Your "conscience" versus Church teaching

[allhers]

Yes. I agree there are exceptions. Rightfully so. But why not exceptions for killing to end suffering?

Suffering is united to Christ for the salvation of the world. You didn’t read the document that John Paul II wrote that I gave you back on post 33 did you? If you read it, it will help you to understand better. All you have to do is click on the link and it will take you right to it.

 

[chaz0426]

thomfra,
You have hit one of the hot buttons and of course there are many opinions. Here is one more.

Any true Catholic must, in good conscience, declare that we must follow Church teaching and that Euthanasia is wrong at any time. Therefore you cannot help end the person’s suffering in the case you have given. However, None of us can declare with full knowledge how we would react in that situation.

Jesus declared Love as the rule of our life. Love even for our enemies. Yet we are permitted under Church Law to serve in the military and to kill our enemies. Likewise we are permitted to kill in self defence or the defence of another. How can this be squared with the Rule of Love?

It is necessary to recognize the difference between the ideal for which we strive and the realities which we sometimes face. A person who finds themselves in your scenerio must quickly weigh many choices and try to determine the higher good. He must also recognize that he will have to live the results of that decision for the rest of his live. For myself, I can only say that I hope my Dear Lord would guide me and I would make the correct choice.

Jesus said that there is no greater love than to lay down your life for your fellow man. If I made a choice to end this person’s suffering even though I “know” I am committing a mortal sin by doing it; if I make this choice out of love for this person, am I not, in a sense, laying down my life for that person? Am I not risking my own soul out of love to save another?

Very tricky and difficult questions. May God grant that none here are faced with such a situation.

Peace
James

Thank you, finally a fully justified and sound conclusion.

I completely agree thats why I was saying to those who sit there and easily condemn it to imagine the moral dilemma you would be in if you were faced with such a decision. It’s easy to sit there at your computer now and say "oh killing is always wrong so I would keep him alive as long as possible even if he is suffering great pain because jesus did "

Yes suffering is redemptive and in most cases it usually is but in this case it is physical pain which is a whole lot different than mental/emotional pain.

There are just some cases although rare where if you truly care or have a natural sense of humanity to end suffering as much as possible and IF there is no chance of survival to consider speeding up death. Or at the very least offer them that choice even if it’s a mortal sin.

I think if you truly acted out of your heart and best interest and what you felt was right, and you prayed to God, he must give mercy to you. (if you outright killed him without second thought then this doesn’t apply obviously since that is justifiably murder)

You should also confess it too to your priest or a priest if you ever did such a thing even if you don’t feel too much guilt in your heart.

To sum it all up I’m just saying to those outrightly condemning things in ALL cases and taking no second thought to this moral dilliema to stop being so “robotic” so to say in church teaching and to justify your means with YOUR OWN conscience and not the churches. It’s easy to sit there and say “because the church said so” or “I don’t know but the church says it’s wrong so it’s wrong”. You see…

Ideally your own true examination of conscience is parallel to the church’s.

If it is not try to read up on why the church justifies it’s conclusions and try to understand. If you still have trouble then please go to as many Priests as possible to get their opinions and to express yours. You will learn so much trust me. It really strengthens your faith if you REALLY TRULY know your faith. (believe me the church has 2000 years of theology and philosophy to fall upon)

 

[YADA]

[REMEMBER NO PAIN MEDS OR PAIN CONTROL IS AVAILABLE]

NO MEDICAL HELP IS AVAILABLE ]

this was common on the battlefield just a few decades ago, even today sometimes

Sorry but medications are not the only way to ease pain … i realized that was not your exact example and said so … but the comfort of another person, a prayer offered … those too ease pain … not all pain is physical and emotional support can ease pain …

You could also argue that God was acting through you.

Well God does not act through us to commit murder nor determine who live, who dies and when … sorry, but I find that misguided … in your scenario, the person will probably not live long but each moment is precious as that may be the very time they need to 'get right with their maker" … your intervention could prevent that occurance … plus you have eliminated the redemptive vale of suffering …

By your reasoning, the Apostle John should have ended Jesus’s agony on the cross or even earlier at the scouraging …

Here is a valid solution: you can place a loaded gun just out of reach from him (not easily accessible but possible) and say “do what you must, it is ultimately your choice” Therefore for him to reach acquire the gun he would have to act out of his own effort

Are you held responsible? You could easily argue no because if he chose to shoot himself, he killed himself because he choose suicide. You didn’t hand him the gun he sought it out and used it and made the choice to kill himself. That was God’s free will in action and he acted out of his own actions. The gun simply existed.

No you should not tempt others to sin nor yourself …

Another counter argument also is that if you actively withheld the gun and did everything to keep him alive you witheld the opportunity or his right of choice and free will from God for him to kill himself. It could also be consider torture and inhumane. In America today that can land you in jail!

