Newman on Conscience (3)

Given what I posted earlier, it might appear as if Newman considers it acceptable to dissent from the Pope’s teaching provided it is not an infallible statement and he has often been recruited as an advocate for such a position. But Newman will have nothing to do with such an attitude and whilst he certainly maintains that conscience must be obeyed under all circumstances, disagreement with the Pope must follow from serious thought, prayer and a serious ‘examination of conscience’ to ensure one is really doing right by one’s conscience.

This is a serious issue because Newman saw that in his day and age (and the same can be said of ours) there was something else acting under the name of conscience, a “counterfeit” which was really only the claims of a Nietszchean will-to-power, the assertions of self-will. Newman rejects any secular liberal conception of conscience which has no reference to God. Strictly speaking, for Newman, conscience and authority could not really come into collision over matters of belief. So the precedence accorded to conscience does not entail a precedence in the matter of collision contra what modern-day dissenters would assert. Newman’s idea of conscience is not synonymous with so-called ‘liberty of conscience’ which has, as Newman says, “has become a license to take up any or no religion…the right of self-will.” Nevertheless Newman’s work on conscience can be seen to have had an effect on the Church’s teaching. If he really is the ‘father’ of Vatican II, then his influence can be seen in such documents as ‘Dignitatis Humanae’ which asserts the right of freedom to worship according to one’s conscience. Newman’s assertion that conscience is the surest way to knowledge of God’s presence (as opposed to a mere assent to certain doctrinal propositions) would appear to be a more credible articulation of how an individual comes to know God, as opposed to any strictly 'rationalist argumentation that may be employed. Most people simply do not come to believe in God in such a manner. Most people, however, can be said to acknowledge a moral law, and certainly if they do not consider this to be a matter of mere subjective preference then surely they must ask from where this Law is derived. Newman wanted faith to be an affair of the whole person, something that would truly change one’s life. Thus he attempted to link doctrine to the moral sense in order to make it something existentially significant to the individual. This must not be presented as Bremond does, as if Newman advocated bracketing one’s faith before investigating a doctrine to see if it was enriching of the moral life. This would be to abandon the “obedience of faith”. (S.A. Graves) Nevertheless, Newman did feel that conscience gave a sort of affirmation of the truth of doctrine in that it bore real “fruits”.

Newman on Conscience (part 2)

Newman's conversion to the Catholic Church necessitated his defence of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility when it came against the attacks of erstwhile critics such as the great statesman and Prime Minister W.E. Gladstone. Newman was keen at all points to stress that the doctrine did not impinge on the rights of conscience and he was as eager to counter the criticisms of Anglicans as he was the 'ultramontanism' of fellow Catholics such as Cardinal Manning.

The promulgation of the doctrine of papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council (1870) and William Gladstone’s attack on it in 1874 gave increased impetus to the need to reconcile conscience with authority. Gladstone’s attacks claimed that the Vatican decrees had completely bound the conscience of every Catholic to the Pope and placed it under his disposal. He brought up the sensitive issue of whether Catholics could really be considered loyal British citizens since they were bound to the decrees of a foreign leader. Newman gave his reply in “A Letter to the Duke of Norfolk” (1875). Newman, who had no problem with the declaration itself but had felt it to be an inopportune moment to declare it, was keen to make clear just what it meant, in order to counter any accusations that it led to a “degrading bondage” as he himself put it in his Apologia. He therefore pointed out that it did not mean that the Pope had general authority over Catholics in all things whatsoever (though some Catholics such as the aforementioned Cardinal Manning seemed to have hoped that this would have been the case) but only spoke infallibly on matters of faith and morals. Science, for example, was outside his jurisdiction to speak infallibly on. Newman then tried to set out ‘the rights of conscience’.

He drew on the Catholic tradition that conscience is always to be obeyed – this was something Thomas Aquinas had himself stated - even if the act was morally wrong in the eyes of the Church. The authority of conscience is not diminished even when it is mistaken due to previous wilful wrongdoing or negligence (for this the person is responsible – but conscience must still be obeyed). In Newman’s conception, conscience determines the rightness or wrongness of actions in the concrete situation in which we find ourselves. That is to say, it bears on something that needs to be done or not done. Papal infallibility, however, deals with general propositions. Thus only if the Pope commands something to be done or not done could conscience come into conflict with authority, but the Pope is not infallible when commanding, and so the problem ‘disappears’. Newman ends his ‘Letter’ with the statement that he “drinks to the Pope, but to conscience first.”

Newman's attempts to allay the sorts of fears which surrounded the promulgation of the doctrine are, I think, important from an ecumenical point of view, in particular as regards the 'High Anglican' tradition which Newman himself came from.

Newman on Conscience (part 1)

I haven't posted anything for a while as I was on holiday. Anyway, here is a post on Newman's attitude towards conscience and its 'freedom'.

The role conscience played in religious life for Newman can hardly be understated. In fact, Henri Bremond goes so far as to say that “for him…the whole religious edifice rests on the conscience.” Newman certainly spoke in very high terms about conscience, calling it “the aboriginal vicar of Christ”. It is an essential constituent of the religious life because it affords the individual an immediate certainty of God’s presence in the world – for Newman, to listen to the voice of conscience is to listen to the Living God Himself.

This ‘immediate presence’ is not to be understood as anything extraordinary or ‘mystical’ in the rigorous sense of the word – it is perfectly ‘ordinary’ and can be experienced by all human beings. It is therefore not surprising that Newman thought that the greatest proof of God’s existence is the ‘moral proof’, that is to say, conscience itself. As he himself states: “[The] Law as apprehended in the minds of individual men, is called conscience.” In looking inwardly one finds one’s conscience – a knowledge of good and evil, and this leads to an understanding of sin; which is to disobey this moral law inscribed in our hearts. The Law is known to be an ultimate law and cannot be reduced to a mere socially constructed law. From disobedience of the Law come feelings of guilt and this leads to the question of from whence this Law comes. The feelings of guilt will also necessarily lead to a search for salvation and this prepares the individual for the acceptance of Christianity. One recalls here Kierkegaard’s statement to the effect that the only way to Christianity is through an agonized conscience. Newman would have agreed.He even goes so far as to say that, were it not for conscience, he would be an atheist, a pantheist or a polytheist for he sees no reflection of the Creator in this “busy little world.”

It is interesting to note the contrast between Newman's view and that of contemporary 'Intelligent design' proponents. Newman states flat out that "I believe in design because I believe in God; not in God because I see design". Perhaps all 'ID' theorists should bear in mind that "The Almighty is something infinitely different from a principle, or a centre of action, or a quality, or a generalisation of phenomena".

More to come tomorrow (hopefully). Once again, comments are always welcome.

I've taken lots of the quotes from a useful article in New Blackfriars, vol. 88, 'Newman on the Argument from Design' by Noel Keith Roberts)