Welcome to the 2nd Term,Lesson 2
CHRISTIAN LIVING 3: MORALITY
Course Outline for Term 2
The Morality of Human Acts:
Subtopic 1: “Exercising Christian Conscience
What is Human Conscience
What Conscience is Not
Conscience Morally Obliges
Subjective Dimension
Objective Dimension
Formation of Conscience
Following your conscience
Forming a Christian Conscience
Mature Christian Conscience
The Law and the Spirit of the Law
Contemporary Moral Issues
Subtopic 2: Celebrating Life and Health- “the 5th Commandment.”
“The Morality of Abortion”
“When Does Human Life Begin?”
“ The Morality of Euthanasia”
“How Should a Christian Face Death?”
“The Issue on Cloning and Stem Cell Technology”
“What is the Stand of the Catholic Church?”
Sources:
Catechism for Filipino Catholics Manila: Episcopal Commission on Catechesis and Catholic Education of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines and Word & Life Publications, 2004.
Catechism of the Catholic Church Manila: Episcopal Commission on Catechesis and Catholic Education of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines and Word & Life Publications, 1994.
Maturing in Christian Faith, the National Catechetical Directory of the Philippines. Manila ECERI, 1985.
Peschke, Karl H. SVD. Christian Ethics: Moral Theology in the Light of Vatican II, Volume 1: General Moral Theology. Manila: Divine Word Publications, 1996.
cw.routledge.com/.../Conscience%20Powerpoi...
http://www.google.com.ph/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=conscience%20powerpoint&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CDYQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundteaching.org%2Fppt%2FThe%2520Conscience%2520of%2520Man.ppt&ei=2EVNUNW4CsfsrAe2yoGQCA&usg=AFQjCNHj5Bq7lnIdg5v658NXzZeDpEH_Ag&cad=rja
Requirements
5 gospel reflections
3 / 4 short assessments
2 long assessments
Class participation/recitation/seatworks
1 Major project
1-2 minor projects
Exercising Christian Conscience
When your intelligence don’t tell you something ain’t right, your conscience gives you a tap on the shoulder and says ‘Hold on’. If it don’t, you’re a snake.— Elvis Presley, American rock 'n' roll icon (1935-1977)
Conscience is God’s presence in man.— Emmanuel Swedenborg, Swedish-American spiritualist (1688-1772)
Reason often makes mistakes but conscience never does.— Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw), American writer and humourist (1818-1885)
Responses of Some Junior Students
To follow what is right and what you know is the right thing to do. - JF
In any situation, we should be well informed and take all facts into consideration. Our gut instinct may not always be right… - JF
Follow what your conscience tells you no matter what the circumstances are and do what is good. –JF
Conscience makes us aware of whether what we are doing is right or wrong. It’s innate that we – people - are made good but we go astray at times and conscience is our reminder, but sometimes it gets clouded by what we value or prioritize –JC
The value and function of one’s conscience is to inform the person about the right or wrong decisions or life choices. It is an inner voice within a person that is also nurtured by experience as a person goes through life. –JC
It is better to die excommunicated than to disobey your conscience.
– St. Thomas Aquinas
CONSCIENCE
When considering the nature and function of conscience there are four questions to keep in mind:
1. What is conscience?
2. Where does conscience come from?
3. Is conscience innate or acquired?
4. What is its function in ethical decision making?
Conscience
What is conscience?
A moral faculty or feeling prompting us to see that certain actions are morally right or wrong.
Conscience can prompt people in different directions.
We consider it to be a reliable guide but it lacks consistency and can lead people to perform terrible actions.
Timeline
Augustine of Hippo 334-430
Thomas Aquinas 1224–1274
Joseph Butler 1692–1752
John Henry Newman 1801–1890
Sigmund Freud 1856–1939
Jean Piaget 1896-1980
Biblical teaching
It is assumed by some biblical writers and early Christian teachers that our conscience is God-given. This view is put clearly in Paul’s letter to the Romans:
‘When Gentiles, who do not possess the law, do instinctively what the law requires, these, though not having the law, are a law to themselves. They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts…’ (Romans 2:14-15a)
Augustine
Conscience is the voice of God speaking to us
Aquinas
All people aim for what is good and sin is falling short of God’s ideals, but sometimes even following conscience we will get it wrong.
