Chapter 6 from What Happened to Sin?, by Seán Fagan. S.M.
The Columba Press, 2008.
There are large numbers of Catholics to whom it comes as a profound and disturbing shock to be told that there are moral questions for which there are no black-and-white answers. Believing in the one true Church, with its divinely revealed deposit of faith, they were given the impression that there is a Catholic position on everything from bus driving to bee keeping, and a Catholic solution to every moral and social problem. Of course, they believed in conscience, and were aware that they had an obligation to follow it. But the obligation applied only to an informed conscience, and the information would be supplied by the Church, which provided the objective moral norms. The function of conscience was to know the moral principles, the rules of right and wrong, judge which ones applied to the particular case, and then decide how they were to be obeyed according to the circumstances of the situation.
For many such people, the controversies of recent years were confusing and upsetting, particularly the contraception debate. They suddenly discovered that the information they were given was no longer as clear as they would like, and that it was being variously interpreted, not only by laity but by priests, bishops and indeed whole hierarchies. Quoting Vatican II, many priests told them they should ‘follow their conscience’. But this was not particularly helpful since they had always believed that following one’s conscience meant accepting the teaching of the Church, and to do otherwise would be simply disobedience, a sin, using the excuse of conscience to do your own thing, to please yourself. This attitude is not restricted to the simple faithful, but seems to be still shared by some priests and bishops. It is generally accepted that Vatican II admitted the principle of freedom of conscience, indeed proclaimed it as a basic human right. But there is still a huge gap between the notional assent people give to this on the surface of their minds, and the real assent it calls for in personal conviction and practical acceptance of all its consequences. Unfortunately there are clergy who in practice still reduce ‘following one’s conscience’ to ‘doing what the Church commands’. It is sad, though understandable, that decades after the Council it should still be necessary to spell out the role of conscience in the moral life.
Loyalty or confrontation
That there could be any conflict between conscience and authority in the Church seemed unthinkable until fairly recently, apart from extreme cases, and even there authority was always presumed to have been in the right. One recalls the exhortations to loyalty by preachers in the period immediately before Humanae Vitae, telling people to accept the decision of the Holy Father whenever it came, whatever it might be. Such preaching was well-intentioned, concerned with the common good of the Church, but reflected a theology of conscience, authority and indeed morality that falls far short of Vatican II principles. It was taken for granted that right and wrong can simply be decreed and must be blindly accepted. During that same period busy pastors and confessors were heard to complain impatiently about the contraception debate: ‘why can’t those people in Rome tell us what’s right and stop all the nonsense’.
Another aspect of the tension between conscience and authority, and of the inadequate theology of conscience so common in the Church, became obvious in the years immediately following Humanae vitae. Confrontation between individual bishops and their priests, and between priests and laity, ended in head-on collisions in which people were deeply wounded and some were scarred for life. It brought shame on the Church. For the traditionally-minded, these sad episodes were simply cases of normal authority dealing with disobedience. But developmental psychologists tell us that the earliest and most elementary response to authority tends to be blind and automatic, and since we all carry within us the child we once were, in situations of stress we revert to childish levels. Both civil and religious leaders tend to rely on this primitive form of response and insist on it when under attack, rather than exercise true leadership by promoting autonomous moral decision. Perhaps this is an over‑simplified and one‑sided reading of these sad incidents, but people are confused when they are given the impression that on moral grounds they can say No to a civil regime, but a situation can never arise where they may have to say a personal, conscientious No to an ecclesiastical authority. That there can be dissent, and indeed loyal dissent, not only in, but for the Church, is not easily understood.
