Thoughts on conscience, ii

I should probably point out that this series is primarily geared for fellow practicing Catholics. I should probably also mention that this isn’t an indictment against anyone for any decisions they may have made. Rather, it’s an effort to help myself (and, incidently, anyone who reads this) grow in understanding, wisdom, spiritual maturity, and - as quaint as we’ve come to consider the concept - true holiness.

There’s likely to be some delay between these posts as I struggle through this topic. I’m not sure exactly how it’s going to develop or how long it will be. If this were an academic exercise, I’d do a formal outline and have a better idea by now how I was getting to the end. As it is, the only end I’m really concerned about is the eternal one, and so I’m trying to enjoy the exercise of just rambling a little. I’m also trying to be careful of my tendency to be a smug know-it-all. If I stumble in that regard, please let me know.

I regularly encounter people who say perfectly reasonable sounding things like "God is no respecter of man's rules," and as a basic tenet, I largely agree with them.

The problem occurs when we use this truth to arbitrarily dismiss other truth. For instance, we’ll propose, "The Church says to avoid artificial contraception, but that's ridiculous in this day and age of overpopulation. My spouse and I will decide for ourselves how many children we should have. The Church needs to wake up and move into the 21st Century!" That certainly seems logical and reasonable, but it’s full of its own suppositions, including:
a) we usually know what’s best,
b) we usually do what’s best, rather than just what we want, and
c) the Church is run by a rigid and closed-minded bunch of out-of-touch old men

Again, I’m not suggesting we turn off our own brains. Limiting the conversation (for now) to this specific topic, there are definitely specific circumstances that might call for departure from the Church’s teaching on artificial contraception. (Obviously, if we're going to act in disregard of the more basic issue of honoring our sexuality, such as by indulging it extra- or premaritally, we’d be stupid to then avoid artificial contraception, but by no means is that all. There may be specific medical indications that call for contraception, either in the short term or the long term. BTW, I seem to have chosen as an example one of my biggest mistakes.)

In general, don't we tend to rebel against perceived restrictions like a petulant teenager, and harden our hearts against that which opposes our will? We won’t try to really understand and appreciate any opposing viewpoint when we’ve decided that it is a roadblock to the path we’ve chosen, let alone one with authority. We might go so far as to ask our priest about a topic like this, but only if we view him as like-minded, so as to validate our position. But actually reading the truly enlightening documents that pertain to it – in this instance, the encyclical Humanae Vitae, or the insightful Theology of the Body series - which might serve to broaden our understanding of the issues beyond our own thoughts, circumstances, experiences, and wishes? Not likely. So we never learn how the former has proven shockingly prophetic regarding the long-term effects of the contraceptive mindset, or see the broader approach to our human dignity (in God's image) laid out in the latter. No, we’ll simply conclude that the Church has institutionalized a puritanical set of burdens which it rigidly imposes on us, when Christ came to free us.

Too often, we conclude that living according to our conscience simply means doing what we think is best. And tragically (for us and those around us), the net result is that we often end up rationalizing what we think we want in the first place.

Now, I’m not condemning couples who use artificial contraception, or live in any other way contrary to the Church’s teaching. But I’ve found that every time I’ve rejected the guidance that God has provided through the Church (note how this assumption differs from those above!), I’ve come to regret it. Those actions were sometimes driven by my own arrogance. Others arose from a failure to fully know myself and our world, which I was interpreting, of course, strictly in light of my own understanding and experiences. Still others were a matter of stubborn willfullness. And some have been a combination of all these.

But at its root, the basic problem is always my tendency to trust in myself instead of in God. “Only I can know what is best for me,” is the post-modern concept of conscience.

In short, we've embraced a sense of conscience which rejects the teaching authority of the Church, and which reduces Her to an out-of-touch, Jiminy Cricket pseudo-parent. This attitude has been been around nearly from the beginning, and has certainly flourished over the last 60 years. But it represents a distortion of the concept of conscience as it has developed throughout salvation history, and has become rooted in our embracing of the twin gods of rationalism (the world must be as I rationally understand it) and experientialism (the world must be as I have experienced it; both of these definitions are my own).

Definitely more to come . . .