Quite a stretch this one … and in America a man witnessed the rape and murder of a child in a Las Vegas casino restroom and was not held accounable for not intervening to stop the crime, did not report that the crime was happening and did not report the crime after the fact :banghead: … so …"land in jail" for your scenario :nope:

because the Church/God/Jesus said so" isn’t valid

It is valid if God really did say and everyone heard it loud and clear it is justified because God knows all

But where in the bible does it say what you should do in this situation? Does Jesus explicitly say “Euthanasia is ALWAYS wrong” Not that I remember. It is deducted and assumed that is what he “would have” said.

The church reasoned it out somehow and I’m sure there is a book or essay out there about it that validly answers it. I don’t have the time to look it up but I will eventually.

God clearly identifies himself as the author of Life … God clearly says that we are "called by Name" from within “our mother’s womb” … God is omniscient and omnipitent … nowhere does God delegate to man the decision to end life for our benefit … And your because the Chruch/God/Jesus is absurd on some level … Jesus founded a Church … he did not delegate and found a multitude of individual decision makers to run around dictating the actions accceptable and un-acceptaable in every mae up scenario … the Church was entrusted with a faith, a morality … and a teaching office … instruction and correction is part of the equation, whether you approve or not …

My point here is no one is giving a valid claim or argument.

Really? I have a different viewpoint … many posts have been very enlightening … they just don’t appear to follow your sense of morality…

Very few people without a Ph.d in philosophy or theology can do that.

We’ll I study morality from a catholic ethicist … the questions you are asking are the wrong ones IMHO upon which to make a moral decision …

 

[beautiful304]

She tried to tell me that even though the Church teaches against birth control that if my conscience tells me otherwise then it is perfectly ok to use birth control.

Well, some people might be taking the pill because of medical reasons. Is the Church against it for that reason also?

Have you told her about NFP?

 

[Greg27]

The CC has some fairly rich reflections on matters of theological ethics. The matter of where teachings derived from moral theology clash with conscience is a complex one. The teaching of theologians is that the person is bound to follow a conscience, including one that may be in error. Even so, to reach the proper decision on a moral matter, a person’s conscience was (and still is) supposed to follow reason and divine law.

There are some limitations on what the Pope and the CC can teach, even when it claims infallibility. The Pope and CC cannot teach something that conflicts with divine or natural law (exhorting people to commit suicide for example) or suddenly reverse a key dogma like the Trinity and declare God is one Being in Four Persons. Infallibility is more seen in terms of preserving and teaching what the church believes is the Gospel and its moral teachings entrusted to it by the Bible and Gospel in particular.

For the believer, my understanding is that there are two types of assent to theological teachings, including of morality. These are with Catholic faith and with religious submission of mind and will. To assent with Catholic faith pertains to things like the Trinity, the Eucharistic presence of Christ, and certain doctrines regarding Mary. To assent with mind and will is to receive the teaching of the church as authentic and true, and to not dissent from it or bring it into disrepute publically. There is room for objection or dissent on grounds of conscience, but the dissenter must first examine the teaching in question carefully and be open to its truth and accepting it. Dissent is not seen as a light option but only as something that occurs when the well-formed conscience cannot assent to a teaching in good conscience. That is different from just rejecting a teaching because you don’t like it, personally. That in my understanding, is the teaching of the church.

I personally think difficult ethical questions require more effort than simply accepting an answer someone else gives you, even if they claim to have an answer backed up by divine authority. Argument and reason and thinking these things through in your own context and situation are incredibly important. Ultimately, only you can make your own decisions, and a priest can’t be there to make them for you. This is where conscience comes in. But there is also a tendency in Western society to reject rationality, tradition and authority; too many people make bad decisions on impulse, a whim, or on purely emotional grounds and disregard rationality. I would agree with the views of some Catholics that the relativity of modern society and its views, including in moral matters, with no general agreement about moral ideals and principles, is not a good thing. To structure life and make proper decisions we need some vision of the good and of virtue, decency, and justice. But at the same time, I don’t agree that answers can simply be found in the decrees of Popes and Bishops or from a simplistic reading of ancient Biblical texts.

We need to be able to make our own minds up when faced with moral questions, whatever our belief, and in a way that is strong, focused, and with powerful conviction. A tepid, sentimental and weak moral compass on the other hand, leads nowhere.

.

 

[larsegarots]

God gave us brains and a conscience.

I think we have a moral obligation to consider that the church teachings are not always correct. After all, the church is run by humans.

If we were to go back in time, the church taught to burn “witches” at the stake. In the 1500’s for example, you could purchase indulgences in sin from the church. In the 1600’s, it was illegal to determine anything contrary to the sacred scriptures, specifically that the Earth revolves around the sun.

I would trust your conscience over church teachings. At the end of the day, your decisions will be between you and God.