Confusion about conscience
That Vatican II’s notion of conscience should be one of the least appreciated of the Council’s insights is understandable. The very objectively orientated theology that dominated the Church’s thinking for centuries made it difficult for people to think of conscience except in terms of obedience. If ‘reality’ was simply ‘out there’ to be accepted, studied, and contemplated, the laws of reality and morality were likewise already there, only to be read off and obeyed. The human being, the subject, the person, tended to be seen as an object among the other objects of creation, rather than as a self-determining person sharing in God’s own freedom and creativity. The emphasis on law and measurement that was so large a feature of the Church’s practice gave the impression of absolute clarity and certainty, so that difficulties could only arise from subjective elements. The ideal was to overcome these and bring one’s thought and action into line with ‘the Church’. This is simply a statement of fact, of how things were.
However, a more general reason why there is so much confusion about the meaning of conscience, and difficulty in accepting Vatican II’s principles, is that the vast majority of people, irrespective of whether they are Christians or not, have not progressed beyond Kohlberg’s ‘fourth stage’ of moral development. Some spend their whole lives doing what they are told by authority simply out of fear. This is stage one, where we all begin as children, fearing punishment. Others obey because it brings them pleasure; this is stage two. Others are at stage three, where they obey because the group expects it, and they enjoy the esteem of their peers and are loyal to them. Stage four is that of most people, who obey simply because it is the law. They obey even when there is no pleasure in it and even when others ridicule them and disobey. The law is seen as good, because it is society’s law, for the common good. At this stage, the ideal conscience is that of the law‑abiding person. But some move beyond this stage to see the values the law is intended to promote and protect, and realise that mature conscience is not simply a matter of internalising the law itself, but of being committed to a personal belief in the value behind it.
Levels of conscience
Of course, the word ‘conscience’ can be used in different senses, but all of them involve two basic elements: knowledge and obligation. We know that certain actions are right or wrong and we feel an obligation to act in accordance with this knowledge. When we do what we believe to be the right thing, we experience peace and satisfaction. When we go against our ‘better judgement’ we feel guilt and remorse. In ordinary experience, conscience is felt as a judgement in a concrete situation. I can continue working on this chapter or I can go and watch TV, but I know that I should continue working if I am to keep my promise to send it to the editor by the end of the week. Not only do I know that to continue is the right thing to do just now, but I also know that I ought to do so, no matter how much my tiredness or laziness tempts me away. In this sense, and on this level, conscience is always concerned with the concrete decision about what is to be done here and now.
But there is a deeper level presupposed by this particular judgement. Even before I arrive at the decision that to continue working is the right thing for me to do just now, I know that as a general principle it is a good thing to keep promises, that promises ought to be kept. Society depends to a large extent on people being faithful to their commitments, keeping their word. This level of conscience is our general knowledge of moral principles of right and wrong, good and bad. Depending on the individual, it can be more or less extensive. It includes the basic principles: do good rather than evil, treat others as you would wish to be treated yourself, and can extend to the Ten Commandments and specific developments of them. But it is more than neutral, speculative knowledge. It calls to something deep within our nature, stirs us with the conviction that we must obey it if we are to be true to ourselves. In this sense, conscience extends to a much deeper level than intellect and will, knowledge and consent. On this deepest of all levels, conscience is the core of our being as free persons. Here it can be said that ‘conscience is the person’. It is on this level that the ‘basic option’ or ‘fundamental attitude’ spoken of in chapter 4 finds its context.
The human person is not a finished article, possessing a ready-made nature, but a being of possibilities with a built-in call to grow in wholeness, to become actually what we are potentially. This forward and upward thrust is part of our God‑given nature. The possibilities for good that we see before us summon us as the voice of conscience. Part of us reaches out ahead of the rest as we discern the good we ought to do, so we experience a certain stretching and tension, the tension of being challenged to grow. Good choices and right decisions in concrete situations enable the rest of our being to catch up, so to speak, with the part that reaches forward, so the tension is relieved, we are ‘at one’ with ourselves, and we experience not only growth, but peace and wholeness. This is the experience of a ‘good conscience’.
