More from Terry Mattingly’s column about the new Protestant-like role of “conscience” in liberal Catholicism: He quotes Blase Cupich, the Archbishop of Chicago, on how he counsels the divorced and remarried, gays, and others in what the Church officially considers to be a sinful lifestyle.
From Terry Mattingly: ‘Conscience’ becomes a key fighting word in Vatican synod – Go Knoxville Story.
“I try to help people along the way. And people come to a decision in good conscience,” said Cupich. “Then our job with the church is to help them move forward and respect that. The conscience is inviolable.” . . .
“And my role as a pastor is to help them to discern what the will of God is by looking at the objective moral teaching of the church and yet, at the same time, helping them through a period of discernment to understand what God is calling them to at that point.”
[Keep reading. . .]
“The conscience is inviolable”? So much for the teaching authority of the Church. Or Scripture.
“Understand what God is calling them to at that point”? That sounds like a distortion of the doctrine of vocation. This is the “enthusiast” belief that God calls individuals and instructs them by an inner voice or an inward feeling. (As opposed to the “external” calling that comes from God’s Word, and vocation as a summons for love and service to the neighbor in the God-ordained institutions of the family, the economy, the church, and the state.
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