Extracts from the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church

From Peacebuilding

Share this page with colleagues

The right to conscientious objection

399. Citizens are not obligated in conscience to follow the prescriptions of civil authorities if their precepts are contrary to the demands of the moral order, to the fundamental rights of persons or to the teachings of the Gospel.

Unjust laws pose dramatic problems of conscience for morally upright people: when they are called to cooperate in morally evil acts they must refuse. Besides being a moral duty, such a refusal is also a basic human right which, precisely as such, civil law itself is obliged to recognise and protect. “Those who have recourse to conscientious objection must be protected not only from legal penalties but also from any negative effects on the legal, disciplinary, financial and professional plane” [Pope John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium Vitae].

It is a grave duty of conscience not to cooperate, not even formally, in practices which, although permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to the Law of God. Such cooperation in fact can never be justified, not by invoking respect for the freedom of others nor by appealing to the fact that it is foreseen and required by civil law. No one can escape the moral responsibility for actions taken and all will be judged by God himself based on this responsibility (cf. Romans 2:6; 14:12).

The right to resist

400. Recognising that natural law is the basis for and places limits on positive law means admitting that it is legitimate to resist authority should it violate in a serious or repeated manner the essential principles of natural law. Saint Thomas Aquinas writes that “one is obliged to obey… insofar as it is required by the order of justice” [Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae]. Natural law is therefore the basis of the right to resistance.

There can be many different concrete ways this right may be exercised; there are also many different ends that may be pursued. Resistance to authority is meant to attest to the validity of a different way of looking at things, whether the intent is to achieve partial change, for example, modifying certain laws, or to fight for a radical change in the situation.

401. The Church’s social doctrine indicates the criteria for exercising the right to resistance: “Armed resistance to oppression by political authority is not legitimate, unless all the following conditions are met:

1) there is certain, grave and prolonged violation of fundamental rights;

2) all other means of redress have been exhausted;

3) such resistance will not provoke worse disorders;

4) there is well-founded hope of success; and

5) it is impossible reasonably to foresee any better solution” [Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2243].

Recourse to arms is seen as an extreme remedy for putting an end to a “manifest, long-standing tyranny which could do great damage to fundamental personal rights and dangerous harm to the common good of the country” [Pope Paul VI, Encyclical Letter Populorum Progressio].

The gravity of the danger that recourse to violence entails today makes it preferable in any case that passive resistance be practiced which is “a way more conformable to moral principles and having no less prospects for success” [Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction Libertatis Conscientia].