The Catholic Practice of “Examining Conscience”: Theoretical and Religious-Cultural Aspects

Abstract

The confessing one’s grave sins in form of a private or auricular confession, introduced as an obligation by the Catholic Church in the thirteenth century and involved as one of the main requirements a detailed recitation of all the circumstances of sinful acts, resulted in the course of time in wide-spreading of “examen conscientiae” procedure. “Examining of con­science” as a preparation procedure for the sacrament of penance becomes its completed form at the turn of the Early Modern Times, but its roots go back to monastic spiritual exer­cises, aimed at self-knowledge, self-evaluation, and moral improvement. Unlike the monas­tic practices, a preparation for the penance was focused primarily on cognition and limita­tion of one’s sinfulness manifestations in all areas of the life. The early Christians borrowed “examen conscientiae” as a regular self-evaluation from the Greek-Roman philosophical tra­dition. The given article analyses the roots of this practice and its reinterpretation by Origen (c.184–c.253); typical texts of “examining of conscience” and their modification under the influence of the theoretical understanding of the sacrament of penance in the works of the so-called “high” speculative theology; particularities of the Early Modern “examen con­scientiae” (a growing number of areas of life becomes gradually the object of moral evalua­tion, and typical texts of “examining of conscience” are supplemented by questions, related to professional activities, fulfillment of duties to God, neighbor, and oneself); influence of the rhetoric and mnemonic methods of memory training, as well as of the “Spiritual Exer­cises” of Ignatius of Loyola on the preparation procedure for the sacrament of penance.