Freedom of Conscience is a term that dissenters
Posted: Sat Jul 05, 2025 8:56 am
twist from its true meaning as described in Vatican II. They would have you believe that freedom of conscience means that a person can choose to do anything they want. Essentially, freedom of conscience is a means to practice pluralism. Although some dissenters also add the qualifier of "without harm to the other person," that is clearly false. For example, abortionists and women who choose abortion purportedly claim their right as enabled by freedom of conscience but it is obvious that an innocent unborn baby is killed. This is a real example of [16] whereby those in power - the adults - force their erroneous belief on a person incapable of defending himself at the buy phone number list cost of his very life - the baby. Dissenters always quote the Vatican II Dignitatis Humanae opening statement:
"A sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man, and the demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a sense of duty."
Does this mean that anything goes, as long as one acts on his or her own judgment? That is what dissenters want, who further claim that the "restrictive old-fashioned" teachings of the Church are coercive and oppressing their right to choose. Of course, Vatican II teaches otherwise. Dissenters fail to - or most likely refuse to - heed the remainder of #1 of Dignitatis Humanae:
"A sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man, and the demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a sense of duty."
Does this mean that anything goes, as long as one acts on his or her own judgment? That is what dissenters want, who further claim that the "restrictive old-fashioned" teachings of the Church are coercive and oppressing their right to choose. Of course, Vatican II teaches otherwise. Dissenters fail to - or most likely refuse to - heed the remainder of #1 of Dignitatis Humanae: