In his column ‘Avoiding the short cut to chaos’ (The Sunday Times of Malta, April 6), Fr Joe Borg states that “during the divorce debate, I defended Catholic voters’ and Catholic politicians’ right to legitimately take a position based on a well-informed conscience which would have been different from the position of the hierarchy of the Church”.
Irrespective of the case mentioned, namely divorce, which as such is the explicit teaching of Jesus Christ and not the “hierarchy”, one supposes that this ‘principle’ guiding Catholic politicians’ vote would be applicable in areas such as IVF legislation, same-sex unions’ legislation, and why not, abortion legislation.
If a Catholic politician’s ‘informed’conscience can directly and safely oppose Jesus Christ’s explicit teaching, such as the issue of divorce, a fortiori it can directly and safely oppose the teaching of the Church Magisterium, or as Fr Borg would prefer, “hierarchy”.
Hopefully I have misunderstood the ‘principle’ and its subsequent ‘applications’.