More on Conscience and Authority

I am grateful for Steve’s recent comments on authority and conscience. He raises issues and develops points that cut across a number of current debates within the Church on pressing contemporary topics. MOJ readers and contributors may conclude that I have a different approach which leads to other conclusions. Steve properly refers to the Dogmatic Constitution of the Church (Lumen Gentium) which is a vital text in comprehending the matters he raises. The Second Vatican Council spoke of the Church as the People of God. This includes everyone who is a part of the Church, and each person, each member has one’s proper role in the Body of Christ, the Communion of Saints. While Steve also incorporates the views of several theologians, I will rely on their perspectives. When it comes to authority and conscience and religious liberty, the Council addressed these issues. Lumen Gentium is the roadmap that explains the apposite relationship of the Church’s members to one another; moreover, it also provides the roadmap by which we navigate the relationships that ensue from our participation in the People of God.

We know from Lumen Gentium that there is a distinction that must be kept in mind about the members and how they are to relate to one another. But these distinctions ultimately do not divide, they harmonize in a communion. As the Councils stated: “The distinction which the Lord has made between the sacred ministers and the rest of the People of God involves union, for the pastors and the other faithful are joined together by a close relationship: the pastors of the Church—following the example of the Lord—should minister to each other and to the rest of the faithful; the latter should eagerly collaborate with the pastors and teachers.” With regard to the faithful laity, the Council said, “by reason of their special vocation it belongs to the laity to seek the kingdom of God by engaging in the temporal affairs and directing them according to God’s will.” But as they engage the temporal affairs of the world, including its difficult political issues, the faithful are to rely on the teaching they have received from their pastors, including their bishops and the Pope. The Council was clear in its presentation that the bishops have the duty as authentic teachers of doctrine; moreover, they exercise this responsibility in communion with the Roman Pontiff, and are endowed with the authority of Christ and rulers who ward off errors that threaten their flocks.

And where does conscience come in to all of this? Again, the Council has provided the way to understand what conscience is for each member of the People of God. Each has and can exercise freedom of religion according to the Declaration, Dignitatis Humanae. For those who are members of the People of God, it means that they are not simply free from interference with their faith by those outside the Church which is a “civil right”; they are also free for accepting what the Church teaches and striving to abide by its teachings in daily life. Temptation can lead us astray from these teachings, but we are informed by the Council that we have the freedom to return to them of our own volition. I do not think that the Council discussed “freedom of conscience.” It did discuss conscience and, in doing so, it explained how the conscience is formed. But, in the formation of conscience, the Christian faithful have been taught to attend to the sacred and certain doctrine of the Church. And as the Council also explained, the Church is, by the will of Christ, the teacher of the truth. It is the Church’s duty “to give utterance to, and authoritatively to teach, that truth which is Christ Himself, and also to declare and confirm by her authority those principles of the moral order which have their origins in human nature itself.” I have already pointed to how Lumen Gentium addresses where this teaching authority is to be found.

Conscience is therefore not a freedom that exists solely within each person. Rather it is that which binds each person in a harmonious relationship with the People of God. It would be mistaken to conclude that “conscience” authorizes the person to decide for one’s self what his or her conscience dictates. These leads to a subjectivism that takes the person away from one’s union with the Body of Christ and the objectives truths which help us understand what proper and what is not; what is right and what is wrong; what is sinful and what is virtuous; and what is true and what is not. Conscience and the Church rely on proper and authentic relationships.

The proper relationship between the bishops and the laity is therefore also addressed by the Second Vatican Council. It is important to keep in mind that this relationship is built on trust, love, dialog, and respect. Each member of the relationship holds an obligation to the others to respect and implement the duties of the relationship. Nonetheless, there are several important points made by the Council necessitating emphasis which shed light on these relationships. The first is that the faithful laity must exercise respect to the bishops who as teachers represent Christ, as He exercised his fidelity in His obedience to the Father. At the same time, the bishops need to acknowledge and encourage the dignity and responsibility of the laity to contribute to the affairs of the temporal world. Moreover, bishops are to be mindful of their duty to rely on the “prudent advice” of the laity and “confidently assign” them duties which are in service to the Church in the exercise of which they enjoy a proper measure of freedom. But all of these individuals—be they clerical or lay—grow from the vine of Christ on which they are branches. And for so long as we choose to remain branches, we need to direct our energies to producing fruit abundantly in the name of Christ and the Church. For that is what the vine needs and expects if we are to remain in communion with Him and with one another.   RJA sj