Demythologizing Conscience
In the debate currently raging over the encyclical Humanae Vitae, much is being said about the "rights of conscience", the "sacred inviolability of conscience", "conscience as the last court of moral appeal", and so on. In all of this talk there are several confusions that unnecessarily complicate an already intricate matter. Anyone who is sincerely interested in whether the dissidents have a legitimate place in the Catholic conversation ought to be interested in shedding some light on the question of conscience.
First, it is essential to know that: Conscience is not a faculty for knowing moral good and evil, that can decide whether certain kinds of behaviors are good or evil. It is only because it is misunderstood in this sense that conscience can be said to be on a collision course with authority: not the practical authority which commands that a certain action be performed or omitted, but the theoretical authority which claims that certain kinds of behavior are good, others evil. The Magisterium of the church is obviously the best example of such a theoretical authority.
A second common error is the exaltation of the individual's conscience because it is "his". A mystique of the individual is being fabricated, and eagerly grasped by individuals, which makes the individual an untouchable fortress. Simply because "I" think this is so, or "I" feel I cannot do that, I am rendered immune to any contradiction, certainly in practice, but even in theory. This radical subjectivism is all too frequently at the basis of the "rights of conscience" trumpeted about today.
A third error is the belief that a man ought not to be penalized in any way for following the solemn dictates of his conscience, even it be an erroneous conscience.
Finally, there is a confusion between what conscience commands and what it merely permits. This is often crucial in the matter of birth control.
The fact that conscience is something different than our perception of the goodness or evil of a given action becomes evident with a single example. We know that stealing is wrong. When a clerk gives us back too much change (say for a ten dollar bill instead of a one) we see at once that it would be wrong to keep the excess money. And we hear, as it were, an inner voice nagging us to take the side of moral goodness. This latter "voice", the voice of conscience, cannot be said to have discovered either that stealing in general is wrong or that keeping the excess change in this instance amounts to stealing. Such a "practical syllogism", or enthymeme, may indeed pass through our minds; but the conclusion — "keeping the excess is wrong" — is not yet the voice of conscience. This can easily be seen by contrasting the case in which we ourselves are warned and nagged by our own conscience to a second case, where we are observing the actions of other persons:
Thus, I may witness that a clerk mistakenly offers to another man nine dollars excess change. My mind may reason: "keeping excess change is stealing, stealing is wrong, therefore this man is doing something objectively wrong if he keeps the excess." My own conscience, however, has remained perfectly silent.
When it is I who receives the excess money, the practical syllogism takes place in the same way — to establish, as it were, that I am about to be tainted with an evil action. Now, however, my conscience joins in and pleads with me to resist the attractiveness of "free" money and to will what is morally demanded, no matter how unattractive. My conscience displays itself, therefore, as an advocate of righteousness — insofar as I am already aware of righteousness and its opposite.
CONSCIENCE DOES NOT MAKE RIGHT
It is just because conscience is the advocate, and not the discoverer or perceiver, of righteousness that it will nag me to do something which is objectively evil but which I think is morally commanded. Conscience may in fact be termed a "blind advocate": whatsoever is presented to it as morally obligatory it will urge me to do: whatsoever is presented as morally evil it will urge me to desist from.
If we think this is so, we may ask what utility conscience has. What good is having a faculty that urges us, not immediately and infallibly to the morally right, but rather only to what we now think the morally right to be? Obviously this faculty is of no worth in allowing us to grasp the morally right. Its worth, rather, lies in the note of gravity and solemnity which it introduces into the sphere of morality. So serious is the moral life, in contradistinction to the intellectual and aesthetic life, for example — so weighted and profound, even having consequences that are eternal, that conscience presents itself as God's urgent ambassador: to call us to our depths concerning the one thing neessary, our moral perfection.
It may well happen that someone with legitimate moral authority over me commands me to do something which I believe not simply to be unwise or futile, but morally evil and therefore absolutely prohibited to me. I must of course refuse obedience to this command. I might phrase my refusal as follows: "my conscience does not allow me to conform to your command." This means not that I refuse to obey because of arbitrary whim or subjective caprice, but that I believe the objective moral law of God forbids me to obey. "My conscience" is shorthand for: the ordinances of God which totally transcend my individuality, which indeed command and restrain the whims of my person, and which are seconded and advocated by God's advocate, the voice of conscience.
