THE
P RTAL
July 2018
Page 21
Conscience before
conformity
“rejoice in this: the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and by the grace of God,
we will have our conversation in the world” (2 Cor 1.12).
Fr Simon Ellis reviews an important book
W ith the
referendum result in Ireland still ringing in our ears, I think conscience, if I may, should
be one focus. Can a nation lose its conscience? Who can help us to regain it? This work by Fr Paul
Shrimpton focuses on a 21 year old biology student who studied at Munich University 75 years ago: Sophie
Scholl. How come this beautiful woman was executed by the Nazis 75 years ago? How come Sophie and her
brother, Hans, would become so famous in Germany that novels, operas and plays would be written about
them? That statues would be erected to them and the University Square in Munich would be named after
them? Because of conscience. Because of conscience before conformity, the title of this excellent distillation
of theology and history that we should all read this year.
Sophie and a number of her student
German (by Theodor Haecker)
colleagues formed the ‘White Rose’
a century later, and provide the
resistance movement. They were
inspiration for German students to
- against all odds - attempting to
do battle against Hitler? Winston
speak truth to power, to publish
Churchill said: “the political
pamphlets calling back the nation
history of all nations has hardly
to its compassionate, Christian
ever produced anything greater
roots. Sophie and her companions
and nobler than the opposition
- Lutheran, Catholic, Orthodox
which existed in Germany. These
- needed to be sustained in their
people fought without any help…
campaign and one of the great writers
driven only by the uneasiness of
they turned to was [our very own]
their consciences”. Compare
Bl. John Henry Newman, whose
this with Hermann Goring, who
sermon, ‘Testimony of Conscience’
said, “I have no conscience, my
(a meditation on 2 Corinthians
conscience is Adolph Hitler”.
1.12) and so much more, provided
the starting point of discussions
We don’t face the same challenges
and gave them encouragement to
as did those students in Munich.
share their views on the importance
But fake news, the culture of
of conscience, of the capacity to distinguish between death, populist leaders, twitter trolls, state-sponsored
good and evil.
terrorism, environmental degradation threaten our
very civilisation. As we face all sorts of challenges,
Sophie sent Newman’s work to her boyfriend, Fritz in St Paul’s words, we will need to “rejoice in this: the
Hartnagel, fighting on the Eastern front. He replied testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and by
that Newman’s words - set amidst the carnage of the grace of God, we will have our conversation in the
the battlefields - were “like drops of precious wine”. world” (2 Cor 1.12).
Drops that would lead a number of these students to
“Conscience before Conformity:
convert to Catholicism. Sophie and Hans asked to be
Hans
and
Sophie
Scholl and the White Rose
received into the Catholic Church an hour before their
Resistance in Nazi Germany” Paul Shrimpton
execution. They were dissuaded by their Lutheran
Gracewing, 2018, ISBN: 978 085244 843 4
pastor on the grounds that it would upset their
evangelical mother.
Paul Shrimpton is a specialist in
When you consider when Newman was around
and first writing about conscience, who would have
thought that his words would be translated into
the history of education and teaches at
Magdalen School, Oxford and is the author
of a number of books about Newman