When we ignore or refuse to do what we know we should, the tension remains, so we lose our basic oneness, we are torn within ourselves; we experience alienation and guilt. This is sin. It is a basic inconsistency between our knowing and our doing, and so we become divided within. We may make excuses for ourselves, rationalise our failure, but the very attempt to ‘rationalise’, to give ‘reasons’ for something which is really against reason, only makes more explicit our alienation and loss of oneness. Since we are not self-sufficient atoms, but relational beings, the sin and lack of oneness within ourselves spills over into our relationships. Whatever the occasion or the area of our sin, it cannot be confined or contained. Not only are we not at peace within ourselves, but on a deep level we become alienated from our fellow human beings, and from God. Even the material world that God meant to be our home and garden becomes a hostile environment to aggravate our inner lack of harmony. This is the ‘bad conscience’ that follows sin.
Self-awareness
On the deepest level of our personality, then, conscience is a special kind of self‑awareness. It is a consciousness, not only of what we are doing, but of what we are and of what we are becoming. It tells us the kind of person we are, but at the same time it also tells us the kind of person we ought to be. It discloses the gap between the two. In this sense, it is not only a mirror or indicator, but also an invitation and a summons, commanding us to become and to be what we are meant to be. Since God is the author of our nature, it is God himself who calls us through the basic thrust of that nature, through the irrepressible appetites of mind, heart and body, recognised in the experience of conscience.
It is to this level of conscience that Jeremiah referred when he spoke in God’s name: ‘I will put my law within them, and write it on their hearts’ (31:33), and the same message came through Ezekiel: ‘I will give them a new heart and a new mind’ (11:39). That God’s call is not restricted to a particular religious group, but is addressed to all people in their very nature through the voice of conscience, is made clear by Paul, when he says that the conduct of the Gentiles shows that ‘what the law commands is written in their hearts. Their consciences also show that this is true, since their thoughts sometimes accuse them and sometimes defend them’ (Rom 2:15). Since the Gentiles knew nothing of the Jewish law, Paul is referring to something much deeper, to the experience of conscience itself. This insight of Paul is echoed by the Second Vatican Council, speaking of the salvation of non-Christians in its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church: ‘Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience ‑ they too may achieve eternal salvation’ (n.16).
Vatican II
The Council uses the word ‘conscience’ no less than seventy two times in eleven of its seventeen documents. Thirty-eight of these occur in the pastoral constitution on The Church in the Modern World, and thirteen in the declaration on Religious Freedom.
This is not the place to analyse all these passages, but the essentials may be seen in one or two quotations. The first chapter of The Church in the Modern World gives a beautiful picture of the human being created in the image of God, though spoiled by sin, and speaks of the essential unity of our human nature, of the dignity of the intellect, of truth, and of wisdom, of the dignity of the moral conscience, and of the excellence of freedom. This is the context in which the Council presents its understanding of conscience. ‘Deep within their consciences men and women discover a law which they have not laid upon themselves, but which they must obey. Its voice, ever calling them to love and to do what is good and to avoid evil, tells them inwardly at the right moment: do this, shun that. For they have in their hearts a law inscribed by God. Their dignity lies in observing this law, and by it they will be judged. Their conscience is their most secret core, and their sanctuary. There they are alone with God, whose voice echoes in their depths’ (n. I6). This text echoes many of the points we have already made. It makes clear that conscience is knowledge, awareness of a special kind, namely the consciousness of being obliged by a law not of our own making, yet within ourselves. That law is the innate thrust of our nature to love the good and avoid evil. This directive of our nature is permanent, ongoing, but not specified in detail as to what precisely is good or evil. But from time to time, ‘at the right moment’, the obligation becomes specific to do this or avoid that. The text says nothing about how we discover and decide in the concrete what is right or wrong. That the law ‘written in our heart’ is simply a metaphor should be clear from chapter 3 above. What this metaphor refers to is our unrestricted desire to know and the urge to make our activity consistent with our knowing. This urge is the inclination towards wholeness, ‘at-oneness’ with ourselves, peace and harmony within ourselves.
