Pope John Paul II: “The passing of unjust laws often raises difficult problems of conscience for morally upright people with regard to the issue of cooperation, since they have a right to demand not to be forced to take part in morally evil actions…. In order to shed light on this difficult question, it is necessary to recall the general principles concerning cooperation in evil actions. Christians, like all people of good will, are called upon under grave obligation of conscience not to cooperate formally in practices which, even if permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to God’s law. Indeed, from the moral standpoint, it is never licit to cooperate formally in evil.”

Formal cooperation occurs when your knowingly chosen act is inherently directed toward assisting the intrinsically evil act of another person in attaining its evil moral object (second font). In other words, formal cooperation occurs when your act participates in the sin itself of the other person. Material cooperation occurs when your act participates in the circumstances (third font) of the sin of the other person.

For example, the knowingly chosen acts that are part of a campaign to pass a pro-abortion law, or a pro-euthanasia law, have a moral object; these acts are inherently directed toward attaining an end. The moral object of such acts is to assist in passing the law, and the act of passing the law is intrinsically evil, because it has the moral object of authorizing the deaths of innocent human persons. Notice that these acts of formal cooperation are not assisting in the act of abortion or euthanasia, but in the act of passing a pro-abortion or pro-euthanasia law. Yet, such acts are formal cooperation, not merely material cooperation. These intentionally chosen acts are, by their very nature, directed toward the end of assisting the intrinsically evil acts of other persons, acts that have the death of innocents as a moral object.

Pope John Paul II: “To refuse to take part in committing an injustice is not only a moral duty; it is also a basic human right. Were this not so, the human person would be forced to perform an action intrinsically incompatible with human dignity, and in this way human freedom itself, the authentic meaning and purpose of which are found in its orientation to the true and the good, would be radically compromised. What is at stake therefore is an essential right which, precisely as such, should be acknowledged and protected by civil law.”

Every intrinsically evil act is “intrinsically incompatible with human dignity”. Therefore, the grave sins of contraception and abortion are also “intrinsically incompatible with human dignity”. Neither sin can be justified by an appeal to freedom, since “the authentic meaning and purpose” of human freedom is “found in its orientation to the true and the good,” which “would be radically compromised” by the deliberate choice of any intrinsically evil act. Therefore, the right to life of the unborn is an essential right of any free and fair society, and must be protected by the law.

Moreover, every citizen, every human person, has a fundamental right to refuse to commit any injustice, any sin. For we each have the moral duty to avoid all sin. But this right to refuse to sin applies especially to intrinsically evil acts, since these acts are immoral regardless of intention or circumstances, and even more so to intrinsically evil and gravely immoral acts, since the values at issue are of grave moral weight.

The above text was excerpted from my book:
Roman Catholic Teaching on Abortion and Contraception

by
Ronald L. Conte Jr.
Roman Catholic theologian and
translator of the Catholic Public Domain Version of the Bible.