Human Conscience

Seminar of Moral, Ethical, Religious and Professional Issues.

Sounds boring, right? I thought so too...until I spent one day in the class.

Every single time I walk into that class, my mind is blown. My professor has an amazing ability to tie together the science and psychology of morality with the teachings of Christ.
(Try to hang with me through the clarification of a couple terms and it will get good.)

Humanistic Conscience

• NOT the internalized voice of authority (ie: teachers, parents, policemen)
• Requires independent thinking
• The voice of our "true selves"
• Calls us to productive living
• Calls us to develop genuine potentials
• Maintains integrity of personality
  

Productivity is the development of the use of one's God-given, human "powers"

• Power of thought
• Power of love
• Power of imagination

We were told a very interesting quote that inspires me more and more every single time I read it:
"The more productively one lives, the stronger is one's conscience, and the more it furthers one's productiveness."

I believe this concept applies so accurately in the exact opposite way. It is when I/we become lackadaisical that I want to do less in life, and even my walk with God. I start to lose the sense of who I am. (More on that concept in a moment.) Its when I/we fall into a routine of comfort that I stop looking for more in life.

Scribes and Pharisees spent a lot of time studying the Bible...but they didn't seem to get the big picture. In this context, we would say they were not being productive. They desired to follow the exact letter of the Law, rather than put the things in the scrolls into their own thoughts, in the context of love, using their own imagination. Was it because in that sense, they were being conventional? Were they just believing the things that had been believed before them, rather than figuring things out for themselves? Or...in a theological sense, were they not open to the leading of the Spirit?

Erich Fromm (German psychologist in the 20th century) states that the humanistic conscience is necessary for this level of thinking. Fromm also states that it is difficult to hear to humanistic conscience. We must be able to listen to ourselves. He states, we are often able to listen to every voice around us except for our own.

This concept blew me away because Fromm wrote this in the early 1900's. He wrote this before iPhones, DVR, blogs, iPods, podcasts, satellite churches, Kindle...before all of this "noise" was even a forethought. Fromm said that there was often so much noise going on in one's own life that he/she didn't take time to hear his/her conscience. How true is this now, in today's context?

Fromm states that not listening to one's humanistic conscience leads to an unconscious guilt, which often surfaces in the form of anxiety of even physical illness. How many times have I been so busy going going going that I didn't take a second to slow down and listen to the Holy Spirit right inside of me...and ended up quite anxious and sick? (Definitely something to think about)

"If man cannot approve of himself, because he fails in the task of living productively, he has to substitute approval by others for approval by himself." This is a moral issue

How often to I/we turn immediately to a friend or loved one for an opinion on a decision/promotion/break-up/achievement, before we turn to the only One that matters? "You must never worship or bow down to them, for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God who will not share your affection with any other god!.." Exodus 20:5

We serve a jealous God.

Princeton.edu defines "god" (little 'g') as "any being worshipped as controlling some part of the world or some aspect of life or who is a personification of a force."

That "controlling some aspect of life" sounds a little bit like the authority I give to some of my best friends, sisters, and often my mom. It is hard to recall a time I didn't have a huge decision/opportunity and I didn't pick up my phone and call one of those closest to my heart...before taking time to quietly seek my humanistic conscience. (If you haven't picked up on it yet, what scientists call "humanistic conscience," we (Christians) often refer to as the Holy Spirit.)

We can have a word that remains in authoritarian sense. "I receive this word, but it never really becomes half mine. But I still have it." It is a dead word. As opposed to the alternative in which I have seen this word and added my own thought, making it my own. It is dynamic, living, and productive. It produces other ideas and thoughts. Where as the other, it does not...it is just held in its dead state.

This was written by a psychologist, not in a theological/spiritual sense...but in a sense of how one makes information his in an authoritarian conscience sense or a humanistic conscience.

Does this sound anything like the discussion between Christ and the Pharisees about "The letter of the law vs. the Spirit of the law"?

What are the consequences on this (humanistic conscience) not developing?

I know we hear all the time 'make your faith your own.' This is not to say we walk away from everything we learn and start to explore and wander into the wilderness of faith. We are supposed to take all of the things we learned from authority (pastor, parent, teacher, mentor, friend) and shape/mold/form it into our own, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Do we believe these things because they sound good, or because they bring materials and form to allow us, through our own thinking and exploring, make our own relationship with God our own? Our faith is supposed to look a little different than our parents or pastors. If you are a different person than them, the relationship you have with God will look different. It may not be a shocking or dramatic difference, but a difference all the same.

But when the internalization process is incomplete, judgement too continues to rely on authoritative rule and directive, and drives its way through adult authority. It reflects the child's identification but it isn't an independent judgement.

The line of thinking could be summed up in this: "I can believe everything the authority says. I can identify with it, yes, but it is not an independent judgement."

Kohlberg states, rarely before age 20 is an individual cognitively able to sort through his/her thoughts on this level. Shapiro makes the point to reiterate that just because, at this age, it becomes a possibility...does not mean it will happen. In most cases, it does not.

When there is a schism, or split, between humanistic conscience and the authoritarian conscience (what is learned/indoctrinated by authority) that one is not aware of, one becomes an adult who is out of touch with "me." He/she can identify with group or authority, but does not hear his/her own voice.

I pose a question: If I'm out of touch with me, and can't connect with myself, does that have any implications in how I connect with you?

Suppose you and I get married, if I'm not in tune with who I am, how can I connect with you? That poses all kinds of problems.

Though Shapiro did not pose such the question, we were asked to consider: If I cannot connect with me, cannot connect with you...how can I possibly connect with an omnipotent God?

Is it possible for people to connect/identify with religion, but not with God? I think we would all say we have seen this, and often done this ourselves.

Again, the Pharisees did this. They were very in touch with their religion, but when God took on flesh and tried to have a conversation with them, they said, "Who are you?"

Though, in class, we discussed a number of prerequisites that are helpful (some deemed "necessary") for one to develop this sense of being in tune with one's own humanistic conscience...that is not what I write about. As I said, it is around age 20 that one is cognitively able to begin to address these concepts. Now is the time for us to make our faith our own. It is time to step away from the chaos of our lives, not for a retreat weekend, but on a daily basis.

Warning: The eventual side effects of this "disconnect" between a person and his/her own "self" is not something to fluff off. Shapiro says, "An estrangement develops between how a person thinks he feels, and how he actually feels and behaves." Doesn't this sound something like what happens when I/we say that we believe one thing because of our faith, yet we so easily do another? THIS is the disconnect he is talking about. We aren't helpless.

Shapiro also says: Neurotic (a person prone to excessive anxiety and emotional upset) people often think they want or are interested in what they actually only think they should want or be interested in. They believe they intend to do something they actually never intend to do.

Is it possible to only love someone because we feel it is what the Bible says we should do? I have been with this person for a long time. I have said I love them, and told their family I want to be with them for a long time, and even mentioned that marriage is something I want...but I know I don't want it, and I get married anyway.

I will repeat what Fromm already said: This is a moral issue.

I end with this thought. It is something to think about, while we are at the age in which so many people our age are falling in love and getting married.

"I feel like you won't love me if you really see me, so I act like someone I know you will love. While I am pretending to be this person, I am forming a disconnect between me and myself, but seperating my ability to connect to you."

We were made to live in community. We were made to have open honest relationships. With God. With ourselves. With others. It is only in those relationships that we can truly see who we are, and thus begin to connect on deeper levels in all three realms.