Conscience a sanctuary
The ‘law in our heart’ is written there by God in so far as God is the author of our nature. Our dignity lies in observing this law; that is to say that we are only true to ourselves when we act in accordance with what our conscience tells us is right. That we will be judged on the basis of our fidelity to conscience is a reminder that morality is part of religion. The text says quite clearly that we will be judged, not according to rules learned by heart, or the views of our parents, or ecclesiastical documents, or laws from the Bible, or even some law in God’s mind if it could be read, but according to our own personal conscience; not according to whether we did the right thing, but basically according to whether we did what we saw and understood as the right thing to do. Our actions are judged for the light they throw on our mind and heart, insofar as they show the kind of person we are. But it is really we ourselves who are judged. Our conscience is thus said to be our secret core, our innermost being. It is an area so intimate that only God can penetrate it, God who alone can read our hearts. It is our sanctuary, a sacred place not to be violated, a place where we can take refuge from all but ourselves and God.
For all people
The voice of God that is heard there is not a detailed code, a dictated law, but rather the consciousness that morality is not simply convenience, efficiency or utility, but a demand of God himself as to what he wants us to be. For Christians, this is explicit in our belief that in Jesus, God our Father/Mother calls us to be his children, and expects us to live ‘with that mind which was in Christ Jesus’. It is explicit insofar as what we see to be the right thing to do is understood explicitly as what God wants us to do. For non-believers, God’s voice is implicit insofar as their moral consciousness is tinged with religious consciousness as they discover the absoluteness of the moral call through conscience, and find themselves grasped by an ultimate concern, without any explicit reference to God.
The Council makes clear that conscience is not the exclusive prerogative of Christians, and that Christians have no monopoly of wisdom when it comes to knowing right and wrong, though our faith can provide us with a new context and motivation for our moral striving. The text continues: ‘Through loyalty to conscience, Christians are joined to others in the search for truth and for the right solution to many moral problems which arise both in the life of individuals and from social relationships’ (n.16). The voice of conscience, therefore, does not answer our questions or solve our problems in advance. There still remains the demanding task of discovering the right thing to do. Though utterly personal, conscience is not meant to function in isolation from others. The search for what is right is a continuing process in which we share with others, with all people of good will. That it is a process rather than a static possession is clear from the following sentence: ‘The more a correct conscience prevails, the more do persons and groups turn aside from blind choice and try to be guided by the objective standards of moral conduct’ (n. 16). Correct conscience is not instantly established by being told the right thing to do. Rather it is gradually attained insofar as people move away from blind choice and are guided by objective standards; and on the other hand, to the extent that people try to be guided by objective standards, their choices will not be blind, but governed by reason.
Objective norms
The reference to ‘objective standards of moral conduct’ or ‘objective moral norms’ could give the impression that correct conscience means simply acceptance of, and obedience to, a law laid down by some authority. This is not the case. It means rather that the reasons for claiming that a particular action is the right one must be good convincing reasons, not mere whim, that in one’s search for the right thing to do, one will be faithful to the laws of reason, be conscious of the dangers of prejudice, bias, selfishness, be aware of one’s obligations and commitments, of the possible consequences of one’s action, of the effect it may have on other people, etc. These are all objective norms, in the light of which one discovers the right thing to do in a concrete situation. The guidelines provided by laws are an important factor in our deliberation, and in most cases we need little discussion to realise that obedience to the law is the responsible and right thing to do. But there are vast areas of life not covered by any law apart from the most general principles that we should not exploit others, that we should treat them as we would wish to be treated ourselves. In those areas where there is a specific law, there may be occasions when conscience will dictate that we disobey it in the name of a higher law, in the name of justice and in the name of God. It would be a misuse of this text of the Council to claim that people in this situation are simply pleasing themselves, deciding for themselves apart from the ‘objective moral norm’.
