based decision be a variance with the teaching of the Magisterium.

Where does She teach this?

Somewhere other than this planet.

CCC:

1799 Faced with a moral choice, conscience can make either a right judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law or, on the contrary, an erroneous judgment that departs from them.

1800 A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his conscience.

1801 Conscience can remain in ignorance or make erroneous judgments. Such ignorance and errors are not always free of guilt.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

After participating in 3 threads about conscience and reading several articles, The Catechism, encyclicals, and some Vatican II documents, I think I understand it pretty well. “Primacy of conscience” is not taught by the Church.

Yes, I am aware that is your opinion. Mine, as you know is different.

I would really like to see 1 example of a Catholic before the 1960’s who ever claimed “primacy of conscience” as a reason to dissent from Church teaching, especially regarding sexual sins. Maybe you can look that up, but I doubt you will find anyone who ever did before then. As a heresy, I am quite sure you can’t trace this one back any further than 1966.

I’m not sure I should have to prove this, since it adds nothing. And in any case, for what reason do you think that someone’s personal conclusion about any Church teaching would somehow be public and available for strangers to puzzle over?

And for the record, Fix and I both posted articles from Cardinal Pell; you never did. I don’t know why you would anyway since he denies the “primacy of conscience” doctrine too.

If you were aware of Pell before me, then I am sorry. I never saw him mentioned until after I posted the abstract in which he was footnoted. I specifically did not eliminate the footnotes, knowing that Pell’s position was in opposition to mine, specifically because I tend to think it’s fairer to present or at least allude to the fact that other opinions are out there. I seldom state things as fact unless I feel confident that the great weight of the evidence is on one site. And then, it is still but an opinion.

Conscience is supposed to be the voice of God. It’s strange how many people God is telling to have abortions, have homosexual sex, and to use birth control. It’s especially strange since He is telling His Church the opposite.

While I’m not inclined to conclude what God may be telling anyone, I would be rather shocked to find God telling people most of the things you address, perhaps in some cases all of them. I agree, the Church’s teachings are quite clear.

someone is determined to sin and blame it on his conscience, he is always free to do that.

I’m not sure anyone would blame their conscience. They would likely claim that this was there reason and choice. And you are right, anyone is free to do so. I would counsel against it except for the most aggregious situation, since its a very dangerous path to tread as I have stated here before. Still, I believe that some are indeed left with no alternative but to seek deeper understanding.

 

[fix]

The Church teaches that “a correctly informed conscience” is one that understands the reasoning behind the Church’s teachings in areas of Faith and morals. Once this understanding is reached, then the conscience is correctly informed and one is free to discern how his or her Faith and the Church’s moral teachings can be applied to everyday life. Sometimes there are no easy answers. But it is important for the conscience to understand why the Church teaches as it does and the bases of those teachings. A good Catholic Christian just cannot randomly opinionate that just because he or she doesn’t agree that one can reject it on that basis alone.

Not so sure I agree with you here. First off what reason is there a Catholic may reject a teaching? If after prayer and study one finds racism is good is such a conscience justified?

Secondly, where is it stated one must understand why the Church teaches as She does? It is good if that is possible, but I cannot see how that is mandatory. Did not Augustine say accept first and understand second?

Catholics have reasoned Christ is The authority behind His Church. What He asks of us does not need to be understood in some sophisticated way that only a doctorate in moral theology would grasp. If one does not grasp the teaching on contracpetion one is not excused until one finally agrees. That would mean every single teaching requires our personal approval before we agree to submit.

 

[fix]

CCC:

None of that says one has informed conscience if one rejects Church teaching and you left out other parts that specfically say one must not set their conscience in opposition to the magisterium.

What I marvel at is why you would look at the one aspect of that one teaching and then think it is possible to reject other teachings. Why would that one aspect of one teaching be mandatory and other teachings be plastic?

