"904. Would it be a lie to say what is untrue to a person who has no right whatever to the information sought?"

Mental reservations

3. If it is never lawful to tell a lie, if the lie of necessity cannot be allowed, what means have we of safeguarding a secret ?

Catholic theologians answer this question by propounding their doctrine of mental reservation. Mental reservations are either strictly or widely so called. The former is the restriction of one's meaning in making an assertion to the proposition as modified by some addition made to it within the mind of the speaker. As if on being asked "Are you going to town ?" one were to answer "Yes," meaning "in imagination." In wide mental reservations the words used are capable of being understood in different senses, either because they are ambiguous in themselves, or because they have a special sense derived from the circumstances of time, place, of person in which they are spoken. Thus, when a servant says that her master is not in, the words may mean either that he is absent, or that he does not wish to see the visitor. The servant's real meaning is restricted to one of these senses. In the same way a defendant on his trial in an English court of justice pleads not guilty i.e., until the charge be proved. A lawyer or a doctor questioned about professional secrets replies, "Idon't know " i.e., I have no knowledge which I can communicate.

Although strict mental reservations are lies, and therefore sinful, yet wide mental reservations are in common use; they are necessary, and they are not lies. They are necessary because justice and charity require that secrets should be kept, and frequently there is no other way of keeping them. They are not lies because, as we saw above, words take their meaning not only from their grammatical signification, but from the circumstances in which they are used. When a priest is asked about a sin which a penitent has confessed to him, and he answers, "I never heard of it," he speaks as a man, not as a confessor who holds the place of God in the tribunal of Penance. All are aware that he is a priest, and to all his words mean ,"I never heard of it outside of the confessional." He never speaks of what he has heard inside the confessional, and nothing can, or should, be gathered about what he has heard there from the words which he uses. Although these wide mental reservations are not lies, yet they must not be employed without just cause, for the good of society requires that we should speak our mind with frankness and sincerity in the sense in which we are understood by our hearers, unless there be a good reason for permitting their self-deception when they take our words in a sense that we do not mean.

Truth requires not only that we should say nothing that we know to be false, but also that we should weigh our statements and not make rash and unconsidered assertions. There are some people whose talk runs babbling along like a stream in a fresh, and with as little meaning. A man with a love for truth will be more sparing of his words, and will weigh them before giving them currency.

--A MANUAL OF MORAL THEOLOGY, REV. THOMAS SLATER, SJ. VOL I. FIFTH AND REVISED EDITION

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The Radio Replies Series: Volume One

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Truth

Mental reservations

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The Radio Replies Series: Volume One

The Radio Replies Series: Volume Two

Chapter One: God

Chapter Two: Man

Chapter Three: Religion

Chapter Four: The Religion of the Bible

Chapter Five: The Christian Faith

Chapter Six: A Definite Christian Faith

Chapter Seven: The Protestant Reformation

Chapter Eight: The Truth of Catholicism

Chapter Nine: The Church and the Bible

Chapter Ten: The Dogmas of the Church

Chapter Eleven: The Church and Her Moral Teachings