The text speaks of right conscience knowing the objective norms, but it is clear that knowledge is not virtue. It is not enough simply to know what principles apply. One must ‘try to be guided’ by them, the implication being that this is not always easy. Effort is needed to put them into practice in trying to discover what is right, and further effort is required to decide to do what conscience dictates. Doing what conscience dictates as the right thing to do is virtuous action. Acting against conscience is moral wrong-doing, moral evil, or in religious terms ‘sin’.
Mistaken conscience
The Council acknowledges that one may be mistaken as to what is really the right thing to be done, that what one decides in all good faith may in reality turn out to be a bad thing. But even in this case, one is still obliged to be consistent with oneself, to act in accordance with one’s honest conviction. Even in error, the sanctity of conscience remains intact. But there is an obligation to do one’s best to keep conscience alive and healthy, delicately sensitive to objective norms and to the true good of the human person. The paragraph concludes: ‘Yet it often happens that conscience goes astray through ignorance which it is unable to avoid, without thereby losing its dignity. This cannot be said of the person who takes little trouble to find out what is true and good, or when conscience is by degrees almost blinded through the habit of committing sin’ (n.16).
The sanctity of conscience is further emphasised in the following paragraph, under the heading: the excellence of freedom. ‘It is, however, only in freedom that people can turn themselves towards what is good. The people of our time prize freedom very highly and strive eagerly for it. In this they are right… But genuine freedom is an exceptional sign of the image of God in humanity. For God willed that men and women should ‘be left free to make their own decisions so that they might of their own accord seek their creator and freely attain their full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him. Their dignity therefore requires them to act out of conscious and free choice, as moved and drawn in a personal way from within, and not by their own blind impulses or by external constraint. We gain such dignity when, ridding ourselves of all slavery to the passions, we press forward towards our goal by freely choosing what is good, and, by our diligence and skill, effectively secure for ourselves the means suited to this end’ (n.17). That freedom is essential to the exercise of conscience is stressed in the declaration on Religious Freedom: All ‘are bound to follow their conscience faithfully in every sphere of activity so that they may come to God, who is their last end. Therefore the individual must not be forced to act against conscience nor be prevented from acting according to conscience, especially in religious matters’ (n.3).
This applies even to the erroneous conscience. Quoting the example of the apostles and the early Church, who steadfastly preached the gospel but did not impose it by coercion, the Council says that ‘at the same time, however, they showed respect for the weak even though they were in error, and in this way made it clear how ‘each of us shall give account of ourselves to God’ (Rom 14:12) and for that reason we are all bound to obey our conscience’ (n.11).
Sanctity of conscience
This emphasis on the sanctity and freedom of conscience was heady stuff for a number of people, who, with only a superficial acquaintance with the Council documents, began invoking conscience almost daily to justify their eccentricities. The Council itself was well aware of this danger, and indeed adverted to it explicitly in its declaration on Religious Freedom. But notwithstanding the possibility of misunderstanding and abuse, it did not water down its basic teaching on the dignity, rights and obligations of conscience. It is clear from its text that the morally mature person is not the obsequious ‘yes-man’ beloved by some authorities, but people who can form their own judgements in the light of truth and objective reality. ‘People today are subjected to a variety of pressures and they run the risk of being prevented from following their own free judgement. On the other hand, there are many who, under the pretext of freedom, seem inclined to reject all submission to authority and make light of the duty of obedience. For this reason this Vatican Council urges everyone, especially those responsible for educating others, to try to form people who will respect the moral order, obey lawful authority and be lovers of true freedom ‑ people, that is, who will form their own judgement in the light of truth, direct their activities with a sense of responsibility, and strive for what is true and just in willing co-operation with others’ (n.8).
A basic right
These statements are not true simply because the Vatican Council decreed them to be so. The Council itself acknowledges that freedom of conscience and of honest conviction is one of the most basic human rights, that it is rooted in the very dignity of the person, ‘the demands of which have become more fully known to human reason through centuries of experience’ (Religious Freedom, n.9) It is a right to be respected by all people, but ‘Christians are bound to respect it all the more conscientiously’ (ibid).