Aquinas
Conscience for Aquinas has 2 essential parts:
Synderesis – the use of right reason by which we learn basic moral principles and understand that we have to do good and avoid evil.
Conscientia – the actual judgement or decision we make that leads us to act.
Aquinas – Reason seeking Understanding
Butler
wrote that the most crucial thing which distinguished women and men from the animal world was the possession of the faculty of reflection or conscience.
So being human involves being moral.
Conscience is a person’s God-given guide to right conduct and its demands must therefore always be followed.
Butler
Conscience comes from God and must be obeyed
Conscience will harmonise self love and benevolence
Butler
the consequence of an action is not what makes it right or wrong as that has already happened
the purpose of conscience is to guide a person into a way of life that will make them happy
conscience will harmonise self-love and benevolence – this may take some sorting out and so in moral dilemmas we may be uncertain what to do
conscience controls human nature
Joseph Butler – conscience comes from God
Newman
Conscience is the voice of God
‘If, as is the case, we feel responsibility, are ashamed, are frightened, at transgressing the voice of conscience, this implies there is One to whom we are responsible, before whom we are ashamed, whose claims upon us we fear.’
Freud
The human personality consists of three areas:
the superego – the set of moral controls given to us by outside influences. It is our moral code or conscience and is often in conflict with the Id.
the ego – the conscious self, the part seen by the outside world.
id – the unconscious self, the part of the mind containing basic drives and repressed memories. It is amoral, has no concerns about right and wrong and is only concerned with itself.
Freud
Conscience is most clearly connected with the sense of guilt that we feel when we go against our conscience. Conscience then is simply a construct of the mind.
In religious people this would be in response to perceptions of God.
In non-religious people it would be their responses to externally imposed authority.
Freud
The content of our consciences are shaped by our experiences
The superego internalises the disapproval of others and creates the guilty conscience
Piaget
A child’s moral sense develops and the ability to reason morally depends on cognitive development.
Piaget
Two stages of moral development:
Heteronomous morality (between the ages of 5 and 10 years) when the conscience is still immature, rules are not to be broken and punishment is expected if a rule is broken. The consequences of an action will show if it is right or wrong.
Piaget
Autonomous morality (10+) when children develop their own rules and understand how rules operate in and help society. The move towards autonomous morality occurs when the child is less dependant on others for moral authority.
Problems
For Christians conscience is often regarded as the voice of God. However, this raises some serious questions:
If we always knew that what our conscience told us to do was God’s command then we would never make mistakes
However, we do make mistakes
If we can’t hear God properly – whose fault is it?
Problems
Christians often have disagreements over moral issues such as abortion.
So are things not as clear cut as ‘the voice of God’ definition of conscience suggests?
Problems
Many atheists claim that conscience is important to them.
Such claims do not rely upon God.
For atheists, agnostics and humanists, conscience is part of being human and there is no need to involve God when moral decisions have to be made.
Conscience appears to be a universal part of human moral living.
Conscience
Is it innate or acquired?
Or both?
WHAT IS CONSCIENCE?
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT OUR CONSCIENCE
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT OUR CONSCIENCE
Misconception # 1
CONSCIENCE IS INDIVIDUALISTIC
Misconception # 2
CONSCIENCE IS GOD’S VOICE WITHIN US
Misconception # 3
CONSCIENCE IS OUR FEELING OF GUILT
Misconception # 4
MEDIA’S DEPICTION OF CONSCIENCE AS AN EXTERNAL REALITY
Group activity: WHAT CONSCIENCE IS NOT
TASK:
Share what you have read to your group – important points
Each group will have to subdivide their groups further (3 small groups).
Each small group should be able to portray unique instances wherein they will be able to show in a skit the topic assigned them.
