This document discusses the role of conscience in morality. It uses a sailboat metaphor to represent how conscience acts as a moral compass, with opposing forces of light and dark influencing its direction. Conscience develops from internalizing moral guidance from others as a child. When we sin, we stray off course but can use tools like examination of conscience to recalculate our direction. An informed conscience is guided by scripture, tradition, reason and experience, culminating in love of God and others. Rationalizations are ways we justify actions rather than listen to our conscience.

1. Generations Of Faith: Morality
Conscience
February 2017

2. Opening Prayer: Our Father
This session on Morality will deepen our understanding of the
role of conscience in our life.
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3. Summary of GOF Morality
Sessions on the Law & Sin
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By Loving God and everyone else we:
• Strive to be the best that we can be in service to others,
and
• When we “miss the mark” (sin), we rely upon a loving
God who accepts our asking for forgiveness, and
• We begin anew by putting into practice what we have
learned.

4. Pre-Reading & Pre-Thinking
4
Pre-Readings:
• Living in the Light (John 3:17-21).
• The Primacy of Love (Luke 10:27-28 and Matthew 5:23-
25).
Thought Questions:
• Think of the things that we tell ourselves to justify our
actions; the rationalizations that are meant to dampen the
inner voice of our conscience.

5. Conscience: Sailboat Metaphor
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Forward motion of a sailboat is caused by the
tension created from two opposing forces:
• Wind against the sail, and
• Pressure exerted on the keel by the water.
Just like squeezing an orange seed between
thumb and index finger, the seed shoots forward.
We are that sailboat moving forward in the face
of two opposing forces:
• Light – the Spirit, and
• Dark – The Evil One.

6. Conscience: Sailboat Metaphor
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In our sailboat metaphor, two key questions arise:
1. Where do we want to go – our destination?
2. How will we get there?
The simple answers without being simplistic are:
1. We are on a journey to go from this life into the next –
Heaven.
2. By loving God and everyone else.
From Fr. Jim Field “…but we live as if we are already there!”

7. Conscience: Sailboat Metaphor
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We get from here to there by:
• First, plotting a course.
• Then employing the compass to
show our heading (conscience).
• Using the wheel to set/reset our
direction (free will of thoughts
leading to actions).

8. Conscience: Sailboat Metaphor
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When we sin, we stray off course
and then we …
Use our tools for a course correction.
Or as our GPS device would say
“Recalculating”!

9. Conscience: In Children’s
Literature
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• Pinocchio has Jiminy Cricket.
• Cinderella has her Fairy Godmother.
• Grinch has the young child who
expresses love.

10. Conscience Development:
Psychology
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• Child experiences Mother saying “No”.
• Child internalizes Mother’s voice
hearing her “no”.
• Finally, it becomes the Child’s own
inner voice saying “no”.

11. Conscience Development

12. Conscience Development

13. Conscience Development:
Psychology
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Who we are is the interaction of our genetic inheritance
and of the sum total of our experiences.
What we do at any moment then depends upon:
• What we have experienced in the past,
• How we interpret what is going on in the moment, and
• What we expect will happen as a result of all of this.
We are adding the other dimension of what we consider
to be morally correct … conscience.

14. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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Directional statements from the Bible: Primacy of Love
• “Love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, with
all your strength, and with all your mind, and your
neighbor as yourself.” (Luke 10: 27-28)
• “What I want is love not sacrifice.” (Hosea 6:6) “What I
want is mercy not sacrifice.” (Matthew 9:13).
• “So then, if you are bringing your offering to the altar and
there remember that your brother has something against
you, leave your offering there before the altar, go and be
reconciled with your brother first, and then come back
and present your offering.” (Matthew 5: 23-25)

15. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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Mass: Primacy of Love
• We open with a reflection on what we have done or have
failed to do and ask for God’s forgiveness.
• In the prayer “Our Father” we express the need to
forgive others in order to be forgiven.
• For the early Christians, the “Kiss of Peace” was the
space for the community members to reconcile with each
other when needed.

16. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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The Act of Discernment
• “For everyone who does wicked things hates the light
and does not come toward the light, so that his works
might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth
comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen
as done in God.” (John 3:20)
• If ever we question whether or not to engage in an
action, the deciding factor can be whether this is
something being done in the light. Would others
approve? Would we be comfortable with others knowing
what we did?

17. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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Conscience is at the intersection of intention and action-timing.
• Intention –
– A good thing done for the right reason is a good thing.
– A good thing done for the wrong reason is not a good thing
– e.g., I help someone out to be seen as a great person!
Jesus called out the Pharisees and Scribes on this very
thing.
• Intention Plus Action–Timing:
– Doing the right thing at the right time for the right reason!

18. Saint Ignatius
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Saint Ignatius merged the spiritual and the psychological
well before psychology was a science.
• Spirit of God wants us only to be at peace and contented
… living in the light.
• Anything that causes us to be worried, upset, confused
… is probably the work of the Evil One and is a time for
us to drag this from the dark into the light by discussing it
with someone.

19. Saint Ignatius
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The wisdom of Saint Ignatius is that we should:
• Know ourselves.
• Pay attention to our thoughts and feelings as the
compass/barometer of what we have done and should do
(the internalized conscience).
• Take corrective action to bring us back into the light
whenever necessary.

