November Coffee Night - Conscience And Faith

Perseverance in Faith

According to the Catechism:

"Faith is an entirely free gift that God makes to man. We can lose this priceless gift, as St. Paul indicated to St. Timothy: "Wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting conscience, certain persons have made shipwreck of their faith.“

• What does this tell you about the importance of acting in good conscience? What does it tell you about the role our conscience plays in our salvation?

Questions to Ponder

• What is conscience?
• Where does it come from?
• How is one’s conscience formed?
• Is it possible for one’s conscience to be misinformed?
• Is it possible for one’s conscience to err?
• What are some of the (positive and negative) things that influence our conscience?
• If you don’t yield to your conscience is it possible to develop a hardened or lax conscience? (i.e. use it or lose it!)

Primacy of Conscience

• Some Catholics claim to base their dissent from catholic teachings on the idea of primacy of conscience. They claim that one should follow one’s conscience above teachings of the Church and that as long as you have prayed and considered Church teaching carefully, you can dissent based on conscience. Do you think this approach to dissent is faithful?

Points to Consider

• The spiritual authority of the church (called the Magisterium) is the ability and authority of the Church to teach the truths found within Divine Revelation.
• Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture are also called the Deposit of Divine Revelation.
• Divine revelation comes from God
• In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… The word became flesh. John 1:1,14

Subjective Conscience

A Catholic doctor prescribes birth control pills according to his conscience and against catholic teaching because he prefers that alternative over abortion.

• Is he right in choosing between the lesser of the two evils?
• And if he’s wrong, what are the consequences to him, his patient, and to the church as a whole?

Conscience and Politics

According to a voting guide published by a prominent Catholic Apologetics website, there are five non negotiable voting issues: abortion, euthanasia, homosexual marriage, stem cell research and human cloning.

As the Holy See has pointed out:

“Democracy must be based on the true and solid foundation of non-negotiable ethical principles, which are the underpinning of life in society”

It is suggested that a Catholic acting in good conscience will not knowingly vote in favor of politicians who promote laws that allow these practices.

• What is a good Catholic to do when all the candidates are in favor of one or more of the non-negotiable issue?

• Is not voting an option that one can take in good conscience?

• Should war also be a non-negotiable?

Struggling with your Conscience

• Assume you're being assaulted by a violent and deadly rapist/murderer. Would you kill him to save yourself from being killed? And, if you didn’t fight to the death, could you face God knowing that you didn’t do all you could to preserve the gift of life he gave you?

Clearing Your Conscience

• If one has faith that one’s sins will be forgiven, why do so many people resist confession?
• Do you go to confession to grow and enrich your faith or as a way to clear your conscience?
• Does one have a moral responsibility to do a thorough examination of conscience before each and every confession (i.e. go through the 10 commandments and/or the 7 deadly sins) or is confessing the major “top of mind” sins sufficient for a valid confession, if not, is one committing a sin by being too lazy to do a proper examination of conscience?

Sharing our Faith

• Why do you think people feel uncomfortable sharing the depths of their faith publicly, one on one, or in a group setting when giving testimony, defending our faith, or evangelizing? And does it go against our conscience to not do so when it’s called for?

Conscience & Ethics

• Is the notion of a conscience only limited to faith or can it be included in the scientific worldview?
  
• What is the difference between making an ethical decision as a scientist would call it and using your conscience, as a person of faith would call it… in other words, are the terms ethics and morals interchangeable?

Conscience at the Movies

• Is it morally wrong to watch movies with much violence, profanity, sexually explicit scenes and morally objectionable content? Should one refrain from watching those movies in order to keep a clear conscience? And, one could argue that it may not be advisable and that there are better things to do with one’s time, etc. But is doing something that is not recommended the same thing as acting immorally

October Coffee Night - Human Relations

1. The 8th commandment is “Thou shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” and not “thou shall always tell the truth” (or something that suggest we should always tell the truth). Why is that?

2. Honesty without gentleness is nothing but brutality, gentleness without honesty is nothing but sentimentality... do you agree or disagree and how do you find the proper balance? When do you choose to tell your friend the truth at the expense of hurting their feelings? Is lying in order to spare their feelings acceptable? How does one speak the truth in love?

