CONSCIENCE AS A MORAL GUIDE

"Conscience", the say, "is God's deputy." It is the rudder that guides a person away from evil. The conscience is a moral enabler. At the most basic level, therefore, it is enough to guide someone into doing what is right, and to do it right with the support of the intellect. 

Being religious in the presence of conscience, is an icing on the cake. In other words, being genuinely religious amplifies the dictates of conscience. The danger, however, is when someone's conscience is depraved. 

A depraved conscience can do anything. All bastialities and dastardly acts that human beings commit are results of depraved conscience. A depraved conscience is like an expired and condensed cement which cannot be useful for anything. 

No wonder the Scripture in Proverbs 12:23 says, 'guard your heart with all diligence, for in it are the issues of life' and, I add, death. If we allow our hearts, the house of conscience, to be overcrowded and condensed by mundane one-offs of life, then, we are in for big shockers!

All acts of terrorism and insurgency, banditary, kidnapping, ritual killings, armed robbery, tyranny/despotism, etc, are manifestation of moral depravity. A depraved hearted person lives in a different world, and sees life differently from the way other human beings see them. He could kill and celebrated or perceived the dastardly act as a form of heroism or service to God. It is that bad and abnormal!  

If a man must lose anything in this life, it should never be the guidance of conscience. May we not get to a point where our conscience is depraved or else, that will be the beginning of the end of humanity. God forbid! 

*(Modest Thoughts with Ayuba, Yilgak'ha, 15th December, 2024)*