Quotes about Conscience

Scientific information about the universe does not displace God. Some have said that they searched the heavens and did not see God. The universe with its measureless spaces remains a vast mystery to us, and those who do not find God in their immediate presence, in their heart and conscience, in the Word and the Christian community, will not find him in the universe either, even though they are equipped with the best telescopes that money can buy.

Christian ethics maintains that the whole man must be good in intellect and will, heart and conscience. To do good is a duty and a desire, a task and a privilege, and thus the work of love. Love is therefore the fulfilling of the law.

There is a vast quantity of religion current in the world which is not true, genuine Christianity. It passes muster, it satisfies sleepy consciences; but it is not good money. It is not the authentic reality that called itself Christianity in the beginning.

We refuse to have our conscience bound by any work or law, so that by doing this or that we should be righteous, or leaving this or that undone we should be damned.

Conscience is God present in man.

People of conscience need to break their ties with corporations financing the injustice of climate change.

Business owners should not have to choose between violating their faith and violating the law.

To say Washington was a Deist—even a "soft Deist"—would imply that he did not have a problem violating his conscience each time he worshiped in his church. It is difficult to imagine how Washington, with his expressed concern for his character and his open commitment to honesty and candor, along with his sensitive conscience, could repeatedly and consistently make a public reaffirmation of a faith that he really did not believe.

There is no such thing as an involuntary sin.

Reason is His voice, His interior prophet, in our souls. We call that prophet conscience. (St. Thomas used two terms for it: "synderesis" was the awareness of its reality and truth and authority and rules, and "conscience" was the application of it. We use "conscience" for both.) Conscience is essentially the power of reason to know good and evil.

William Temple, who served as Archbishop of Canterbury during the difficult days of World War II. He wrote, "To worship is to quicken the conscience by the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagination by the beauty of God, to open the heart to the love of God, to devote the will to the purpose of God."

People who disregard the Bible may someday get what they want—a society where the Bible is no longer read or proclaimed, and where they can freely sin without Scripture confronting their conscience. But they may get more than they bargained for—a society without the moral compass of Scripture will self-destruct from moral decay and decadence.