Which means, the big group should be able to present 3 unique short skits (30 seconds – 1 minute) of the topic assigned them. Reminder: No skit within the big group should be alike.
The big group will only be given 20 minutes to brainstorm, form subgroups and rehearse.
After 20 minutes, the presentation of the skits will take place.
Submit in a ½ crosswise in 5 minutes:
Group # and topic
Overall leader:
Members:
Skit 1 – names
Skit 2 – names
Skit 3 – names
Presentation of Skit
Introduce the group
and the topic
At the end of ALL the skits, explain your topic with a quick summary.
Misconception # 1
CONSCIENCE IS INDIVIDUALISTIC
The notion of “my way” … doing and following one’s conscience without considering the good of others.
1. What matters most is “I was the one who made my decisions whether it’s good or evil.”
2. “Malinis ang Konsensiya… wala akong pakialam sa iba.”
3. “it’s between me and my conscience”
We are RELATIONAL BEINGS
…we are truly free as persons-in-community only by fulfilling our moral obligations toward one another.
Misconception # 2
CONSCIENCE IS GOD’S VOICE WITHIN US
Natural tendency is to relate our conscience to God’s voice since we are created as moral persons and God is the perfect norm.
We should not equate our conscience with God’s voice because conscience can sometimes be a serious error.
Misconception # 3
CONSCIENCE IS OUR FEELING OF GUILT
We hear a common remark “nakakakonsensiya ang ginawa ko.”
The statement erroneously equates conscience with a feeling of guilt.
Does it mean that our conscience is automaitcally correct once we no longer feel guilty?
We should not equate guilty feelings with conscience itself.
OTHERWISE we reduced conscience to a feeling that results from our personal temperament, upbringing, or maturity and not from an actual objective moral judgement.
Misconception # 4
CONSCIENCE IS MEDIA’S DEPICTION OF CONSCIENCE AS AN EXTERNAL REALITY
Films and advertisements usually depict human conscience in very entertaining yet misleading ways.
Example: (choosing which brand of soap smells better)
Media’s depictions don’t have reference to any objective moral standard and real moral weight or value.
CHRISTIAN LIVING 3: MORALITY
Course Outline for Term 2
The Morality of Human Acts:
Subtopic 1: “Exercising Christian Conscience
What is Human Conscience
What Conscience is Not
Conscience Morally Obliges
Subjective Dimension
Objective Dimension
Formation of Conscience
Following your conscience
Forming a Christian Conscience
Mature Christian Conscience
The Law and the Spirit of the Law
Contemporary Moral Issues
Subtopic 2: Celebrating Life and Health- “the 5th Commandment.”
“The Morality of Abortion”
“When Does Human Life Begin?”
“ The Morality of Euthanasia”
“How Should a Christian Face Death?”
“The Issue on Cloning and Stem Cell Technology”
“What is the Stand of the Catholic Church?”
Sources:
Catechism for Filipino Catholics Manila: Episcopal Commission on Catechesis and Catholic Education of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines and Word & Life Publications, 2004.
Catechism of the Catholic Church Manila: Episcopal Commission on Catechesis and Catholic Education of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines and Word & Life Publications, 1994.
Maturing in Christian Faith, the National Catechetical Directory of the Philippines. Manila ECERI, 1985.
Peschke, Karl H. SVD. Christian Ethics: Moral Theology in the Light of Vatican II, Volume 1: General Moral Theology. Manila: Divine Word Publications, 1996.
cw.routledge.com/.../Conscience%20Powerpoi...