3. Do you agree that the line between love and hate is very thin? If so, why do you think it is?

4. Some people are good at forming relations with others. What do you think affects people’s ability to form relations? Some are loners, or argumentative, or always have conflict while others are extroverted, the life of the party…Is it genetics, environmental, biological (height, weight, physique), other?

5. What does it mean to take personal responsibility and how do you deal with people who refuse to take responsibility for themselves? How much of a master of your destiny are you by through choices you make? How much does it depend on you and how much does it depend on God/fate/luck?

6. In Mathew 5:44 Jesus commands us to love our enemies? In today’s world… who would be considered your enemy and how does one go about loving them?

7. Power and history come into play affecting how comfortable or unsettling it feels to speak up. Being adult children of our parents, how does one honor our father and mother as we speak up and stand up for our decisions when our parents disagree with us as to what we think is in our best interests?

8. We confuse good relations with approval. One way of expressing strong disapproval of another’s conduct is to terminate the relationship: “After what she did, I will never speak to her again!!” Such “banishment” is common to personal, business, and diplomatic relations. Refusing to deal with someone will rarely solve an immediate problem… what do you think? Is approval essential in a good working relationship or friendship?

9. What is the difference between persuasion & coercion, control & power?

10. Good morning!! Is there a spoken or unspoken rule in your home or workplace about saying good morning? What is it, do you like it, what do you think it should be? How do you deal with a co-worker that does not wish you good morning or makes an effort to reciprocate conversation when it is made/ offered?

September Coffee Night

We are sorry to announce that the September coffee night is cancelled due to unavoidable circumstances. We will have a coffee night in October, so please stay tuned.

June Coffee Night - Da Vinci Code

• Question I

•Some readers argue that The Da Vinci Code goes beyond the traditional definition of historical fiction and that the author has fused fact and fiction in a way that may mislead some readers. Some claim that it is un-ethical to blur the line between fact and fiction, while others point out that it is fiction and it's up to the readers to believe what they want. Do you think there is anything unethical in either Dan Brown's methods or his book? Or do you agree that if it's fiction, anything goes?

• Question II

•The phenomenal success of The Da Vinci Code, along with the rising popularity of the "Gospel of Judas" and the "Jesus Papers", suggests a need in our society for an alternative to the standard teachings of the church. What are possible reasons for this need for a different version of Christianity? How do we, as Christians, deal with those who choose to support or advocate these alternative theories?

• Question III

•The claim that Jesus was married to Mary wasn’t proven, nor, has been proven otherwise. The DaVinci code sites the gospel of Phillip, where it claims Jesus kissed Mary Magdalene often on the _____ [lips?]. Also the existing Jewish culture during the time of Jesus, expected a young man to be married before a certain age. This fact along with the claims made in the gospel of Phillip, is used by Dan Brown to state his theory is plausible.

Why do you think it’s important for us Christians to have an unmarried Jesus?

• Question IV

•Professor Teabing, one of the characters of The Da Vinci Code, argues that Jesus was not a divine being and claims that Jesus' divinity was an invention of the church. In essence, a distinction is made separating the Historical Jesus, the man who died on the cross, from the Theological Jesus, the God Jesus invented by the church. This dual Jesus is the primary undertone of the Jesus Papers as well. Do you think it is possible that the Theological Jesus is an invention of the church? Why do you think the church is so adamant that its version of Christianity is the right one and that any new findings contradicting the traditional story are regarded as heresy? (Gnostic gospels, Jesus Papers,etc.)

• Question V

•In light of the Da Vinci Code movie that was recently released, how do you think the church and individual believers should engage this story? E.g.

–Should they see the movie?

–Should they buy the book?

–Should we encourage/discourage others from reading the book and/or watching the movie?

–Different Cardinals at the Vatican have differing opinions on how to engage this story, one calls for a boycott, another says, see it if you want as long as you know it’s fiction, and Pope appointed another to rebut the false claims of the book? Which do you agree with and why?

–Local dioceses are sponsoring seminars, lectures, handing out booklets, the US Bishops set up www.jesusdecoded.com, is this going overboard or is it a necessary action which they need to take in order to defend the church and our faith?

• Question VI

•The gospel of Judas claims Jesus wasn't betrayed, but rather Judas was asked to show the soldiers the way to where Jesus was. There are various bible passages to support the claim that Judas wasn't the bad guy the Gospels made him out to be. If Jesus orchestrated his own death, do you think that he could be viewed as a fraud that wasn't sent by God to die for our sins?