20. Saint Ignatius
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Which is why Jesuits conduct an examination of their
conscience every evening. How you can do it:
1. Place yourself in the presence of God.
2. Pray for the grace to understand how God is acting in
your life.
3. Review your day – recalling specific moments and your
associated feelings.
4. Reflect on what you did, said or thought in those
circumstances. Were you drawing closer to God or
further away?
5. Look toward tomorrow – think how you might do better
and conclude with the “Our Father”.

21. Saint Ignatius
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We can adapt this same practice of an examination of
conscience by asking ourselves two basic questions at the
end of the day:
• #1. What did I do well today that I should continue to do
tomorrow?
• Rather than what did I do wrong today … which may
spiral down into negativity, ask …
• #2. What can I do even better tomorrow?

22. “Bringing it into the Light”:
Talking It Over With Another
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One option we have is to talk it over with others:
Another option is to talk it over in the confessional:

23. What Should the Extent of Our
Love Be
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Jesus forgave everyone he encountered in the Gospels …
even the Romans who were crucifying him.
He expressed anger only towards two groups of people:
• Those who were taking advantage of the poor in the
Temple … the money changers … “You have made my
Father’s house a den of thieves.” (Matthew 21:13)
• Those whose role was to speak for the poor,
disenfranchised, and marginalized but who did not do this
… the Chief Priest, Scribes, and Pharisees.

24. What Should the Extent of Our
Love Be
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The scary message for us is that both these groups had a
“good reason” for doing what they were doing.
• The money changers were providing a needed service to
exchange pagan money into Temple money.
• The Chief Priest, Scribes, and Pharisees were
cooperating with the occupational Roman forces as a
means of protecting the people.… the greater common
good.
Rationalization is where we come up with a good sounding
reason, but it is not the real underlying reason.

25. Challenges to Conscience
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Rationalizations
•
•
•
•
What are some of the
things we tell
ourselves to justify
our actions …
rationalizations that
are meant to dampen
the inner voice of our
conscience and/or
to justify an already
formed opinion?

26. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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Conscience then is both:
• The Spirit’s voice speaking within us to remain in or to
return to the light, and
• The grace of God expressed in our relationships with
each other in our Faith Community.

27. Informed Conscience
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• Scripture
• Tradition
• Reason
• Experience
Culminating
in
Loving God
and
Everyone
Else

28. Conscience: Our Moral Compass
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America, April 25, 2016, Editorial page 5
• “The Church has been called to form consciences, but
not to replace them.”
• “… individual conscience is the final arbiter of the moral
life.”
This gives us the responsibility to be people of the Light for
ourselves and for each other as we listen to the Spirit of
God within each of us.

29. Conscience: A Seeming
Contradiction
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While we are expected to judge our own decisions and
behavior by employing our conscience,
We are not expected to judge others … we are called to
extend mercy and forgiveness to others in love.
• “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; because the
judgement you give are the judgements you get, and the
amount you measure out is the amount you will be given.
Why do you observe the splinter in your brother’s eye
and never notice the plank in your own. … Take the
plank out of your own eye first, and then you will clearly
see enough to take the splinter out of your brother’s
eye.” (Matthew 7: 1-5)

30. Conscience: A Final Thought
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The 1970 Movie Love Story (Erich Segal) had Jennifer
Cavilleri (Ali MacGraw) saying the following line to Oliver
Barret (Ryan O’Neal) without much explanation:
“Love means never having to say you are sorry”.
Jennifer was implying that she knows Oliver’s intentions
intimately and forgives his missteps. Our all-knowing God
also knows our intentions intimately, but we still must ask for
forgiveness of God and others when we miss the mark.
Sometimes the person we must forgive is our self … the act
that Judas could not do, but Peter found the strength in his
fellow believers to do.

31. Conscience: A Final Thought
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If you ever feel overwhelmed or discouraged by the
seemingly endless task of becoming the best that we can
be, remember the words of a Worldly Saint, Darryl Sutter.
The Los Angeles Kings Hockey Team was up 3 games to 1
over the New York Rangers in the 2013-2014 Stanley Cup
Finals needing only to win one more game to clinch the
Cup.
When asked what he told the Team before they came onto
the ice he said ….

32. Conscience: A Final Thought
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• “Focus on output not
outcome.”
• The application for us is
similar to what he intended
for his team that night.
• Do not overburden yourself
with trying to control the
outcome. Focus solely on
being the best that you can
be and results will follow!

33. Take Away from this Session on
Conscience
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• Conscience at Work, Boston College
Resources C21, Fall 2016

34. Upcoming Final GOF Session on
Morality
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• Topic: Life is Good – Living as the Spirit
of God intends us to live with joy,
contentment, and peace!
• Sessions on March 29, 30, and April 1
• Passion Sunday April 9 (Vigil Mass April 8)
• Holy Week April 10-15
• Triduum is April 13-15 (Thursday-Saturday)
• Easter Sunday is April 16

35. February 2017
Thank you for being with us today!
Generations Of Faith: Morality
Conscience

36. Today’s GOF Session:
Plus / Delta
1) Plus: What about this GOF session
worked and we should continue in
future sessions?
2) Delta: What process improvements or
upgrades should we make for future
GOF sessions?
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DeltaPlus