15. The Argument from Conscience

In an age of relativism, many people declare there are no universal moral obligations and that we should simply each follow our own conscience. Yet that statement alone goes a great distance to prove the existence of God. 

Again, if you are new to this series, click here to discover its purpose. 

Peter Kreeft and Ronald Taccelli in the Handbook of Catholic Apologetics write
From something less than me (nature)

Isn't it remarkable that no one, even the most consistent subjectivist, believes that it is ever good for anyone to deliberately and knowingly disobey his own conscience?  Even if different people's consciences tell them to do or avoid totally different things, there remains one moral absolute for everyone: never disobey your own conscience.  

 Now where did conscience get such an absolute authority- an authority admitted even by the moral subjectivist and relativist?  There are only four possibilities.

1. From something less than me (nature)
2. From me (individual)
3. From others equal to me (society)
4. From something above me (God)

Let's consider each of these possibilities in order. 

1. How can I be absolutely obligated by something less than me- for example, by animal instinct or practical need for material survival?
2. How can I obligate myself absolutely?  Am I absolute?  Do I have the right to demand absolute obedience from anyone, even myself?  And if I am the one who locked myself in this prison of obligation, I can also let myself out, thus destroying the absoluteness of the obligation that we admitted as our premise.
3. How can society obligate me?  What right do my equals have to impose their values on me?  Does quantity make quality?  Do a million human beings make a relative into an absolute?  Is "society" God?
4. The only source of absolute moral obligation left is something superior to me.  This binds my will, morally, with rightful demands for complete obedience

Thus, God, or something like God, is the only adequate source and ground for the absolute moral obligation we all feel to obey our conscience  (Handbook of Catholic Apologetics, pg. 80).

Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli are masters at reasoning and thorough explanations of these difficult subjects.  Check out their Handbook of Catholic Apologetics- Reasoned Answers to Questions of Faith for a more complete explanation and clarifications on the implications this argument has (and doesn't have) on religion as well as the possible relations between religion and morality, God and goodness.