On the Virtues, Theological & Moral
We have before us a vast topic and all we can hope to do in this little amount
of time given to it to outline some of its main points so that you can get a
general idea of the subject. I want to speak first about virtue in general and
then about the two main types, theological and moral.
Virtue comes from the Latin word virtus meaning power or strength. When we speak
about it in the sense that concerns the matter at hand, we mean something
spiritual that is more or less permanently resides in us. Virtues are powers
that enable us to do great things: either to act in a morally good manner (in
the moral virtues) or, more, to act in a uniquely Christian manner (the
theological virtues).
The ancient pagan philosophers wrote about virtues that concerned both public
and private conduct. These were considered desirable to acquire because by means
of them one could be a self-mastered person, a good man, and a good citizen. The
way to become morally good was through practice: doing the good thing over and
over again, fighting against the contrary tendencies, until achieving a certain
facility in acting well, becoming a self-controlled or “virtuous” person. All
this knowhow was the subject of the philosophical study of Ethics. By studying
this science one came to know what virtues need to be acquired, their
relationship to one another, and the general rules for gaining them.
Some philosophers thought that all one needed to do to become morally good was
to know good from bad; then, one would naturally do the good. This–in crude
form–is what Plato taught. We know, however, even from our own experience that
this account is inadequate, for we frequently act contrary to what we know we
should do. Simply put, becoming virtuous is not merely a matter of the intellect
knowing what’s good but of the will pursuing what’s good. (An aside: although we
may readily admit this, we sometimes act like Platonists. Consider the idea of
teaching “values” to kids in schools. The premise is that if the right thing is
taught, the learners will have inculcated the value and become upright. But,
even here, there’s a problem, since one can’t always provide an adequate
rationale for what is right. How can one say that something is good and the
opposite bad? We must answer that this is determined by nature; it can’t be
constructed or fabricated, nor is this knowledge obvious to everyone. That being
said, however, it remains that will is the basic problem, even should there be a
consensus about what is right and wrong. Giving information [sex ed programs as
a case in point] does not make people good. They need to be moved, motivated to
act well. Even this talk is a case in point. If you come away knowing more about
what the virtues are, you will not necessarily become any better. For that you
need to be inspired by the lives of the saints, or by roused by fervent prayer,
or edified by the good example of good and pious persons, or through the love of
Jesus, etc.)
Well, I’ve told you so far only a very little about what some of the ancient
thinkers understood about the moral virtues. Actually, they knew a good deal
about the subject. They knew the names of the virtues, what was opposed to their
possession, the sub-divisions of each major virtue, and much else. Now, when we
speak as Catholic Christians, we are not concerned about virtue as the pagans
understood it. This is not because we so much disagree with anything particular
they understood about the virtues, but rather because once we form part of
Christ’s mystical body we have a lifeline, a source of spiritual and moral
vitality and goodness that was unknown and unavailable to those living before
the time of Christ. The thing hitherto withheld and therefore unknown from
humanity before the time of Christ is sanctifying grace. Once we’re baptized
(and as long we remain in God’s friendship) we have a divine ‘connection’ that
enables us to act in a wholly supernatural way. To put it another way, when we
are Christians in a state of grace we are–mindful of it or not–living on a
higher level, above that of others who are not ‘graced.’ The consequence of this
is that although we can advance in moral goodness–in virtue–much like
non-Christians through practice, through repetition–yet we own a source of
strength (grace) that they did not have. Our resulting good deeds then have a
meaning far above theirs. This is only part of the benefit in belonging to
Christ through grace.
Christians have virtues that are infused. ‘Infused’ is a term used in contrast
to ‘acquired’. What is ‘injected into’ us through baptism by the doing of the
Holy Spirit is distinct from what must be gained by dint of human effort alone.
Not only do we not have to work to get these virtues in the first place
(although we must continue to work to sustain them–more about that later) but
these infused virtues have an supernatural goal: they aim not merely at becoming
good moral persons but at getting us to heaven. This means that Christians have
a distinct ‘edge’ over non-Christians. It also means that they are going to held
more accountable for being good than they since they have a supernatural and
effortless first impulse of virtue supplied at baptism.
This is what actually happened to us when we were baptized: original sin (the
estrangement from God) was canceled; sanctifying grace was added to our souls so
that we became holy and acceptable to God, adopted into his supernatural family.
Along with sanctifying grace we received the three theological virtues: faith,
hope and charity which enabled us to act on a higher, divine level of activity.
We also received that infusion of the moral virtues (just spoken about) which
are usually said to be four main or cardinal ones: prudence, justice, fortitude
and temperance. (Baptism, by the way, had a few other marvelous effects: it
lessened unruliness [concupiscence] in us; it made of our bodies and souls
dwelling places of the Holy Trinity; it gave us the right to go to heaven; it
made it possible for us to receive the other sacraments, and to do good works
that will merit reward in heaven.)
