[Editor’s Note: What follows is the text of the talk Toledo Bishop Leonard P. Blair gave at the First Thursday Dialogue Feb. 7 at the Toledo Club regarding the U.S. Bishops’ document on faithful citizenship. First Thursday Dialogue programs are organized by the diocesan Secretariat of Pastoral Leadership and feature different speakers and topics each month. The U.S. Bishops’ document, Faithful Citizenship, which was the subject of the talk can be found through the Toledo diocesan Web site, www.toledodiocese.org, or directly from the U.S. Bishops’ Conference, www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/index.htm.]

The topic of forming consciences for faithful citizenship simply reflects the title of the document approved last November by the Bishops of the United States in anticipation of 2008 as an election year. For more than 30 years the bishops of our country have followed this practice of encouraging Catholics to be thoughtful about the moral dimensions of their faith as these apply to participation in political life.

Over the last 30 years or more we have witnessed a great upheaval in the life of our society. Consensus about fundamental moral issues has broken down, for example, with regard to the protection of unborn life and the very definition of marriage and family. In the Catholic Church this tidal wave of cultural and social change has given rise to a situation in which some people claim to be Roman Catholic and yet dissent from fundamental teachings of the Catholic Church, sometimes in a public manner that is scandalous, sometimes out of ignorance of what their own church believes and teaches, other times not.

The bishops’ desire to fulfill their responsibilities as teachers of faith and morals by offering guidance to the Catholic voting public has been the focus of increasing attention and even controversy. Some accuse the bishops of trying to tell Catholics exactly for whom or against whom to vote, thus embroiling the church in partisan politics. Others think that the bishops are too hesitant, and that they should be more pointed in telling Catholics exactly how to vote in light of the gravity of the moral issues.

In Faithful Citizenship the bishops state flatly: “The church is involved in the political process, but is not partisan. The church cannot champion any candidate or party.” What the church is calling for is “a different kind of political engagement: one shaped by the moral convictions of well formed consciences and focused on the dignity of every human being, the pursuit of the common good, and the protection of the weak and the vulnerable.”

It is important to call attention to the seven key themes that are the bishops’ elaboration of these moral priorities. Without going into the detail that you can read for yourself in Faithful Citizenship, these key themes of Catholic social teaching are meant to provide a moral framework for decisions in public life. The bishops list them as follows: not surprisingly, first and fundamental to everything else is the right to life and the dignity of the human person; then the call that everyone has to family, community and participation; the morality of both rights and responsibilities; an option for the poor and vulnerable; the dignity and rights of workers; human, global solidarity; and caring for God’s creation. Each of these themes, in turn, is elaborated with regard to specific issues.

The fundamental stance of the bishops reflects the teaching of Pope Benedict. In his encyclical Deus Caritas Est he writes: “The church wishes to help form consciences in political life and to stimulate greater insight into the authentic requirements of justice as well as greater readiness to act accordingly…. The church cannot and must not take upon herself the political battle to bring about the most just society possible. She cannot and must not replace the state. Yet at the same time she cannot and must not remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice.” (no. 28)

It should be noted that in the wider context of Pope Benedict’s encyclical the church’s challenge of helping people form their consciences well is not restricted to Catholics, but is meant for all people of good will “in the public square,” to quote a phrase, and is rooted in the natural law. Natural law can be defined as “the universal moral law given by God in the very act of creating human beings and open to being known by the light of reason.”

In his Message for the World Day of Peace on Jan. 1, 2008, Pope Benedict referred to this common moral law, which is based on “the deepest inclinations” of our being, and which, over and above cultural differences, enables human beings to come to a common rational understanding regarding the most important aspects of good and evil, justice and injustice.
So, for example, when in our document we American bishops refer to the direct and intentional destruction of innocent human life or to racism as intrinsically evil, we do not understand this to be an assertion of some peculiar Catholic belief, but rather as something universally knowable by all human beings. We believe and maintain that any rational person who objectively examines the natural law inscribed on the human mind and heart can understand that killing innocent life in the womb or treating another person with contempt and injustice because of their race are immoral acts and can never be justified. These things are not good or evil because a legislature or court says they are, or an opinion poll, but they are evil by their very nature and cannot be justified. That is not to say that sin does not take ts toll. Sin makes it harder to discern and obey the natural law (cf. Mt 19: 1-9).

