There was a particular aspect of Christian life Archbishop Joseph Mercieca used to think about a lot, also after his retirement as leader of the Church in Malta.
This aspect was the often difficult task of choosing between right and wrong.
Mgr Mercieca knew that many people of our era, especially the younger generations, have such a high sense of the dignity of the human person that they feel prompted to act more and more on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion, but motivated by a sense of duty.
He believed that this demand for freedom in human society involves chiefly the quest for the values proper to the human spirit, in the first place the free exercise of religion in society.
His concern was that this kind of freedom was occasionally greatly abused, as when people feel they can do everything that is pleasing to them notwithstanding that it is morally wrong.
“It is dangerous to state that, ‘I have the right to do what my conscience tells me to do’, simply because my conscience tells me to do it, or to act in this way. It is dangerous because this way, in the end it is my conscience, and not the objective truth, which determines what is right or wrong, true or false,” he argued in one of his penned post-retirement reflections.
Mgr Mercieca considered that in the presence of such beliefs, it would be very useful that such views be reconsidered in the light and the context of what Christians hold that Almighty God declared openly to all mankind.
“When Almighty God placed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and forbade them from eating fruit from a specific tree upon punishment of death, God made it clear that no person on earth has the power to decide what is wrong and what is right. Indeed, no person on earth can ever usurp this power which belongs solely exclusively to Almighty God.
“By straying far from God’s will our first parents fell into sin, that is, the wrong use of freedom. Yet the heavenly Father did not forsake us; he sent his Son Jesus to heal our wounded freedom and to restore the disfigured image, making it even more beautiful. Victorious over sin and death, Jesus affirmed his lordship over the world and history. He is alive and invites us not to submit our personal freedom to any earthly power, but only to him and to his almighty Father.
“One’s conscience must remain in obedience to the law of God, which is not always the easy way.
“One recognises the weight of the sacrifices and the burdens which it can impose. Heroism is sometimes called for in order to remain faithful to the requirements of the divine law,” argued Mgr Mercieca in a 2009 reflection on the subject.