CHAPTER II -
"DO NOT BE CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD " (Rom
12:2) - The Church and the discernment of certain
tendencies in present-day moral theology
Teaching what befits
sound doctrine (cf. Tit
2:1)
28.
Our meditation on the dialogue between Jesus and the rich young man has enabled
us to bring together the essential elements of Revelation in the Old and New
Testament with regard to moral action. These are: the subordination of man
and his activity to God, the One who "alone is good"; the relationship
clearly indicated in the divine commandments, between the moral good of
human acts and eternal life; Christian discipleship, which opens up
before man the perspective of perfect love; and finally the gift of the Holy
Spirit, source and means of the moral life of the "new creation"
(cf. 2 Cor
5:17).
In her reflection on
morality, the Church has always kept in mind the words of Jesus to the
rich young man. Indeed, Sacred Scripture remains the living and fruitful source
of the Church's moral doctrine; as the Second Vatican Council recalled, the
Gospel is "the source of all saving truth and moral
teaching".43 The Church has faithfully preserved what the word of
God teaches, not only about truths which must be believed but also about moral
action, action pleasing to God (cf. 1 Th 4:1); she has achieved a doctrinal
development analogous to that which has taken place in the realm of the
truths of faith. Assisted by the Holy Spirit who leads her into all the truth
(cf. Jn 16:13), the Church has not
ceased, nor can she ever cease, to contemplate the "mystery of the Word
Incarnate", in whom "light is shed on the mystery of
man".44
29.
The Church's moral reflection, always conducted in the light of Christ, the
"Good Teacher", has also developed in the specific form of the
theological science called "moral theology ", a science which
accepts and examines Divine Revelation while at the same time responding to the
demands of human reason. Moral theology is a reflection concerned with
"morality", with the good and the evil of human acts and of the
person who performs them; in this sense it is accessible to all people. But it
is also "theology", inasmuch as it acknowledges that the origin and
end of moral action are found in the One who "alone is good" and who,
by giving himself to man in Christ, offers him the happiness of divine life.
The Second Vatican Council
invited scholars to take "special care for the renewal of moral
theology", in such a way that "its scientific presentation,
increasingly based on the teaching of Scripture, will cast light on the exalted
vocation of the faithful in Christ and on their obligation to bear fruit in
charity for the life of the world".45 The Council also encouraged
theologians, "while respecting the methods and requirements of theological
science, to look for a more appropriate way of communicating doctrine to
the people of their time; since there is a difference between the deposit or
the truths of faith and the manner in which they are expressed, keeping the
same meaning and the same judgment".46 This led to a further
invitation, one extended to all the faithful, but addressed to theologians in
particular: "The faithful should live in the closest contact with others
of their time, and should work for a perfect understanding of their modes of
thought and feelings as expressed in their culture".47
The work of many
theologians who found support in the Council's encouragement has already borne
fruit in interesting and helpful reflections about the truths of faith to be
believed and applied in life, reflections offered in a form better suited to
the sensitivities and questions of our contemporaries. The Church, and
particularly the Bishops, to whom Jesus Christ primarily entrusted the ministry
of teaching, are deeply appreciative of this work, and encourage theologians to
continue their efforts, inspired by that profound and authentic "fear of
the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom" (cf. Prov 1:7).
At the same time, however,
within the context of the theological debates which followed the Council, there
have developed certain interpretations of Christian morality which are not
consistent with "sound teaching" (2 Tim
4:3). Certainly the Church's Magisterium
does not intend to impose upon the faithful any particular theological system,
still less a philosophical one. Nevertheless, in order to "reverently
preserve and faithfully expound" the word of God,48 the Magisterium has the duty to state that some trends of
theological thinking and certain philosophical affirmations are incompatible
with revealed truth.49
30.
In addressing this Encyclical to you, my Brother Bishops, it is my intention to
state the principles necessary for discerning what is contrary to
"sound doctrine", drawing attention to those elements of the
Church's moral teaching which today appear particularly exposed to error,
ambiguity or neglect. Yet these are the very elements on which there depends
"the answer to the obscure riddles of the human condition which today
also, as in the past, profoundly disturb the human heart. What is man? What is
the meaning and purpose of our life? What is good and what is sin? What origin
and purpose do sufferings have? What is the way to attaining true happiness?
What are death, judgment and retribution after death? Lastly, what is that
final, unutterable mystery which embraces our lives and from which we take our
origin and towards which we tend?".50 These and other questions,
such as: what is freedom and what is its relationship to the truth contained in
God's law? what is the role of conscience in man's moral development? how do we
determine, in accordance with the truth about the good, the specific rights and
duties of the human person? — can all be summed up in the fundamental question
which the young man in the Gospel put to Jesus: "Teacher, what good must I
do to have eternal life?" Because the Church has been sent by Jesus to
preach the Gospel and to "make disciples of all nations..., teaching them
to observe all" that he has commanded (cf. Mt
28:19-20), she today once more puts forward the Master's reply, a
reply that possesses a light and a power capable of answering even the most
controversial and complex questions. This light and power also impel the Church
constantly to carry out not only her dogmatic but also her moral reflection
within an interdisciplinary context, which is especially necessary in facing
new issues.51
It is in the same light and
power that the Church's Magisterium continues to
carry out its task of discernment, accepting and living out the admonition
addressed by the Apostle Paul to Timothy: "I charge you in the presence of
God and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing
and his kingdom: preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season,
convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching. For the
time will come when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching
ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings,
and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths. As for
you, always be steady, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfil
your ministry" (2 Tim 4:1-5;
cf. Tit 1:10,
13-14).
