Conscience and Morality

What's Your Next Step? Examine Your Conscience.

The 10 commandments form the basis for the Church's moral teachings. They serve as a rough outline to living in such a way that we won't look back on our lives with disappointment and despair.

• Take a minute to look a this examination of conscience. Do these principles make sense to you?

But Christian morality is more than simply following rules laid down for us by a divine parent; it's a matter of being awake and attentive to the actions and attitudes in our lives. Some actions and attitudes are ways of participating in the life of God, and other actions and attitudes are ways of stepping away from the life of God. For Catholics, a fully formed conscience is a heart that is attentive, awake, to the currents of life and death that run through our lives. Conscience is the ability to be vigilant about your choices, and to be able to choose a course of action firmly and wisely. . 

• Take another minute and reflect on the normal state of yourconscience.  Is it generally awake all the time, or does it slumber until a life crisis jolts it to consciousness? Are you perpetually worried about what you're doing wrong? Are you somewhere in the middle?

The quality of our conscience depends on  memory and  attention. When we remember times of spiritual growth and spiritual decay, we are able to see, to pay attention to, the patterns of God's life unfolding in us. One ancient practice of using memory and attention to develop the conscience is called the  examen a version of an examination of conscience. To practice the  examen, we simply set aside regular times (daily, weekly, monthly) to reflect on times in which we have experienced the fruits of our good choices and times in which we have suffered the consequences of poor choices. 10 minutes of reflection at the end of each day can yield tremendous insights into our opportunities to participate more deeply in God's life within us.

• Take a final minute and look at this version of the examen. Could this or something like it be useful in your spiritual journey? How will you set aside regular time to reflect on how your actions demonstrate the influence of God's infinite love and mercy?