It may perhaps be argued that when I invoke the supremacy of my conscience over a command by practical authority, no explicit reference be made to a personal God: nevertheless, it is a matter of simple logic that I appeal, if not to God, then certainly to an objective moral law that is clearly superior to me, one that has the right, as it were, to hold me responsible for its decrees.
The point, against subjectivity, is crucial in many practical matters. All to often the man who alleges that his conscience forbids this or commands that means HE is against this or that. His protests, however, cannot have even the possibility of being valid unless they in fact refer to an objective moral law, something higher than himself. But once this is granted, his actions are no longer protected by the fortress of subjectivity and they must now reckon with the objective precepts of morality itself.
Moral teachers cannot do less than insist that each man follow his own conscience in all things. This simply means: let each man shun evil and perform obligatory good as God's ambassador, his conscience, urges him.
We must now bring up the question of a wrong conscience. Suppose I think that a certain behavior is morally prohibited, when in fact it is quite innocent: will my conscience urge me to desist? If so, am I obliged to follow my conscience? The answer is yes to both questions. God's advocate will plead with me to shun evil insofar as I deem some behavior to be evil. Just because my conscience is a blind advocate it will make me shun even the objectively innocent — simply because I think it evil in the first place. And the reason I am obliged to follow even an erroneous conscience is equally obvious. The apparent complexity of the question vanishes as soon as I grasp that it is equivalent to: Why should I be obliged to do good and avoid evil to the extent that I grasp it?
At this point we must recognize another element of the problem. If we follow a correct conscience, such a procedure may cost us dearly. Many evil things are alluringly attractive — e.g., bribes and impure liasons. A correct conscience will prompt us to resist such allurements. If we do, we shall be morally unstained but also unsatisfied: it will cost us much to pass by the attractiveness of the evil course. At times, we almost regret having a conscience: we tend to become "envious of evil doers" as the psalmist says.
Thus, if a man lives in a society which penalizes objectively good behavior, obviously he will pay an extra price for being good — for following his conscience when it is right. In a business world where everyone uses false and misleading statements to advertise his product, the honest man will lose money if he remains scrupulously honest. In such a case, men of good will should try to change the social conditions so that goodness is no longer penalized.
ERROR HAS CONSEQUENCES
Does the same hold true with respect to an erroneous conscience? Granted that the man is morally obliged to follow such a conscience, is society equally obliged to ameliorate the consequences, or to take steps that the man is not penalized "for following his conscience?"
This is the key issue in the question of selective conscientious objection. A man like Gordon Zahn, for example, was quite sure that the American involvement in Vietnam was morally evil; according to him, therefore, those who resisted being drafted had a right conscience. Nevertheless, he did not press that point. Rather, he said, even if they had a wrong conscience, they should not be penalized.
In a speech at Boston College, Zahn criticized the American Bishops for what he saw as their gravely inconsistent and cruel behavior. On one hand, he said, they teach young men to follow their consciences in all things; on the other hand, they do not lift a finger to help those whose consciences instruct them to defy the draft law. Zahn thinks it is only right that the bishops agitate with other men of good will to change the laws so as not to penalize those who follow their consciences with respect to any given war — regardless of whether their consciences are objectively right or wrong.
Is this is a logical consequence of our conclusion that a man is obliged to follow even an objectively wrong conscience? Ought we expect society to create laws and structures that will avoid penalizing those who follow, not only a right conscience, but even a wrong one?
If we take the case where it is clear that a man's conscience is wrong, we can easily see the folly and the INJUSTICE TO OTHERS of cancelling the consequences of an erroneous conscience. Thus Matteo Falcone, thinking that the family honor was stained by his son's behavior, felt honor-bound, conscience-bound, to execute his son. Less extreme cases from everyday life might be multiplied; in all these there might be really sincere men who do hateful deeds, which might be otherwise repugnant to them, because they wrongly believe some higher law obliges them. Are such men to be declared immune from the just laws they break in "obedience to a higher law?"
Of course not. A correct conscience has every right to be protected from the penalties so far as the law is able; a wrong conscience has no such right. Thus if America's role in the Vietnam war is evil, then the bishops should be expected, not to agitate for the right of selective conscientious objection, but to condemn our participation in the war. But if our role in the war is morally permissable and even noble, then those who defy the draft — however sincerely — have a wrong conscience. Why, even when a right conscience so often costs much and is so greatly penalized, should anyone expect that a wrong conscience should endure no penalties?
