Conscience and Moral Law

LESSON 4 OBEYING GOD’S LAW IS EXERCISING
AUTHENTIC FREEDOM
Path 11 Conscience and Moral Law
CONTEXT
ICON
Add words which are related to conscience and

moral law to the crossword PUZZLE.
C O N S C I E N C E
Sacred Scripture: Mark 3:1-6 (A Man with a Withered Hand)
He said to the man with a withered hand, “Come up here before

us.” Then He said to them, “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath rather
than to do evil, to save life ratherICON
than –to destroy it?” But they remained
EXPOSITION
silent. Looking around them with anger and grieved at their hardness of
heart. He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched out and his
hand was restored.
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The Sabbath Law presented a fundamental disagreement between Jesus and the
Jews. For the Jews, Jesus’ curing on a Sabbath was a reason to reject Jesus. The Jews
interpreted the Sabbath Law as absolute, rejecting all work on the Sabbath. With such a
rigid and narrow human interpretation of the Sabbath law, the Jews had so absolutized
their interpretation of God’s law that they had lost the original meaning of the law.
For the Jews curing on a Sabbath was absolutely forbidden even though the Law
clearly stated that "every case when life is in danger supersedes the Sabbath Law."
It was the absolutely fixed frame of mind of the Jews that Jesus was against. Jesus
was perfectly aware of the Law and respected it. He knew that the Pharisees were
watching and waiting to find a defect in Him. Yet He went ahead and was angry with
them. He healed the man. Jesus knew the Law was for man not man for the law (Mk 3:
27) such was His Father’s love for man. His love for humanity is far beyond his respect
for ritual Law.
Jesus went to the synagogue, and there was a man with a paralyzed hand. The
Pharisees were there and showed no concern for the man, but instead they questioned
Jesus: "Is it permitted to heal on the Sabbath day?" Jesus knew the answer, but He chose
to answer the question by means of an allegory. “It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath
rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” (Mk 3: 4) But they remained
silent. Then Jesus looked at them and became angry and grieved at their hardness of
heart.
Jesus healed the paralytic and, in healing him, gave him three things:
1. He healed the man.

2. He also gave him back his hand (Mk. 3:5).
3. He gave him back his self-respect.
Because they could not deny what Jesus said, the Scribes and Pharisees plotted to
kill Him (Mk. 3:6).
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What are the implications of the three things which Jesus gave to the paralytic after his
healing?
Jesus healed the

man.
Because Jesus gave

this man back his
restored hand, and
power to work.
Because Jesus gave

this man back his
hand and his work,
he gave him back
his self-respect.
Church Teaching: Gaudium et Spes 17

Hence man's dignity demands that he acts according to a knowing and free choice
that is personally motivated and prompted from within, neither under blind internal
impulse nor by mere external pressure. Man achieves such dignity when, emancipating
himself from all captivity to passion, he pursues his goal in a spontaneous choice of what
is good, and procures for himself through effective and skillful action, apt helps to that
end.
Moral laws have a special place in our Christian life as human beings living a
moral life. Our national catechism enumerates its functions, which are: 1) To provide
criteria for judging who we are and how we should act, 2) to help in our moral
development, especially in the formation of our conscience, 3) to provide stability and
consistency in our lives, and 4) to challenge us by stretching us in view of an ideal. Thus,
moral laws provide us an explicit direction which protects basic moral values for the
common good. They further promote mutual respect among us and the ability to
collaborate with those in authority (CFC 803).
On the other hand, our life is not buried under a heap of external laws and rules.
We have to actualize ‘what we ought to do’ in particular situations which are in harmony
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with God’s will and who we are as disciples of Christ. Therefore we need to actualize in
our exercise of concrete individual free acts the universal norm to be honest, not to lie, to
protect one’s life, foster human life, respect our sexuality, private property and the truth.
Laws are universal; They do not touch the full reality of concrete individual
thoughts, words or deeds. It is only our conscience that judges whether an individual
moral act violates a certain law or not. For example, a woman in one of her visits to
Manila took the public bus to reach the place. As she was seated, the ticket collector
asked for her fare. She gave him Php1, 000.00 but her fare was only Php620.00. He was
supposed to give her P380.00 as her change. Unintentionally, he gave her Php480.00.
When she counted her change, she discovered that it exceeded what was correct. What
was she to do? There is no law that applies directly to this individual moral act. She has
to use her conscience to judge whether keeping the extra Php100.00 is breaking the 7 th
commandment, “Do not steal”. It is her conscience which judges whether keeping the
money is stealing or not.
Conscience, therefore, is our subjective moral norm; It is our reason which
applies a universal objective moral norm to a particular free act. It is the faculty which
judges whether a particular moral act is good or evil in a particular situation. There is no
automatic application of universal objective moral laws or rules to a given concrete single
act. There is always the need for the moral judgment of conscience in applying the
universal norm to the single individual thought, word or deed.
Therefore, conscience and moral norms are always interrelated. They are
inseparable, but in the last analysis, conscience is the final lawgiver. Conscience is not a
law in itself; It always refers to an objective moral norm. Moreover, “No universal law
applies itself.” The Commandments do not operate by themselves. They need conscience
to work, otherwise; They will just remain words in a book.
Given this scenario, what will you do?
Your friend, a senior high school student, texted you to seek

