When Conscience and Politics Meet: A Catholic View Book

Sheed's analogy of Catholic life and doctrine as a kind of map in which our particular experiences and perceptions are redrawn in their proper relation and proportion to one another serves as one of the most helpful catechetical images I've yet discovered. Think about how one uses a map: implicit trust, frequent checking and rechecking of one's position, periodic contradictions between where I think I am and where the map says I should be--all such experiences translate fairly easily into our spiritual and moral experiences. So too, the willingness to accept the authoritative quality of a map is just the point that most of us need to hear when struggling with religious authority. None of us is in a position to judge the suitability of a map of life by our own experience; for only at the end of life will we be able to make that well-considered judgment, but it is precisely a map worthy of use in my own particular life that I am looking for. Hence, I must rely on the trustworthiness of the map-maker--once again, an analogy that is helpful in our day, full of self-guided tours or of constant revision of the map by the ones using it.
On this point, Sheed's straightforward explanations about conscience (the practical moral judgment of the intellect) are helpful and necessary clarifications on a vague and widely misunderstood point. The book is worth reading for this chapter alone.
Sheed's style can be somewhat thick at times, and he doesn't spend much time justifying the Church's teachings--he is more interested in showing how they interrelate. For this reason, I wouldn't recommend it across the board to all readers; someone looking to grow in their knowledge of why the Church teaches as She does might find other more helpful resources elsewhere. But for a reader hoping to broaden his view of the whole and delight in the comprehensive beauty of the truth of Catholicism, I could hardly recommend a better book.