The document approved by the bishops last November, however, focuses primarily on the formation of conscience by the Catholic people, so that they can exercise their duties as citizens in a responsible manner that reflects the Catholic faith they profess. The formation of conscience is central to the moral life not just with regard to political participation but with regard to all our personal moral choices in concrete circumstances in a world filled with evil as well as good, and with temptations and perplexities.

When there was a consensus about fundamental moral issues in our country, which by the way was largely a Judeo-Christian consensus about moral issues based on a belief in the veracity and authority of biblical teaching, then conflicted public choices about these moral issues were few and far between. Now that the consensus is broken, and biblical teaching, if mentioned at all, is rejected or re-interpreted so as to be unrecognizable, there is an attempt to redefine the moral foundations of our society. Catholics, among others, are challenged to form their consciences carefully and correctly, with integrity, in keeping with the faith they profess.

Before speaking more at length about what the bishops teach on the formation of conscience, I think it is important to say that Judeo-Christian religion, and Islam too, for that matter, has always made a claim to teach moral truths for the right conduct of individuals and of society.
If one had to characterize the faith of Israel in the Old Testament as distinct from the surrounding religions of the time, the description one would have to give is ethical monotheism: not only a belief in one God as opposed to many, but also the formation of an ethical social order. The God who revealed Himself to the Hebrews is not content with outward rituals to appease Him or to win His favor. God’s gift to Israel, its most precious heritage, is the law of God revealed as a demand for godly, that is to say righteous, just conduct among people toward each other as essential to the honoring of God.

I don’t need to recite for you the Ten Commandments, which enumerate the main principles of the natural law, and which are the principal expression of ethical monotheism as it relates to human behavior. In the New Testament Christ said that He had come not to destroy the law or to abolish it but to fulfill it by bringing it to the perfection of total self-sacrificing love even for strangers and for one’s enemies.

It is important to note here that what God commands of us, is not some strange alien conduct, but rather something that corresponds to the deepest meaning of our being as we were created by God in His image and likeness. The vision of human action and interaction in the world, both in the Old and New Testament, reflects our human calling to live in communion with God and with one another here and in eternity. Because of original sin human beings lost not only their immediate knowledge of what is good, but also true freedom, that is, the capacity to spontaneously choose and do what is good. Now, thanks to Christ, that freedom has been restored to the human race as a gift of redemptive grace to be received through conversion and faith.

As mentioned earlier, human beings are often blinded, or choose to be blind, to the law that is written in their hearts and that can be rationally known. The intrinsic evils that the bishops mention include not only acts such as abortion, euthanasia, human cloning and embryonic stem cell research, but also the sin of racism. One has only to look at history to see the tragedy and the scars left by racism, which especially but certainly not exclusively during the time of American slavery, was thought to be morally justifiable by many in our country, and even in American law. The fact that so many people thought that racism was morally acceptable or tolerable did not make it so.

Just as through much of American history upright consciences faced situations of moral conflict in the political sphere regarding the intrinsic evil of racism, so now people face situations of moral conflict with regard to another intrinsic evil, abortion and other sins against human life. These issues — racism and abortion — is each the moral issue of their respective times — but are played out within the whole compass of the other moral, social and political issues of the day.

The question arises on the part of a believing and practicing Catholic, how can I, by my participation in political life, best uphold fundamental moral truths of right and wrong, justice and injustice. In human history, rarely if ever does one candidate or party embody all that is morally good or all that is morally evil with respect to a given situation.

Furthermore, to quote our document: “Not all issues are equal [but rather] address matters of different moral weight and urgency. Some involve matters of intrinsic evil that can never be supported. Others involve affirmative obligations to seek the common good.” (no. 90) For these reasons the bishops seek to provide principled guidance for conscience formation so that Catholics can make political choices for the common good of their country and participate in the political process in order to promote that common good in truth and justice.