"You will know
the truth, and the truth will make you free" (Jn 8:32)
31.
The human issues most frequently debated and differently resolved in
contemporary moral reflection are all closely related, albeit in various ways,
to a crucial issue: human freedom.
Certainly people today have
a particularly strong sense of freedom. As the Council's Declaration on
Religious Freedom Dignitatis Humanae
had already observed, "the dignity of the human person is a concern of
which people of our time are becoming increasingly more aware".52
Hence the insistent demand that people be permitted to "enjoy the use of
their own responsible judgment and freedom, and decide on their actions on
grounds of duty and conscience, without external pressure or
coercion".53 In particular, the right to religious freedom and to
respect for conscience on its journey towards the truth is increasingly
perceived as the foundation of the cumulative rights of the person.54
This heightened sense of
the dignity of the human person and of his or her uniqueness, and of the
respect due to the journey of conscience, certainly represents one of the
positive achievements of modern culture. This perception, authentic as it is,
has been expressed in a number of more or less adequate ways, some of which
however diverge from the truth about man as a creature and the image of God,
and thus need to be corrected and purified in the light of faith.55
32.
Certain currents of modern thought have gone so far as to exalt freedom to
such an extent that it becomes an absolute, which would then be the source of
values. This is the direction taken by doctrines which have lost the sense
of the transcendent or which are explicitly atheist. The individual conscience
is accorded the status of a supreme tribunal of moral judgment which hands down
categorical and infallible decisions about good and evil. To the affirmation
that one has a duty to follow one's conscience is unduly added the affirmation
that one's moral judgment is true merely by the fact that it has its origin in
the conscience. But in this way the inescapable claims of truth disappear,
yielding their place to a criterion of sincerity, authenticity and "being
at peace with oneself", so much so that some have come to adopt a
radically subjectivistic conception of moral judgment.
As is immediately evident, the
crisis of truth is not unconnected with this development. Once the idea of
a universal truth about the good, knowable by human reason, is lost, inevitably
the notion of conscience also changes. Conscience is no longer considered in
its primordial reality as an act of a person's intelligence, the function of
which is to apply the universal knowledge of the good in a specific situation
and thus to express a judgment about the right conduct to be chosen here and
now. Instead, there is a tendency to grant to the individual conscience the
prerogative of independently determining the criteria of good and evil and then
acting accordingly. Such an outlook is quite congenial to an individualist
ethic, wherein each individual is faced with his own truth, different from the
truth of others. Taken to its extreme consequences, this individualism leads to
a denial of the very idea of human nature.
These different notions are
at the origin of currents of thought which posit a radical opposition between
moral law and conscience, and between nature and freedom.
33.
Side by side with its exaltation of freedom, yet oddly in contrast with
it, modern culture radically questions the very existence of this freedom. A
number of disciplines, grouped under the name of the "behavioural
sciences", have rightly drawn attention to the many kinds of psychological
and social conditioning which influence the exercise of human freedom.
Knowledge of these conditionings and the study they have received represent
important achievements which have found application in various areas, for
example in pedagogy or the administration of justice. But some people, going
beyond the conclusions which can be legitimately drawn from these observations,
have come to question or even deny the very reality of human freedom.
Mention should also be made
here of theories which misuse scientific research about the human person.
Arguing from the great variety of customs, behaviour patterns and institutions
present in humanity, these theories end up, if not with an outright denial of
universal human values, at least with a relativistic conception of morality.
34.
"Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?". The question
of morality, to which Christ provides the answer, cannot prescind from the issue of freedom. Indeed, it considers
that issue central, for there can be no morality without freedom: "It
is only in freedom that man can turn to what is good".56 But
what sort of freedom? The Council, considering our contemporaries who
"highly regard" freedom and "assiduously pursue" it, but
who "often cultivate it in wrong ways as a licence to do anything they
please, even evil", speaks of "genuine" freedom: "Genuine
freedom is an outstanding manifestation of the divine image in man. For God
willed to leave man "in the power of his own counsel" (cf Sir
15:14), so that he would seek his Creator of his own accord and
would freely arrive at full and blessed perfection by cleaving to
God".57 Although each individual has a right to be respected in
his own journey in search of the truth, there exists a prior moral obligation,
and a grave one at that, to seek the truth and to adhere to it once it is known.58
As Cardinal John Henry Newman, that outstanding defender of the rights of
conscience, forcefully put it: "Conscience has rights because it has
duties".59
Certain tendencies in
contemporary moral theology, under the influence of the currents of
subjectivism and individualism just mentioned, involve novel interpretations of
the relationship of freedom to the moral law, human nature and conscience, and
propose novel criteria for the moral evaluation of acts. Despite their variety,
these tendencies are at one in lessening or even denying the dependence of
freedom on truth.
If we wish to undertake a
critical discernment of these tendencies — a discernment capable of
acknowledging what is legitimate, useful and of value in them, while at the
same time pointing out their ambiguities, dangers and errors — we must examine
them in the light of the fundamental dependence of freedom upon truth, a
dependence which has found its clearest and most authoritative expression in
the words of Christ: "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you
free" (Jn
8:32).
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