Dr. Janet Smith's topic - The Role of Individual Conscience in Making Decisions About Right and Wrong is something that challenges each of us and our own little voice. Often, we hear people talk about their conscience as though it were a trump card, that their conscience overrules the mandates of scripture and accepted morality. Dr. Smith's talk showed us that conscience is both a student and a teacher. It is our duty to form our conscience by prayer, study, and a lively spiritual life. Dr. Smith used some examples of her own inner monologue to give examples of how small and insidious the small temptations of our lives are. These humorous anecdotes were a terrific means to take wordy moral theology and show how it applies to our daily life.
Drawing heavily from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Dr. Smith touched on the elements of will and consent in the sinfulness of a particular act. Although the Church's teaching may sound legalistic it is rooted in Scripture and and the experience of the Saints and thinkers of the Church's life throughout the ages.
Dr. Smith provided examples of the use of conscience from such wide examples as such seemingly innocuous things as overly enjoying and confiding in someone of the opposite sex and seeking out their companionship over that of spouse to lofty questions of the morality of organ donations of live ovaries.
Always we must keep in mind our human weakness, and our tendancy to rationalize. Our conscience is a tool for interpreting Scripture and the Church's teaching in our daily lives. Like any tool, however, our conscience must be honed and kept sharp by grace and diligence.
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