Download CONSCIENCE FORMATION

CONSCIENCE FORMATION
May you fight a good fight by having faith
and a good conscience. Some, by rejecting
conscience, have made a shipwreck of their
faith – 1 Timothy 1:18-19
With and Without Conscience
• Negative view: “Conscience is the inner voice
which warns us that someone may be
looking.”
• “My conscience is like a three-cornered thing
in here that stands still when I am good. But
when I’m bad, it turns around, and the corners
hurt a lot. But if I keep on doing bad,
eventually the corners wear off and it doesn’t
hurt much anymore.”
Definition
• “The awareness of a moral or ethical aspect to
one’s conduct together with the urge to prefer
right over wrong.”
• A secular, non-Christian definition.
What Conscience Is Not
• To fully understand what conscience is, we
must understand what it is not.
• 1) Conscience as a majority opinion: Not what
everyone is doing; surrenders personal
responsibility to the group.
• 2) Conscience as a feeling: What feels right
isn’t necessarily right. This holds that we
create our own moral rules
...Is Not Con’t
• 3) Conscience as Superego: “left-over rules
from childhood that we carry. Freud. Authority
figures told us and we followed because we
wanted to be loved.
• 4) Conscience as gut instinct: Does not involve
intellect
• 5) ...as Jiminy Cricket: it’s not a supernatural
line to God
...Is Not Con’t
• 6) Conscience is a myth: It does exist.
• Not created to control us; the denial of
conscience leads to the death of morality.
What Conscience Is
• Definition by the CCC and the Second Vatican
Council on pages 132 of text.
• Three interlocking aspects of conscience:
• 1)Conscience is awareness of God’s call to be:
– Where we are alone with the Triune God, and hear
His invitation to be who He calls us to be.
...Is Con’t
• 2) Conscience is awareness of God’s call to
know and to do the good, that is, to love:
– As persons with dignity we reflect our God, who is
love.
– Done when we respond to the good; when we
love.
– Obey the law written in our hearts, that of love,
love of God and neighbour.
...Is Con’t
• 3) Conscience is a practical judgment of the
intellect:
– Helps to discover the loving path and to avoid the
path that is evil
– Judges the act we are about to perform.
– Mixed with the desire to love helps us to choose
love and shun evil in the here and now
...Is Con’t
• 3 points stress the personal nature of
conscience to be a loving person, search for
moral truth and do good.
• Must come together to apply the objective
norms of morality to issues that affect the
common good.