Conscience: God’s Voice in Our Hearts Grade 4: Sessions 4-8

Session 4: What Is a Conscience? What Is It Not?

What Is a Conscience? Our conscience works as a voice in our hearts, guiding us out of love for God to know and choose what is good and avoid what is evil. “I will place my law within them, and write it upon their hearts; I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:33b). Throughout our lives, God continually calls us and graces us to know the good and to love unselfishly. We have a role to play too — we must strive to be open to God’s Word and to hear what He tells us in our hearts about what is right and wrong.

My Conscience We are free to make good or bad choices, but God continually calls us and graces us to know the good and to love unselfishly. Some of the things we can do to help us hear God’s voice in our hearts are: Paying attention during Mass Reading the Bible Listening to our parents, teachers, and catechists Finding quiet time to pray

Session 5: Steps to Making Good Moral Choices

Moral Decisions Throughout our lives we need to make moral decisions, and all of us need God’s grace to make these choices well. He will help us choose the good and avoid evil if we let Him. “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, on your own intelligence do not rely; In all your ways be mindful of him, and he will make straight your paths” (Proverbs 3:5-6). God gave us a conscience as a tool for us to trust in Him. The Church gives us steps to reflect on to help us listen to our conscience before we make a moral choice.

Steps for Making a Good Moral Choice The Church gives us steps to guide us in making a good moral choice: Pray for the help of the Holy Spirit. Recall God’s law and Church teachings. Consider the consequences of the choice. Seek advice when necessary. Remember that Jesus is with you and speak with Him about the choice. Recall that our decision will affect your relationship with God and others.

Session 6: God Calls Us to Love Unselfishly

Jesus Is the True Vine Read John 15:1-17. Jesus said that we must remain in Him in order to bear fruit, because without Him we are nothing. God continually calls us and graces us to know the good and to love unselfishly. When we love unselfishly, we live as the Lord lives.

Session 7: Learning to Know and Choose Good

Habits A habit is a repeated behavior that becomes part of our nature — we often repeat our habits without thinking about them. To break bad habits, we must replace them with good ones. Bad habits include: biting your fingernails, smoking, cursing, laziness, overeating, always sitting down to watch TV or play video games right after school. Good habits include: waking up early, only eating until you are full, getting your homework done, saying please and thank you, brushing your teeth, remembering to think of others before you think of yourself.

Habits Everyone has bad habits that make it easier to sin, as well as good habits that make it easier for them be open to God’s grace. Everyone, including the saints, needs to develop good habits and work hard every day so that doing good becomes more natural to them. Just like a snowball that grows bigger and bigger the more it rolls down a hill, the more we practice virtue the more virtuous we become! We are all born with a fallen nature, so that we are more inclined to sin.

Habits By replacing bad habits with good ones we learn the self-discipline to master our passions (emotions) and work to lead virtuous lives. Of course this is not a replacement for God’s grace and the life of the Sacraments. But building good habits detaches us from sin, or makes sin look less attractive, and make us more receptive to responding to God’s grace in our lives. When we are good, we become more attracted to what is good, and God is the source of all good!

Session 8: Feelings and the Well-Formed Conscience

Our Conscience Jesus, who led a sinless life, experienced intense feelings. God made us all with feelings, and feelings themselves are never sinful. But because of Original Sin, our feelings don’t work the way God intended. We need Jesus’ help to keep feelings in their proper place. If we have a well-formed conscience, our feelings will help us confirm that we have made good moral choices.

Feelings “The passions” is another word for our feelings. God made us with feelings, and it is good that we have them. But because of Original Sin, our feelings don’t work the way God intended. If we allow them to, our feelings can sometimes overwhelm us and lead us in bad directions. As with everything else, we need the help of our Savior Jesus Christ to help us keep our feelings in their proper place.

Feelings Any specific feeling we have is neither good nor bad. The moral quality of our passions is determined by what we decide to do with our feelings. For example, if someone trips you, it’s not sinful to react with feelings of suspicion or anger. But if you decide to hang on to anger and to hold a grudge, it can become the capital sin of wrath (anger). If you let go of that anger and respond with understanding and forgiveness, that feeling can help you cultivate the Theological Virtue of charity.

Feelings First, we must first use our minds to decide what is right. Second, we use our wills to act on what is right. Feelings come third. This is because our feelings are good companions, but poor guides. If we have a well-formed conscience, our feelings help us confirm that we have chosen well. Doing good will make us happy.

Conscience Occasionally our hearts may want to do what is wrong because evil is often the easier and more attractive choice. In these moments, we have to ask our hearts if what we are hearing is actually what the Church and Jesus’ example teach us. Jesus wants us to follow Him so we can choose good and avoid evil. With the help of grace and a well-formed conscience, we can know that an action is good or bad and our feelings will confirm that understanding.

Conscience Assuming we have a well-formed conscience, bad actions make us feel sad, guilty, ashamed, and so forth, while good actions make us feel happy, content, fulfilled, and so forth. When our conscience is well-formed and we strive to grow closer to Christ, we are more naturally drawn to what is good.