Our conscience is a guide when considering how to follow God’s law

Published: June 12, 2004

By Charles T. Sullivan

“In the depths of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience … a law written by God. To obey it is the very dignity of man; according to it he will be judged.” (Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, paragraph 16) What is our conscience?

Over the centuries, the term has been defined in many different ways by a wide variety of Christian writers and theologians. Conscience has been described as an instinctive sense of right and wrong or as a personal system of fundamental values. It is, explained the Council Fathers of Vatican II, “the most secret core and sanctuary of a man.”

Thinking about my own life, I would describe “conscience” as the subtle but clear and persistent voice of reason that helps guide me to make good ethical decisions and promptly rebukes me when I choose poorly and make bad ones. Freedom to choose makes man a moral subject. This special attribute of free will sets humankind above the rest of the material world and most perfectly reflects the image and likeness of God to which we were created.

Yet even though we are free to choose, we can detect in the center of our consciousness a law “written by God” that somehow calls us to obedience. This natural law can be summed up in one simple directive: “Strive always to do good and avoid evil.” Again, thinking about my own life, I would have to allow that this one “simple directive” is much easier said than done!

The Ten Commandments, traditional foundation stones to the Christian moral life, are themselves a Spirit-inspired articulation of this natural law of God written in our hearts. As free human persons and baptized followers of Christ, we are obliged in all that we say and do to follow faithfully what we know in the depths of our hearts to be morally right and proper.

The critical function of our conscience is to help us in this obligation by applying either general or particular moral knowledge to any specific human action we may be considering. In moral theology, there are two classical rules for following one’s conscience: always obey a certain conscience; and never act on a doubtful one.

The freedom to follow a personal judgment of conscience presupposes that we have sincerely searched for the objective moral truth pertaining to the issue at hand. Thus, all Catholics have both a duty and an obligation to properly form their conscience by consulting appropriate sources, including sacred Scripture, Catholic tradition, and the official teachings of the Church.

Considerations of moral action are seldom crystal clear or “black and white.” Following our conscience requires that we search for the objective truth, discern the proper course, and then act in concert with that understanding. Since conscience is a judgment, there are always two distinct possibilities: we can either judge correctly or incorrectly.

Thus, the judgment of conscience does not necessarily guarantee that we are doing the objectively right thing. But when we choose what we honestly perceive as the right course of action, we can be assured that we are acting with integrity and in a manner befitting our dignity as sons and daughters of God.

Charles T. Sullivan, a member of St. Bernard Catholic Church in Bella Vista, has a master’s degree in theology from the University of Dallas. This article was originally published in Arkansas Catholic June 12, 2004. Copyright Diocese of Little Rock. All rights reserved. This article may be copied or redistributed with acknowledgement and permission of the publisher.