The Concept of Institutional Conscience

Some bioethical commentators argue that protection for the institutional conscience of Catholic health care providers should be discarded because the notion is conceptually flawed and conflicts with the demands of medical professionalism. This paper argues in defense of the concept of Catholic institutional conscience. The arguments leveled against the concept of institutional conscience are based on an unsound definition of conscience, assume the validity of a definition of conscience that is amenable to the concept of institutional conscience, and indeed assume the validity of the concept of institutional conscience in order to argue against the conceptual validity of the consciences of Catholic health care institutions. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 12.3 : 409–420.