The bishops refer to a basic principle of moral life when they speak of a well-formed conscience. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, moral conscience “enjoins a person … to do good and to avoid evil. It also judges particular choices, approving those that are good and denouncing those that are evil. (no. 1777) Conscience is “a judgment of reason, whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act…. [Every person] is obliged to follow faithfully what he [or she] knows to be just and right.” (no. 1778) The Bishops remind Catholics of our lifelong obligation to form our consciences according to reason in the light of God’s Word, before the Lord’s cross, assisted by the Holy Spirit, aided by the sound advice of others and guided by the authoritative teaching of the church (cf. no. 1785).

Today people sometimes mistakenly equate a well-formed conscience with a supposedly individualistic right to determine good and evil for themselves. This is not what Catholic teaching means by a well-formed conscience. Living as we do in a sinful and fallen world, an individual may sincerely follow a process of conscience formation marred by ignorance or error. And such ignorance and error are not always free of guilt. There are abortionists or racists who may believe that what they do is right according to their conscience, but that does not make it right. To be well formed or correctly formed the judgment of conscience must, in the words of the Catechism, be “upright and truthful … in conformity with the true good willed by the wisdom of the Creator.”

In addition to a well-formed conscience the bishops speak of the virtue of prudence. According to the Catechism, “the virtue of prudence enables us to discern our true good in every circumstance and to choose the right means of achieving it.” (No. 1806) We might say that conscience reveals what is right in a concrete situation, and prudence helps us discern how to achieve it. When it comes to how we achieve the good, the official summary of Faithful Citizenship says this: “As Catholics seek to advance the common good, we must carefully discern which public policies are morally sound. A good end does not justify an immoral means. At times Catholics may choose different ways to respond to social problems, but we cannot differ in our obligation to protect human life and dignity and help build through moral means a more just and peaceful world…. A candidate’s position on a single issue is not sufficient to guarantee a voter’s support. Yet a candidate’s position on a single issue that involves an intrinsic evil … may legitimately lead a voter to disqualify a candidate from receiving support.”

Let me elaborate further on these last two sentences.

With regard to issues, the bishops point out that Catholics who knowingly, willingly and directly support public policies or legislation that undermine fundamental moral principles are cooperating with evil.

With regard to candidates, the bishops state that a Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in a grave evil if he or she voted for a candidate with the intention of supporting that candidate’s position in favor of an intrinsic evil like abortion. However, if in conscience the voter, for truly grave moral reasons — and the bishops emphasize this — for truly grave moral reasons voted for such a candidate while rejecting the candidate’s position on abortion, then it could be morally permissible, provided that such a vote was not “to advance narrow interests or partisan preferences or to ignore a fundamental moral evil.” I would envision very serious moral soul-searching on the part of a Catholic who is inclined to vote for a candidate who supports an intrinsic evil like abortion.

On the other hand the bishops also state that a voter should not use a candidate’s opposition to an intrinsic evil like abortion to justify indifference or inattentiveness to other important moral issues involving human life and dignity, as reflected in the themes of Catholic social teaching I mentioned earlier and other thorny issues of political activity, lived — to use the words of Pope Benedict — from the perspective of “social charity.” (Deus Caritas Est, no. 29)

I should add that cooperation with evil, knowingly and willingly done, has consequences in eternity, and that is why the bishops say that political choices can affect an individual’s salvation.

I would like to conclude with these words of our bishops document: “In the Catholic tradition, responsible citizenship is a virtue and participation in political life is a moral obligation.” It can equally be said that this is an American tradition. The church exercises her constitutional right to bear witness to her religious and moral convictions and concerns in public life. As always, in the Diocese of Toledo we will seek to bring to the attention of the Catholic people, and others who are listening, the moral dimensions of the issues of our day in a non-partisan manner. I know that you join me in praying for God’s blessing and His gift of wisdom for our country and the elections in November.