When we talk of "following our consciences and not the authority of men," we ought to ascertain the exact kind of opposition involved. It is one thing, for example, to be commanded by an authority to do something evil, and it is quite another thing to be prohibited by an authority from doing something good but not obligatory.
Thus some official of the state may order me to kill an innocent prisoner of war. I quite rightly answer that my conscience — i.e., God's objective moral law as I know it — forbids this and I ought to obey God rather than man. But suppose some law of the state forbids the sale of alcoholic beverages. While such a law is unwise and even unjust to all moderate drinkers, still it does not violate my conscience. Or do I think myself morally OBLIGED to drink alcohol even as I think myself morally PROHIBITED from killing an innocent man?
Still another gradation is found in the birth control issue. Granted, there are rare cases when persons believe themselves OBLIGED to use contraceptives. But the ordinary situation is quite different: the conflict usually is between a teaching authority which holds that artificial contraception is evil and a person who "sees nothing wrong" with contraception.
When this person acts in defiance of the teaching authority, he cannot be said to "follow his conscience." Rather, he follows his desires. His conscience, far from pleading with him to desist from the horror and ugliness of a moral evil, or to do something morally demanded, is perfectly quiet. Because he sees nothing wrong with contraception, his conscience has nothing to be an advocate about. There is nothing especially noble, therefore, and certainly nothing heroic, if one "follows his conscience" in such a case. And yet all the rhetoric in favor of conscience when it genuinely resists evil commands is usually present here also — as if the decision to use contraceptives constituted a case of "following God rather than men."
One fruit of the above clarification is a better grasp of the unique problem a Catholic faces when the Magisterium of the Church seems to oppose his conscience. Is it possible that there really be such an opposition? If so, must allegiance to an infallible magisterium yield to the "higher dictates of conscience?" Keeping in mind our distinction about the gradations of opposition, let us take a case where the Church teaches the contrary of what our conscience COMMANDS (as opposed to what it merely permits since we "see nothing wrong with it").
Suppose a young woman fears the coming birth of her "thalidomide baby." It is highly probable that the infant will be grossly deformed; she now thinks it not only desirable, not only permissable, but morally obligatory that the fetus be aborted. Her conscience, acting on this conviction urges her not to permit such a deformed organism to come into this world and live out a useless, suffering, and bewildered existence.
The teaching authority of her church, however, continues to repeat in season and out of season that abortion is intrinsically evil and thus is absolutely prohibited. Must she resolve this conflict in favor of conscience? Would she here be even morally innocent if she followed the magisterium and OVERRODE HER CONSCIENCE?
In truth these questions, which seem so actual and so terribly earnest, and which point to the obvious supremacy of conscience, are possible only to one who has confused notions about conscience and the Magisterium. In the moment we grasp that conscience must be obeyed because it advocates GOD'S moral law as far as this is known, and in the moment when we believe that the church is the authoritative teacher of God's law, then we see any "conflict" between conscience and the Magisterium must always be resolved in favor of the Magisterium.
In other words, if I honestly believe abortion to be legitimate, indeed morally required, my conscience will command it; and I may at first reluctantly assent, because I strive in all things to do what God's ambassador advocates. When, however, God's authentic interpretation of morality — the unique Catholic Church in its authoritative teaching office — tells me that abortion is evil, then I know for certain that my conviction was erroneous. And I acknowledge the enlightenment of my conscience.
GOD Versus GOD?
Many of the quarrels with the magisterium and many of the disobedient acts of the "faithful" must be explained, therefore, not as cases where two absolutes met and the lesser one of the Magisterium had to yield to the supreme one of conscience; but as cases where the faithful lost their faith — at least in the Catholic Church, and perhaps even in God. They are at best "protestants" — having seceded from any visible church which might presume to be the living teacher and interpreter of God's word.
We hear enough about the Church against herself; are we now to add that God too is against Himself, and that He says one thing through conscience and the exact opposite through the very Church he founded to safeguard and interpret His law? Let the next Catholic who opposes his conscience to the Magisterium be presented with the Credo (Nicene Creed): if he can repeat it with genuine belief, he will hasten to reform his views about good and evil to what the Church officially teaches and he will strive to have his conscience advocate what he thus firmly holds. If, however, he protests that his conscience must not yield to the Magisterium, then he should identify his quarrel with the Church as one of simple disbelief.
The late William A. Marra was professor of philosophy at Fordham University. He hosted a TV program on the EWTN Global Catholic Network called "The Roman Forum." He founded Catholic Media Apostolate and was heavily involved in Keep the Faith.
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