advice. She has a boyfriend who is a third year college student. Both of them go to the
same school. They had sexual relations which resulted in her pregnancy. Her parents,
who are very strict, did not know about their daughter’s conduct. Her boyfriend has
enough money for her to get an abortion. He pushed her hard to submit to an abortion. In
fact she had been given some abortive pills by her boyfriend, but she wants to do the
right thing. There are some factors bothering her in her decision. These include:
1. Her family is well known in their town; If she continues with her pregnancy, the
family will become the talk of the town; She will lose her good name.
2. Her parents are very strict and she thinks that they might disown her if they
discover her pregnancy;
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3. If she continues with her pregnancy, she knows that her boyfriend will not
support her and the baby; he will not marry her.
ICON – Morals
INTEGRATION We are morally obliged to follow our formed conscience as we
apply a universal moral law to a concrete individual thought, word
and deed.
Conscience is the personal moral guide by which we judge
moral thoughts, words and deeds according to relevant
universal moral laws or norms. Conscience is used to discern
moral good from evil in all our concrete situations.
Give an example in your life when you had to apply a
moral norm to a particular moral act.
Doctrine
Our dignity as persons is the ultimate basis for judging what is
morally good or evil.
Conscience is our reason which judges the morality of
a concrete moral act in a concrete situation. Does
conscience always tell you the objective good? Why?
Worship
We pray to enlighten our conscience and to form a truly Christian conscience.
We judge the moral good or evil of an individual thought, word or deed since
God/Christ is the ultimate norm for morality. We picture our conscience as the
“place” God is present to us. Through our conscience, God speaks to us. There we
can be alone with God whose voice echoes in our depths.
Pause for a while and in the silence of your hearts, dialogue with God. Write
what happened in your conversation with God.
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SUMMARY
 Conscience is our ultimate and subjective norm of morality. It is the

faculty by which we apply the universal objective moral norms to
our actual individual free thoughts, words and deeds.
 It is our personal moral guide by which we judge our thought, words

and deeds according to objective moral norms.
 Judging the morality of anything is always based on an objective

universal moral norm (the law) and our subjective moral norm,
which is our conscience.
VOCABULARY
Conscience applies moral law to particular case, thus formulating moral obligation.
Gaudium et Spes (GS) - The Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern
World
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LESSON 4 OBEYING GOD’S LAW IS EXERCISING

Add words which are related to conscience and

Sacred Scripture: Mark 3:1-6 (A Man with a Withered Hand)

He said to the man with a withered hand, “Come up here before

1. He healed the man.

Jesus healed the

Because Jesus gave

Because Jesus gave

Church Teaching: Gaudium et Spes 17

Given this scenario, what will you do?

Your friend, a senior high school student, texted you to seek

 Conscience is our ultimate and subjective norm of morality. It is the

 It is our personal moral guide by which we judge our thought, words

 Judging the morality of anything is always based on an objective

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