http://www.google.com.ph/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=conscience%20powerpoint&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CDYQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundteaching.org%2Fppt%2FThe%2520Conscience%2520of%2520Man.ppt&ei=2EVNUNW4CsfsrAe2yoGQCA&usg=AFQjCNHj5Bq7lnIdg5v658NXzZeDpEH_Ag&cad=rja
Requirements
5 gospel reflections
3 / 4 short assessments
2 long assessments
Class participation/recitation/seatworks
1 Major project
1-2 minor projects
Exercising Christian Conscience
When your intelligence don’t tell you something ain’t right, your conscience gives you a tap on the shoulder and says ‘Hold on’. If it don’t, you’re a snake.— Elvis Presley, American rock 'n' roll icon (1935-1977)
Conscience is God’s presence in man.— Emmanuel Swedenborg, Swedish-American spiritualist (1688-1772)
Reason often makes mistakes but conscience never does.— Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw), American writer and humourist (1818-1885)
Responses of Some Junior Students
To follow what is right and what you know is the right thing to do. - JF
In any situation, we should be well informed and take all facts into consideration. Our gut instinct may not always be right… - JF
Follow what your conscience tells you no matter what the circumstances are and do what is good. –JF
Conscience makes us aware of whether what we are doing is right or wrong. It’s innate that we – people - are made good but we go astray at times and conscience is our reminder, but sometimes it gets clouded by what we value or prioritize –JC
The value and function of one’s conscience is to inform the person about the right or wrong decisions or life choices. It is an inner voice within a person that is also nurtured by experience as a person goes through life. –JC
It is better to die excommunicated than to disobey your conscience.
– St. Thomas Aquinas
CONSCIENCE
When considering the nature and function of conscience there are four questions to keep in mind:
1. What is conscience?
2. Where does conscience come from?
3. Is conscience innate or acquired?
4. What is its function in ethical decision making?
Conscience
What is conscience?
A moral faculty or feeling prompting us to see that certain actions are morally right or wrong.
Conscience can prompt people in different directions.
We consider it to be a reliable guide but it lacks consistency and can lead people to perform terrible actions.
Timeline
Augustine of Hippo 334-430
Thomas Aquinas 1224–1274
Joseph Butler 1692–1752
John Henry Newman 1801–1890
Sigmund Freud 1856–1939
Jean Piaget 1896-1980
Biblical teaching
It is assumed by some biblical writers and early Christian teachers that our conscience is God-given. This view is put clearly in Paul’s letter to the Romans:
‘When Gentiles, who do not possess the law, do instinctively what the law requires, these, though not having the law, are a law to themselves. They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts…’ (Romans 2:14-15a)
Augustine
Conscience is the voice of God speaking to us
Aquinas
All people aim for what is good and sin is falling short of God’s ideals, but sometimes even following conscience we will get it wrong.
Aquinas
Conscience for Aquinas has 2 essential parts:
Synderesis – the use of right reason by which we learn basic moral principles and understand that we have to do good and avoid evil.
Conscientia – the actual judgement or decision we make that leads us to act.
Aquinas – Reason seeking Understanding
Butler
wrote that the most crucial thing which distinguished women and men from the animal world was the possession of the faculty of reflection or conscience.
So being human involves being moral.
Conscience is a person’s God-given guide to right conduct and its demands must therefore always be followed.
Butler
Conscience comes from God and must be obeyed
Conscience will harmonise self love and benevolence
Butler
the consequence of an action is not what makes it right or wrong as that has already happened
the purpose of conscience is to guide a person into a way of life that will make them happy
conscience will harmonise self-love and benevolence – this may take some sorting out and so in moral dilemmas we may be uncertain what to do
conscience controls human nature
Joseph Butler – conscience comes from God
Newman
Conscience is the voice of God
‘If, as is the case, we feel responsibility, are ashamed, are frightened, at transgressing the voice of conscience, this implies there is One to whom we are responsible, before whom we are ashamed, whose claims upon us we fear.’
Freud
The human personality consists of three areas:
the superego – the set of moral controls given to us by outside influences. It is our moral code or conscience and is often in conflict with the Id.
the ego – the conscious self, the part seen by the outside world.
id – the unconscious self, the part of the mind containing basic drives and repressed memories. It is amoral, has no concerns about right and wrong and is only concerned with itself.
Freud
Conscience is most clearly connected with the sense of guilt that we feel when we go against our conscience. Conscience then is simply a construct of the mind.
In religious people this would be in response to perceptions of God.
In non-religious people it would be their responses to externally imposed authority.
