It is the teaching of the Church that I must always follow my conscience. I can never try and shelter myself behind authority, and say that though my conscience objects, I have a right to put it aside and follow authority blindly. Put in this way, I am certainly wrong, for in that case I should be using authority to break up conscience; I should be using that of which the whole basis is an appeal to conscience (for the idea of duty which is contained in the idea of submission to authority is part of the very fundamental of conscience) in order to violate conscience. Yet, on the other hand, is it not true that authority once proved divine must be obeyed, that authority can even instruct conscience, teach it principles of right and wrong, such as left to itself it might never find out at all? This contradiction is sometimes, perhaps, a puzzle to me as a Catholic. How am I to deal with the situation when my conscience and the authority of the Church, whose divine mission I accept, come into conflict? This puzzle, which, of course, is absolutely simple for Catholics when they once start to examine the matter, is altogether a scandal for non-Catholics. Forgetful of the fact that during the whole of her rule the Church has been the champion of conscience against tyranny of the state, or tyranny of superstition, non-Catholics are in haste to suppose that conscience and authority are in opposition, whereas they are necessary for each other it is impossible to find the one safeguarded without the other. Wherever authority has broken down I shall find that in effect conscience has also been overridden, and where authority has been upheld it has but confirmed the rights of conscience.
But I must begin by recognizing the distinction that, on the whole, conscience is rather concerned with the application of principles than with the settling of principles. Our Lord came to teach truth, and consequently I am sure that in His creed I shall find what I want to guide me through life; but where I shall fail is that I shall from time to time be uncertain as to where or how these wide principles are to be adopted in my ordinary life. How far does self-sacrifice become an evil? When exactly am I obliged to consider my own good name? When shall I scourge with ropes the buyers and sellers in the holy places, and when meekly submit to their authority? Here, then, it is clear that in this matter there will be little possibility for opposition, for the conscience does not concern itself with principles, and the authority of faith concerns itself with little else. Faith says to me that I must not kill, and conscience has to settle which sort of killing is really murder: the two spheres are thus, on the whole, divided. Yet it is certainly possible for them actually to come into conflict. Thus I can suppose that my faith tells me of an everlasting place of torture called hell, while my conscience tells me that I cannot believe that God would be so cruel. What is to happen? First, am I certain that this is of faith? Yes, I am certain. Then why does my conscience object? Because it cannot square such a place or condition with God s mercy. Then I look back at my conscience and say: Well, first of all, our Lord uses the phrase "everlasting fire," and if we follow His words we cannot go wrong. Then the Church has never said that she quite knows what the punishment really consists of, nor can we really have any very accurate concept of eternity. Lastly, at the most, all I can say is that my conscience does not quite see how divine mercy and eternal punishment fit in, but I cannot honestly say that they do not fit in. Thus the only point that conscience blocks is merely a personal difficulty in seeing how things which faith tells me are compatible can really be so.
Thus it is in every case. Conscience may stick at the explanation, but it has to leave the principles alone. My conscience itself is a growing thing, quite capable of training and cultivation. For years I may consider certain things allowable, and only come to find them forbidden later in life. Many a practice which a boy has thought in no sense wrong, later years have shown him to have been, indeed, full of evil. Or, again, I have, perhaps, not realized many of the social evils to be quite so terrible as they actually are; for I have all through my life to be teaching my conscience ever greater refinement, keeping it well-informed of the decisions of the Church, being careful lest it should grow heedless or too accustomed to evil, and therefore no longer angry at injustice. Whatever the voice of conscience dictates I must fearlessly follow. But I have also to be sure that conscience itself is properly taught the correct view of life, comparing its acts from time to time with the authoritative decisions of the faith and with the familiar example of the life of Christ. I must in this way take care that I do not yield to authority in those matters where authority has no right to interfere, nor, on the other hand, erect into a principle of conscience what is really nothing else than some foolish fancy of my own intelligence.
- text taken from Meditations for Layfolk by Father Bede Jarrett, O.P.