The Council caught most people unprepared for the new insights, and in the confusion of the post-conciliar period it is understandable that many should come to think of conscience and authority as being necessarily opposed. In fact, they are complementary aspects of the same basic search for the human good. Whether in the Church or in civil society, authority is simply the voice of the community deciding what is right, what is the best thing for all concerned. The morally mature and responsible person will admit that there is a presumption in favour of authority and law, that even though it may not be the absolute best, it is still good, and normally should be obeyed. The body of laws constitutes a kind of traditional wisdom or conventional morality that grew out of the conscience and experience of the community. But it can also happen that they reflect the narrow‑mindedness and prejudice of a particular community, as in the case of racist and discriminatory laws. Unless individuals could challenge the commonly accepted moral standards of their society and refuse to be mere conformists, there would never be any moral progress; we would still be in the jungle. If society today is more sensitive to and concerned about the dignity of the human person and the equality of all people, it is only because there were prophetic voices down through history to protest against exploitation and discrimination, and to rebel against even lawful authority.
It would be a mistake to imagine that this holds true only with regard to civil laws, and that conscience could not clash with ecclesiastical authority. History proves the contrary. The laws of the Church are not divinely-revealed absolutes, but human ordinances for the religious good of the community of believers. As such, they reflect not only the wisdom of the Church at a given time, but also the cultural and theological outlook of a particular period, with all its limitations and defects. It is instructive to read a list of the propositions that the faithful were expected to hold down through the centuries. A few of the more bizarre ones have been quoted in an earlier chapter. Even those decreed within the present century make one wonder. Most of them were never officially withdrawn, so in theory they are still the ‘official position’ of the Church. It was decreed that the gospels were written in the same sequence in which we enumerate them today, that the Pentateuch was written entirely by Moses, that most of the psalms were composed by David, that the epistle to the Hebrews was written by Paul. Not one of these statements is accepted as true today. One would have been called a ‘modernist’, and therefore condemned, for suggesting that the Holy Office might be changed or that the Index of Forbidden Books be abolished. Yet, the Index has in fact gone, and the Holy Office has been changed, at least in name, and is now the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
A service to the Church
Does it follow that one is not free to dissent from any of these positions until they are withdrawn? Such an attitude would do violence to reason itself. Respect for authority demands that its laws be accepted with reverence, that its teaching be received with docility, but one is still bound by the dictates of conscience guided by objective norms. No Church authority can order members of the faithful to close their minds, so anyone convinced of the falsity of a particular doctrinal decree has the right to hold this conviction and to explain the reasons for holding it. Had nobody ever done this, the Church would have suffered serious loss in the course of its history. There is no shortage of examples to choose from, even apart from the Galileo fiasco. To speak of collegiality in the Church was tantamount to heresy for years. Had everybody accepted this position without question, it would not have been possible for the Vatican Council to produce the dogmatic constitution on The Church as it did. Sadly, in spite of Council teaching on this point, there are still no structures in place to make collegiality a reality in today’s Church. Had French and German monks not broken liturgical laws in the nineteen forties and fifties, it is unlikely that the liturgical renewal launched by the Council would ever have taken place. It was the constant teaching of the Church for over fourteen hundred years that slavery was not intrinsically evil. This was not officially changed until Vatican II, but it would never have changed had not conscientious people spoken out against it. An acquaintance with history and a more nuanced understanding of the teaching authority of the Church might have cooled the contraception debate considerably. The ‘teaching’ of Humanae vitae has failed to convince most people, and to give the impression that it can be imposed under obedience does serious harm to the Church’s teaching authority. Cardinal Léon-Joseph Suenens, one of the most respected members of the Second Vatican Council, argued that the encyclical would have had much more authority had it been a collegial production instead of the lonely decision of Pope VI. When John Paul II was elected pope in 1978 he set about strengthening the rule of the Church from Rome. John Wilkins, former editor of the London Tablet, claims that he did this by redefining collegiality to empty it of any real meaning. (1)