Freud
The content of our consciences are shaped by our experiences
The superego internalises the disapproval of others and creates the guilty conscience
Piaget
A child’s moral sense develops and the ability to reason morally depends on cognitive development.
Piaget
Two stages of moral development:
Heteronomous morality (between the ages of 5 and 10 years) when the conscience is still immature, rules are not to be broken and punishment is expected if a rule is broken. The consequences of an action will show if it is right or wrong.
Piaget
Autonomous morality (10+) when children develop their own rules and understand how rules operate in and help society. The move towards autonomous morality occurs when the child is less dependant on others for moral authority.
Problems
For Christians conscience is often regarded as the voice of God. However, this raises some serious questions:
If we always knew that what our conscience told us to do was God’s command then we would never make mistakes
However, we do make mistakes
If we can’t hear God properly – whose fault is it?
Problems
Christians often have disagreements over moral issues such as abortion.
So are things not as clear cut as ‘the voice of God’ definition of conscience suggests?
Problems
Many atheists claim that conscience is important to them.
Such claims do not rely upon God.
For atheists, agnostics and humanists, conscience is part of being human and there is no need to involve God when moral decisions have to be made.
Conscience appears to be a universal part of human moral living.
Conscience
Is it innate or acquired?
Or both?
WHAT IS CONSCIENCE?
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT OUR CONSCIENCE
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT OUR CONSCIENCE
Misconception # 1
CONSCIENCE IS INDIVIDUALISTIC
Misconception # 2
CONSCIENCE IS GOD’S VOICE WITHIN US
Misconception # 3
CONSCIENCE IS OUR FEELING OF GUILT
Misconception # 4
MEDIA’S DEPICTION OF CONSCIENCE AS AN EXTERNAL REALITY
Group activity: WHAT CONSCIENCE IS NOT
TASK:
Share what you have read to your group – important points
Each group will have to subdivide their groups further (3 small groups).
Each small group should be able to portray unique instances wherein they will be able to show in a skit the topic assigned them.
Which means, the big group should be able to present 3 unique short skits (30 seconds – 1 minute) of the topic assigned them. Reminder: No skit within the big group should be alike.
The big group will only be given 20 minutes to brainstorm, form subgroups and rehearse.
After 20 minutes, the presentation of the skits will take place.
Submit in a ½ crosswise in 5 minutes:
Group # and topic
Overall leader:
Members:
Skit 1 – names
Skit 2 – names
Skit 3 – names
Presentation of Skit
Introduce the group
and the topic
At the end of ALL the skits, explain your topic with a quick summary.
Misconception # 1
CONSCIENCE IS INDIVIDUALISTIC
The notion of “my way” … doing and following one’s conscience without considering the good of others.
1. What matters most is “I was the one who made my decisions whether it’s good or evil.”
2. “Malinis ang Konsensiya… wala akong pakialam sa iba.”
3. “it’s between me and my conscience”
We are RELATIONAL BEINGS
…we are truly free as persons-in-community only by fulfilling our moral obligations toward one another.
Misconception # 2
CONSCIENCE IS GOD’S VOICE WITHIN US
Natural tendency is to relate our conscience to God’s voice since we are created as moral persons and God is the perfect norm.
We should not equate our conscience with God’s voice because conscience can sometimes be a serious error.
Misconception # 3
CONSCIENCE IS OUR FEELING OF GUILT
We hear a common remark “nakakakonsensiya ang ginawa ko.”
The statement erroneously equates conscience with a feeling of guilt.
Does it mean that our conscience is automaitcally correct once we no longer feel guilty?
We should not equate guilty feelings with conscience itself.
OTHERWISE we reduced conscience to a feeling that results from our personal temperament, upbringing, or maturity and not from an actual objective moral judgement.
Misconception # 4
CONSCIENCE IS MEDIA’S DEPICTION OF CONSCIENCE AS AN EXTERNAL REALITY
Films and advertisements usually depict human conscience in very entertaining yet misleading ways.
Example: (choosing which brand of soap smells better)
Media’s depictions don’t have reference to any objective moral standard and real moral weight or value.
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