key words

What is conscience?

Human reason making moral decisions.

The knowledge of what is right or wrong and the God-given compulsion within all human beings to do what is right and to avoid what is evil.

What is evil?

The absence of good and the impulse to seek our own desires at the expense of the good of others which often results in suffering.

What is free will?

The decision-making part of a person’s mind is called the will.

A will is free if a person can choose right from wrong without being controlled by other forces.

What is goodness?

The quality of being like God: seeking the well-being of others selflessly.

What is incarnation?

‘Made flesh’

The Christian belief that God became man in the person of Jesus, fully human and fully divine.

What is natural law?

The moral laws of right and wrong which are universal and not dependent on human laws.

The belief in natural law is the belief that the moral law is discoverable by every human being and is the same for all human beings in all places at all times.

What is privation?

The loss or absence of a quality or something that is normally present.

For example, evil is a privation of good.

What is suffering?

Pain or loss which harms human beings.

Some suffering is caused by other human beings (often called moral evil); some is not (often called natural evil).