The debate about its ‘obligation in conscience’ is a perfect example of a ‘category mistake’. The words ‘teaching’ and ‘obedience’ do not belong together. When it was presented to the public it was clearly stated that it was not ‘infallible’. Later it was rumoured that Pope John Paul II wished to declare it infallible but was persuaded not to. Why do Church authorities expect it to be ‘obeyed’? When I work hard and conscientiously to prepare a lecture and deliver it to students, I would never ask: ‘do you obey my teaching?’ I would be interested to know if they found it convincing and were persuaded by the truth of it. The word ‘obedience’ has no meaning in this context. But if I were president of the institute and made an order within the limits of my authority I would certainly expect ‘obedience’. But truth cannot simply be ‘declared’ and imposed under obedience. Truth can only be discovered and shared. Truth shines by its own light. When the phrase ‘Church teaching’ is used it would be far more convincing if it were used with the Vatican II understanding of the primary meaning of Church as the People of God. A major weakness in our Catholic Church is that popes and bishops for far too long have behaved as absolute monarchs instead of leaders of a Christian community. ‘Church teaching’ is seriously impoverished when they do not recognise the conscience of God’s holy people who are the Church as a divine resource, together with Scripture, tradition, reason, etc. in our search for truth. Church leaders seem to be afraid of the sacred conscience of Church members as a threat to their authority. Have they forgotten that in the Family of God that we call Church authority is service, not power?
A major element in the credibility of Church teaching is body language. Jesus taught by word and deed, but discussion of Church teaching can focus almost exclusively on words and documents. If the Church in practice were living up to the ideals it preaches, its most effective teaching would be the silent sermon of its example. Outsiders do not read our documents, but what they see in Church action can sometimes reinforce their prejudices, and some see the Church as an ideological power-structure in the hands of repressive authorities. Its political concerns can often blur its gospel image, for example when it sides with dictators and military regimes. Its record in Haiti was a scandal. Moreover, when clerical sex scandals reached world headlines, the automatic response of Church leaders, even in Rome, was one of damage control, to cover up and protect the Church’s image. Only later was it realised that this reaction did even more damage to the Church’s image. It took considerable time before compassion and justice for the innocent victims became a concern, which would seem to indicate that the gospel response of mercy is not a spontaneous reaction of the Church.
Authoritarianism
What puts many people off the Catholic Church is not its authority, but its authoritarianism, its way of exercising authority. It presents a most unattractive picture when it publicly humiliates or disparages saints, prophets and pastors loved by millions of believers, people like Bishop Helder Cámara, Cardinal Arns, Archbishop Romero, and it censures respected theologians like Rahner, Schillebeeckx, Häring, Boff, Curran and others. It can seem more interested in power than spiritual insight or pastoral concern. At times the Church’s central authority is not only at variance with the normal procedures of justice and fairness now commonplace in the civilised world, but even contradicts its own official teaching. For example, when it condemns a theologian for his views, there is no real dialogue. He is called to Rome to be lectured, and the same authority carries out the investigation, produces the evidence and pronounces the condemnation, while the accused is not even told who his accusers are, and the whole procedure is kept secret, allegedly to protect the accused, but in fact so that the prosecutors are saved the embarrassment of being called to account. Already in 1215 the Fourth Lateran Council decreed that ‘He who is the object of an inquiry should be present at the process, and should have the various headings of the inquiry explained to him, so as to allow him the possibility of defending himself; as well, he is to be informed not only of what the various witnesses have accused him, but also of the names of those witnesses.’ The harrowing experiences of Frs. Häring, Curran, Boff and so many others at the hands of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in recent times would have been condemned as unjust by the Church itself in the thirteenth century.