The problem with your position is you elevate one part of the teaching and seem to minimze the other part. The Church does not want any of us to act on an erroneous conscience. She prefers we act on a properly formed conscience. Such a conscience would not contradict Church teaching.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

This is from Lumen Gentium 25, which I have pointed out several times to you. You can read the whole thing in context, and the meaning doesn’t change:

It’s not a mere suggestion, it applies to you too.

Yes I know. But lets not belabour the point. I look at LG and note that it generally sets out how the hierarchy works in the Church, who is responsible to who. Therefore a general statement of who’s pronouncements are meant for whom seems not controlling here, at least to me. They are by no interpretation talking about conscience, how to form one, or what to do when you cannot agree. Other documents do address this specifically and I have quoted and cited them. Of course they are dismissed without comment generally, which means I guess nobody could come up with a good argument. In any case, I think we all know where we stand.

 

[fix]

In particular, as the Council affirms, "the task of authentically interpreting the word of God, whether in its written form or in that of Tradition, has been entrusted only to those charged with the Church’s living Magisterium, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ".41 The Church, in her life and teaching, is thus revealed as “the pillar and bulwark of the truth” ( 1 Tim 3:15), including the truth regarding moral action. Indeed, “the Church has the right always and everywhere to proclaim moral principles, even in respect of the social order, and to make judgments about any human matter in so far as this is required by fundamental human rights or the salvation of souls”.42

In their desire to emphasize the “creative” character of conscience, certain authors no longer call its actions “judgments” but “decisions” : only by making these decisions “autonomously” would man be able to attain moral maturity. Some even hold that this process of maturing is inhibited by the excessively categorical position adopted by the Church’s Magisterium in many moral questions; for them, the Church’s interventions are the cause of unnecessary *conflicts of conscience.

• In order to justify these positions, some authors have proposed a kind of double status of moral truth. Beyond the doctrinal and abstract level, one would have to acknowledge the priority of a certain more concrete existential consideration. The latter, by taking account of circumstances and the situation, could legitimately be the basis of certain *exceptions to the general rule *and thus permit one to do in practice and in good conscience what is qualified as intrinsically evil by the moral law. A separation, or even an opposition, is thus established in some cases between the teaching of the precept, which is valid in general, and the norm of the individual conscience, which would in fact make the final decision about what is good and what is evil. On this basis, an attempt is made to legitimize so-called “pastoral” solutions contrary to the teaching of the Magisterium, and to justify a “creative” hermeneutic according to which the moral conscience is in no way obliged, in every case, by a particular negative precept…

Does this sound like The Pope thinks each subjective conscience is free to reject magisterial teaching?

 

[fhansen]

Other documents do address this specifically and I have quoted and cited them. Of course they are dismissed without comment generally, which means I guess nobody could come up with a good argument. In any case, I think we all know where we stand.

Thanks for the link to “Conscience and Truth”. It explains the Catholic position well and personally helped me to better understand the issue. The problem, like Janet said, is that we’re not defining and using the term “conscience” correctly. In the Popes’ view, as well as in Newmans’, “conscience” is that part of us that already knows the truth and that should cause guilt in us when we sway from it. This is the key to understanding Newmans’, “I shall drink—to the Pope, if you please,—still to conscience first and to the Pope afterwards”. The Pope comments, "Newman embraced an interpretation of the papacy which is only then correctly conceived when it is viewed together with the primacy of conscience, a papacy not put in opposition to the primacy of conscience but based on it and guaranteeing it.” In other words, our consciences, properly understood, already agree with the Church, they were designed with the truth as an integral part of them, but they can be repressed or denied-in fact we are BORN in denial of them, to some degree, due to the fall. Our purpose is to free them so that they can reign as per Gods’ design. A promise from the prophet Jeremiah is quoted in the NT: “I will write my laws in your hearts and on your minds”. Perhaps this means that the conscience will be freed so that it and the mind/will/self can again be of one accord. In any case, the Pope continues with a brilliant comparison, well worth reading, of the “conscience”, viewed falsely as the arbiter of truth rather than as the God-given knower of truth, to the universe as described by the theory of relativity.: “And what is called conscience in such a worldview is, on deeper reflection, but a euphemistic way of saying that there is no such thing as an actual conscience, conscience understood as a “co-knowing” with the truth.” A “co-knowing” with the truth is what the Church is after in us. That part of us that is in opposition to or unconcerned with the truth bases its judgments on what it can get: money, glory, pleasure, etc. What’s been called “primacy of conscience” in this thread is really the “primacy of the ego”. So the Pope wrote, “We can now say: it will not do to identify man’s conscience with the self-consciousness of the I, with its’ subjective certainty about itself and its moral behavior.” Conscience doesn’t error- and it’s the same for all of us. WE error by wanting primacy for ourselves-that is our guilt.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Does this sound like The Pope thinks each subjective conscience is free to reject magisterial teaching?

