Acting for others: the moral life

The moral life

The moral life is highly significant for the Christian. It is the place where one meets God. It is a form of discipleship. The challenge of leading a moral life is not only with knowing what to do, but in being able to do it; in being faithful to the moral call; and in enduring the call in the face of difficulties.

Free will

Every individual is created with free will. The Vatican II document, Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World: Gaudium et Spes (1965), states that only in freedom - not from blind internal impulse, nor from mere external pressure - can we direct ourselves towards goodness. But since our freedom has been damaged by sin, only with the help of God’s grace can we bring our relationship with God and thereby with the whole of creation to full flower (n. 17). Freedom enters into the very definition of what it means to be human. To be free is to be present to oneself, to be in possession of oneself, to be conscious of oneself as a distinct, responsible being. Freedom does not so much allow us to do something as to be someone. Such freedom is not absolute, however. Human freedom is limited from without and from within.

From without, our self-understanding and therefore our freedom, is shaped by our place in history and mediated through our experience - e.g. what our parents tell us we are, what our friends and relatives and neighbours tell us, what society tells us, how our institutions, including the church, define us, what our economic and social status permits us to be.

From within, our freedom is qualified by the fact that we can never be fully present to ourselves. There is a psychic universe, described in different ways by various psychologists, which remains hidden from our consciousness and yet influences profoundly our awareness, our vision and our sense of personal responsibility.

Conscience

Human conscience also impacts on individuals’ moral lives. Conscience is not a feeling, whether good or bad. One can feel guilty about a whole range of things which have nothing to do with conscience. Similarly, the fact that one does not feel guilty about an issue does not make it right. Feelings are not indicative of moral rectitude or deficiency.

Conscience is the radical experience of ourselves as moral agents. Only when one decides to do, or not to do, something, is one acting out of conscience. Conscience is the radical experience of being other Christs- disciples- acting in his name to further the kingdom of God.