 

[KathleenElsie]

If your conscience tells you otherwise, or against Church teaching, you have a poorly formed conscience.

She needs to look around and notice that there are few people left in the cafeteria, because it closed two years ago!

We closed the buffet of choice.

 

[thomfra]

We closed the buffet of choice.

we?

 

[thomfra]

I would trust your conscience over church teachings. At the end of the day, your decisions will be between you and God.

I think if you have a brain of your own, then yes. This is what you would do. Listen to you conscience. Otherwise you have lost what it is that makes you a human being.

 

[Joe_5859]

God gave us brains and a conscience.

I think we have a moral obligation to consider that the church teachings are not always correct. After all, the church is run by humans.

If we were to go back in time, the church taught to burn “witches” at the stake. In the 1500’s for example, you could purchase indulgences in sin from the church. In the 1600’s, it was illegal to determine anything contrary to the sacred scriptures, specifically that the Earth revolves around the sun.

I would trust your conscience over church teachings. At the end of the day, your decisions will be between you and God.

The examples you cite are not really examples of teaching but examples of practice. As Catholics, we believe the Church teaches without error on matters of faith and morals. This doesn’t mean that we believe the individual members of the Church never make mistakes in their actions.

The Church never taught that witches should be burned at the stake. Did that happen? Possibly (though I have seen many articles arguing that the State had more to do with such things than the Church). If it did happen, at most we could say is that it was an incorrect discipline (problematic application of capital punishment) that was rooted in a correct teaching (witchcraft is wrong).

The same with the sale of indulgences. Did some people in the Church participate in such an abuse? Absolutely. But it was never a teaching. It would be akin to looking back on the Church of today 500 years from now and saying that the Church taught that pizza and beer was valid eucharistic matter. Did some priests incorrectly try to celebrate Mass with pizza and beer? Yes. But it is/was an abuse, not a teaching.

Similarly, the Church never taught anything regarding geocentrism vs. heliocentrism. This is a matter of science, not faith or morals. Galileo had the Church’s full support in his theories (which weren’t really his theories, but Copernicus’). The Church only stepped in when Galileo overstepped his bounds and tried to force Copernicanism on the Church as the only way to interpret Scripture when his theory had yet to be fully proven (and his theories were never fully proven until after his death). Here are some articles that deal with that.

We need to be very careful about ascribing things as being part of “Church teaching”. Many examples, like the ones above, do not fit and thus can be very misleading. The Church’s teaching on moral issues is in a completely different category than these examples.

 

[larsegarots]

The examples you cite are not really examples of teaching but examples of practice. As Catholics, we believe the Church teaches without error on matters of faith and morals. This doesn’t mean that we believe the individual members of the Church never make mistakes in their actions.

Isn’t what the Pope says the teachings of the Church. After all, the Church regards a Pope as infallible.

Pope Innocent VIII issued the papal bull Summis desiderantes which gave full papal approval for the Inquisition to move against witches and permission to do whatever necessary to get rid of them. He also supported the Spanish Inquisition.

When all Christians believed around 400 that the world was flat because of scripture, how can you say this was not the Church’s teaching. Did the Church teach it was a sphere, and yet all Christians disagree?

In 1600, priest Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake for believing in science, due to the Roman Inquisition, which the pope presided over.

When Pope Leo X established the practice of selling of indulgences, how could this not be considered church teaching since the pope established it!

Galileo had the Church’s full support in his theories

Galileo went to Rome in 1616 to try to persuade the Church authorities not to ban his ideas. Cardinal Bellarmine ordered him to stop defending his ideas.

In 1633, the Inquisition determined the idea that the Sun is stationary was condemned as “formally heretical” and sentenced Galileo to arrest.

It wasn’t until 1758 that the general prohibition against heliocentrism was removed.

This hardly suggests that the Church fully supported his theories as you have claimed.

Additionally, the Church has changed its mind on matters. For example, in 325 marriage for priests was okay. In 385, however, Pope Siricius commanded complete celibacy and demanded divorce for bishops, priests, and deacons who were married.

…be akin to looking back on the Church of today 500 years from now and saying that the Church taught that pizza and beer was valid eucharistic matter.

If the Pope himself said that pizza and beer was valid Eucharistic matter, then I think most Catholics would agree that that is the teaching of the Church.

 

[KathleenElsie]

we?

Yes “we” as a part of Holy Mother Church. We are the body of Christ. I am part of that body of Christ. So yes “we”.

 

[thomfra]

Yes “we” as a part of Holy Mother Church. We are the body of Christ. I am part of that body of Christ. So yes “we”.

Yes but you didn’t make, and can not make any policy decisions. You do what you are told? Correct?

 

[JRKH]

Yes but you didn’t make, and can not make any policy decisions. You do what you are told? Correct?