Of course not, and not one person here is suggesting anything so patently frivolous and useless.

 

[peary]

Not so sure I agree with you here. First off what reason is there a Catholic may reject a teaching? If after prayer and study one finds racism is good is such a conscience justified?

The Church does not teach racism.

Secondly, where is it stated one must understand why the Church teaches as She does? It is good if that is possible, but I cannot see how that is mandatory. Did not Augustine say accept first and understand second?

**As Catholic Christians we have the responsibility *and the duty ***to understand why the Church teaches the principles of morals as it does.

Catholics have reasoned Christ is The authority behind His Church. What He asks of us does not need to be understood in some sophisticated way that only a doctorate in moral theology would grasp. If one does not grasp the teaching on contracpetion one is not excused until one finally agrees. That would mean every single teaching requires our personal approval before we agree to submit.

It means using both our Faith and reason to understand a moral position taken by the Church. One cannot use reason alone; it must be enlightened by the revelation of FAITH.

 

[Janet_S]

Yes I know. But lets not belabour the point. I look at LG and note that it generally sets out how the hierarchy works in the Church, who is responsible to who. Therefore a general statement of who’s pronouncements are meant for whom seems not controlling here, at least to me. They are by no interpretation talking about conscience, how to form one, or what to do when you cannot agree. Other documents do address this specifically and I have quoted and cited them. Of course they are dismissed without comment generally, which means I guess nobody could come up with a good argument. In any case, I think we all know where we stand.

It says: “Bishops, teaching in communion with the Roman Pontiff, are to be respected by all as witnesses to divine and Catholic truth. In matters of faith and morals, the bishops speak in the name of Christ and the faithful are to accept their teaching and adhere to it with a religious assent.” It can’t get much clearer than that.

Look at it this way, the Pope is our shepherd. We are the sheep. Sheep are free to stray, but, when they do, they usually fall off a cliff or get eaten by a wolf.

 

[c659smith]

When Adam and Eve ate the fruit from the tree of Knowledge man had a conscience.

When God ask why they were hiding their response was because I am naked.

What gave them the reasoning to know they were naked?

a conscience.

When Cain Killed Abel he hid from God and God asked where is your brother and his response was a lie and stated “am I my brothers keeper”?

Cain knew he was wrong because of a conscience.

This was not taught to them but it is what seperates us from the animal kingdom.

When we reach the age of reason–the ability to say no and it’s effects we have a conscience.

By the way can I hold a conscience in my hand? Is it tangible? Can I buy one?

No, it is part of the soul.

 

[Janet_S]

I think it would be a disaster for anyone involved in lay ministry to present the teachings of the Church as optional. I know this is done all the time, and maybe this is how some of the people here were instructed.

Should we tell our RCIA candidates: “This is what the Church teaches. Pray about it. If you can’t accept it, that’s fine. Each of us must follow his conscience.”

Please, what kind of instruction is that. For one thing, how many people even know what the Church means when by “conscience.” For another thing, if a person is just beginning to learn about Catholicism, the chance is about nil that they have anything close to a well-formed conscience. Who would bother wrestling with the Church’s teachings, especially the tough ones, if they can so easily dismiss them.

I realize “primacy of conscience” is the heresy du jour in the Catholic Church. People have taken a truth and twisted it into something unrecognizable.