Just a few years ago, an archbishop from one of the Vatican congregations publicly declared that the Church had nothing to be ashamed of in the Inquisition, that it was quite justified. A sobering thought is that so many of the documents from Roman congregations will be lying unread in Church archives except as material for students seeking doctoral dissertations, whereas the writings of Rahner, Schillebeeckx, Häring, Küng, Gutierrez, Boff and Curran have already entered into the Church’s bloodstream to enrich its intellectual, spiritual, and pastoral life.
Theological censorship was exercised in such a way in the Church for the past four hundred years that there was a real lack of freedom of theological expression. Books were placed on the Index en bloc, with no discussion of their contents. Because of the severity of the censorship, moral theology as expounded in textbooks for generations was largely thoughtless conformism. That the climate in today’s Church is different is due to the fact that there were conscientious non‑conformists to ask questions and look for reasons. To be faithful to conscience, therefore, is not simply to go one’s own way in spite of the Church, but to be faithful to the reality of the Church, which is Christ, to contribute to the welfare of the People of God who are the Church. It is not merely the exercise of a personal right to question and speak out, but a vital contribution to the very life and health of the Church itself.
Conscience not infallible
But Vatican II’s insistence on the sacredness of the individual conscience should not allow us to forget that conscience is not infallible, that it can be blunted by sin, and that even good people can be guilty of self-deception. There is wisdom in the old saying that no one is a judge in their own case. But the solution is not that people should therefore abdicate their moral responsibility and let someone else take the place of their conscience. Rather, when people find themselves perplexed or in conflict with authority, they should look to their fellow-believers for counsel, seek guidance from the Bible and Church teaching, and turn to God in prayer. All of these may enlighten us to our own ignorance or self-deception, and we must always remain open to this possibility. But should we find that, having done everything possible, we are still convinced that we cannot accept the ruling of authority, this is the conviction we are bound to follow. Should this mean losing our reputation, our standing in the community, or even our life, our conscience is still the voice we must obey. No Church, no authority, no superior can take its place.
Theologian Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope, summed up perfectly the teaching of the Catholic Church in the words: ‘Over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority, there still stands one’s own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else, even if necessary against the requirement of ecclesiastical authority. This emphasis on the individual, whose conscience confronts him with a supreme and ultimate tribunal, and one which in the last resort is beyond the claim of external social groups, even of the official Church, also establishes a principle in opposition to increasing totalitarianism.(2)
Because the individual conscience is so open to distortion and self‑deception and therefore may often be in error, and because there is normally a presumption in favour of authority, it is sometimes taken for granted that authority is automatically right, that dissent is simply disloyalty, and disobedience therefore sinful. But there is no principle in the Bible or Church teaching to the effect that authority is always right, or that the conservative side must always win. In fact, the language of winning or losing is totally out of place here, especially in the Christian community of the Church. Since both authority and conscience are complementary elements in community living, it is not surprising that people should experience a tension between them. But this tension is something we must learn to live with. It can become almost unbearable for either side at times, and there is a natural inclination to get rid of it by bulldozer tactics. Authority may rigidly insist on conformity, or individuals may reject all dialogue and make their decisions in isolation.
Situations like this can involve sin, on the part of either or both sides. If non‑conforming individuals are sometimes intemperate or violent in their relations with authority, it may simply be the reaction of their sinful, but very hurt, human nature to the violence originally done to their conscience and human dignity by the authority. Violence breeds violence, and there are more kinds than physical assault. No one has a monopoly of sin any more than any one side has a monopoly of grace or inspiration. The Church which is not only an institution with its necessary organisation, but also a fellowship of brothers and sisters in the Lord, needs to discover ways and means of resolving conflicts, and exercise the ministry of reconciliation rather than the strategy of unconditional surrender.
Footnotes
(1) John Wilkins, Bishops, not Altar Boys, in Commonweal, New York, June 6, 2008.
(2) Joseph Ratzinger in Herbert Vorgrimler, ed., Commentary on the documents of Vatican II, vol. V, p. 134 .