Thomfra,
Please recognize that The Church Never had a policy of “cafeteria” style theology. Those espoused it were, unfortunately, tolerated and those who warned against it and the harm it was causing were frowned upon and made to feel old fashoned and out of step.
Now that JP II and B XVI have, “Put their Foot Down” as it were, and called to account those who aspouse this kind of lax catholicism, those who have always held to the full teaching and authority of the Church are now being heard and listened to more.

In short, Yes we “do what we are told”, and those who felt they didn’t have to are getting a wake-up call.

Peace
James

 

[thomfra]

In short, Yes we “do what we are told”
James

Yes. I was merely clarifying that the previous poster had/has no say whatsoever in RCC policy.

 

[JRKH]

Originally Posted by JRKH
In short, Yes we “do what we are told”
James

But His statement of “We” is still valid because it is to a large extent through the efforts of folks like him that the “Cafeteria” is being closed.

Peace
James

 

[thomfra]

But His statement of “We” is still valid because it is to a large extent through the efforts of folks like him that the “Cafeteria” is being closed.

Peace
James

What “efforts” are these then?

 

[JRKH]

What “efforts” are these then?

This is a broad question and may best be answered by each individual. I’ll just list a few general ideas of ways that the faithful have stood forth.

1. Pro-Life work. A complete and earnest rejection of any “exception” in either the abortion or ABC discussion.
2. Support of what I will call “Full Faith Compliance” groups such as Opus Dei, EWTN etc. who promote a complete and perfect communion with and submission to Rome.
3. Activities in Parish work which offset, at least to some degree, the more excessive liberalization of local liturgy and teaching.
4. Working toward and support of the return of the TLM (or EF). The re-introduction of the Latin mass has demonstrated a very real and substative desire for a return to orthodox faith and worship.
5. Taking time to post, blog and in all ways evangelize, both catholics and non-catholics about the true teachings of the Church so that all will recognize the consistant truth that is The Catholic Church.

These and thousands of other works have been performed by the faithful and who have kept their eye firmly upon Rome and the teachings of the Magisterium.
It is these “people in the pews” who have firmly rejected the concept of, “I am catholic but I reject the teaching on…”. There can be no such thing.
It is these people who are and will be in the forefront of rebuilding the Church from within, and in accordance with the Holy Father and the teachings of the Church.

Peace
James

 

[KathleenElsie]

This is a broad question and may best be answered by each individual. I’ll just list a few general ideas of ways that the faithful have stood forth.

1. Pro-Life work. A complete and earnest rejection of any “exception” in either the abortion or ABC discussion.
2. Support of what I will call “Full Faith Compliance” groups such as Opus Dei, EWTN etc. who promote a complete and perfect communion with and submission to Rome.
3. Activities in Parish work which offset, at least to some degree, the more excessive liberalization of local liturgy and teaching.
4. Working toward and support of the return of the TLM (or EF). The re-introduction of the Latin mass has demonstrated a very real and substative desire for a return to orthodox faith and worship.
5. Taking time to post, blog and in all ways evangelize, both catholics and non-catholics about the true teachings of the Church so that all will recognize the consistant truth that is The Catholic Church.

These and thousands of other works have been performed by the faithful and who have kept their eye firmly upon Rome and the teachings of the Magisterium.
It is these “people in the pews” who have firmly rejected the concept of, “I am catholic but I reject the teaching on…”. There can be no such thing.
It is these people who are and will be in the forefront of rebuilding the Church from within, and in accordance with the Holy Father and the teachings of the Church.

Peace
James

Thank you James. You said it better then I could.

It is these “people in the pews” who have firmly rejected the concept of, “I am catholic but I reject the teaching on…”. There can be no such thing.

 

[Spirithound]

…any logical person can deduct and conclude that no good of the suffering would come out of this rather it would cause much distress for the person deciding to end his life or not and the person suffering at his hand. Allowing him to suffer would do what good?

We seem to be working from different defnitions of “good”

Thank you, finally a fully justified and sound conclusion.

Yes suffering is redemptive and in most cases it usually is but in this case it is physical pain which is a whole lot different than mental/emotional pain.

That was no “fully justified and sound conclusion.” It wasn’t even a conclusion! James opened his post by saying essentially “the Church says so”, a statement you’ve been dismissing for 3 days now. In fact, what you’re happy about is that James doesn’t say for sure what he’d do.

James, you’re a good man, and I have every confidence that the Lord with guide you properly. I’m not ragging on you, just saying that your post doesn’t really give a conclusion that hasn’t been given before.

Back to the post…ALL suffering is redemptive, and it doesn’t matter whether it is physical or metal, emotional, or spiritual. This is the good that suffering produces. Frankly, I can’t think of a single direct worldly good that suffering produces. It’s all redemptive, salvific, purgative.