Challenges in Forming the Conscience (September 22, 2019)

September 22nd of 2019, and the venue for the formation of conscience was jam-packed. This formation made me more curious as to what or how really the conscience works. It made me ask more questions like if I am really hearing the voice of God?

This formation taught us the importance of having a well-formed conscience. In our journey of life, we have heard so many voices, and we might not be able to identify which is the voice of God. Fr. James said it is like playing “Pukpok Palayok”. We are blind folded and hearing too many voices. There are voices that leads us to the wrong way, so that we will not be able to hit our goal which is the clay pot full of candies (palayok) but there are voices that will lead us to our true goal.

A well-formed conscience is able to process all the voices that we hear and identify which is the voice that comes from God. Yes, “process” is the word. We were told that it takes the combined work of our heart and mind to process the voices we hear, because conscience is not only about feelings. It is like seeing a car at a huge discount price, and we feel that we will be very happy if we are able to get the car at a huge discount, but we should also ask questions about that car - we have to do engine checks, check the mileage, durability and other specifications essential on buying a car. The same goes with every decision we will do in our lives - we don’t just rely on the feelings. We also need to think about the pros and cons of our decision. From every voice that we will be hearing, we process it with both our hearts and minds.

Forming our conscience is a life-long process because new issues arise and the world keeps changing. We need to be aware of these changes, the technical aspects also, and the impact of these changes so that we are able to make the right decision, especially today when we don’t know if the news we are reading is fake or not. When we have a well-formed conscience then we will be able to respond righteously.
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It was a fruitful formation indeed, a vital formation in our everyday life that will help us in making the right decisions.

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With thanks to Jason Delgado and the WordNews team