Are all people born with a conscience?

Don't you just love it when you go to enter you car and you realize you have been VIOLATED! For what I believe is the 4th time in 4 years one of our cars was broken into last night....mine. Well, it wasn't broken into exactlybecause fortunately (or unfortunately) the doors were unlocked and the windows weren't smashed. When I approached the car I noticed the door was ajar and then the console was opened. Apparently only my ipod & CDs were stolen. (Of those CDs were a collection of Christian music for children. I cetainly hope the thieves pop that one in their stereo first.) Fortunately the car seat and 2 strollers were still in place...the most expensive items in the car. Once again, this leads me to the question I have asked my self each of the 4 times our cars were broken into, "Are all people born with a conscience?" What do you think?

Of course I went to the most trusting source and I Googled "born with a conscience" and this was the most interesting responses I found...

All people are born with a conscience.. When I studied psychology,, a professor liken a conscience to a geared wheel,,which meshes with another geared wheel..The one geared wheel is our lives,,the other is our conscience which guides us in our lives... Every time one does something which is bad or of bad consequence,, its like hitting the geared wheel with a hammer and breaking one of the teeth off the wheel.. If that behavior is cultivated and continued,,eventually all the teeth are broken off the geared wheel and the wheel becomes smooth and no gears are present and therefore no guides for us in our lives which is represented by another geared wheel which meshes to guide us in our behavior in life..Once the gears are gone,,so is our conscience..Its still there,, but its of no importance,,because we don't feel it or anything,,and therefore are not guided to do the proper things in our lives.

This makes sense to me and I think it is a good analogy. Each time we have been "violated" (because of course that is how I feel when we are robbed) I have always thought to myself, "those that robbed us must have needed it more than we did." I really feel for those people because the hammering and breaking of the teeth off the wheel must have started early in their life without good role models.

Do you think all people are born with a conscience? If not, how do you intend to teach your children to have a conscience? I know that when my conscience starts to speak to me it does so in a very quite and private way. Normally it is not something I share with others. For instance, I was shopping at Home Depot with Carson and I went to unload the shopping cart. Of course I have already buckled Carson in his seat when I realized that I hadn't paid for a light bulb which was likely less than $1. I have to admit I first put it in my bag and closed the door. Then my conscience spoke to me and I proceeded to unbuckle Carson, strap him back into the shopping cart, and wheeled him into the store to pay for the light bulb. I promise I am not looking for a pat on the back here...how do you teach that to your children? I suppose it has to start a little later than 14 month old, he wouldn't begin to understand it now. I would love to hear what you think? Are you born with a conscience? If not, how do you teach your children to have one????

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