Now, before getting on to any detail of the virtues there are a few other
introductory points to be covered. One of these is this: the goal or purpose of
infused virtue entirely surpasses that of the ‘natural’ or acquired virtues. Our
motive for wanting to be good, to be moral, to be virtuous is not just to gain
self-perfection, self-mastery, or to become upright or respectable persons, but,
over and above these noble ends, to become holy, even unto becoming saints! Some
examples: we act temperately (temperance is one of the four principal moral
virtues) not just to become disciplined or dignified in our acts, but, more, to
become like Christ who was perfectly temperate. We practice humility not only to
avoid the blotches of excessive pride or vanity or anger, but because Jesus
Himself was very humble, even unto submission to crucifixion.
Another preliminary point: although these virtues are infused at baptism for the
Christian, they still must be practiced in order to be maintained and increased.
Without repetition, without constant exercise, one can lose the facility of
acting well and immediately, and thus dispose himself for sin. It’s not that the
virtues themselves dissipate through disuse or neglect (they are habits, as we
say: permanent possessions). It is rather that their non-use disposes one for a
fall into sin. Then, with sin, one does begin to lose what he had gained: some
virtues being lost by certain sins entirely; others not at all: it all
‘depends.’ (More on this later.)
While virtues themselves once in possession can’t be decreased in us (but they
can be lost by certain sins, as we said), they can and should grow. This happens
through increasing sanctifying grace. Receiving the sacraments worthily,
praying,
and performing good works in a state of grace all serve to increase the virtues.
Venial sins have this effect: while they don’t lessen virtues gained, they make
them less operative. Mortal sins cause a loss only of the moral virtues that are
opposed to them, but they do not necessarily deplete all facility to act morally
well in a state of mortal sin. Thus, by a single lapse in telling a serious lie
one loses the virtue of truthfulness but not necessarily the general tendency to
be truthful. But one always loses the theological virtue of charity when mortal
sin is committed (as Jesus said, if you love me, you will keep my commandments;
meaning, if you disobey me, you do not really love me. See 1John 1:6.) One loses
the virtue of hope only when he sins against hope; one loses faith only when he
denies an article of the Catholic faith or otherwise sins against faith.
I’m still on the introductory issues that relate to virtues. There is something
yet to say about the connection virtues have to one another. St. Paul said,
“charity is the bond of perfection.” Charity then encompasses all virtues,
theological and moral. One whose loves for God and neighbor is perfect, can’t be
lacking in any virtue. If one is perfect in charity, one has all virtue. Second
point: if one has any one of the virtues perfectly developed, he must have at
the same time all the virtues. Why? because every virtue is bound to all the
others. Accordingly, when one grows in any one of the them, all the others are
naturally increased at the same time. The rule then to grow in virtue is this:
practice the particular virtue most opposite your basic weakness. By doing this,
all the other virtues will necessarily come into play, being mutually
strengthened as they come to the aid of the particular virtue being practiced.
An example: if you have a problem being temperate, say, in the matter of eating,
then, as you begin to trim your cravings for food all the other virtues must
consort in helping: you will become more prudent as you practice restraint
(since in-temperance is surely an unwise thing to do); justice helps here also
because you will be doing what is right for your health; fortitude or courage
will be strengthened because it takes a certain toughness of spirit to be able
to say “no” to the pleasures of the table. (However–just to make things more
complex, it is possible for someone to have proficiency in a particular virtue
without having much mastery of the others. One can be humble but not all that
merciful, for example; yet the more mercy he acquires, the more his other
virtues will be perfected.)
I’m going to quit the introductory material now and go for the heart of the
subject (although necessarily in an abbreviated way) in speaking about
particular virtues. We will start first with the moral virtues and then pass on
to the theological. Just remember here that we are only skating the surface of a
huge area that well deserves a more detailed treatment.
The Moral Virtues
There are really a great many moral virtues, but all of them come down to some
form of the four principal ones that match all our needs. I explain: we need,
first of all, to make good moral choices. We need, in other words, the knowhow
of acting well. This is the virtue of prudence. Also, in our actions we need to
do not only what is right but to make sure that our actions do not upset the
rights of others: this is justice. In order to do what prudence already
indicated should be done, and for the sake of acting justly to our neighbor, we
have to conquer the fear of acting rightly: thus we need fortitude (or courage).
Finally, we need to regulate our actions according to a right balance: too much
or too little of the thing would not be virtuous. Thus we need also to have
temperance.
These four cardinal virtues find their right place in our moral activity in this
way: they are located as the exact balance between the extremes of too little
(defect) and too much (excess). To return to our example of eating: too little
food is bad for health, too much is likewise bad. The virtue of temperance lies
exactly in the middle. Another virtue for the modern busy American: dutifulness.
A dutiful person is one who is neither lax in his duties (defect) nor a
workaholic (excess). He does all that duty demands, but always according to what
is possible and reasonable.
Prudence
Prudence is the virtue that directs us to choose always the right course of
action. A prudent person is one who always knows the right thing to do. These
are the folks that others look up to for advice because they seem to have this
practical wisdom exemplified in their own conduct.(By the way, one who can’t
regulate his own life can’t be of much help to you when you need help. One
should choose his advisors from among those who themselves have orderly,
virtuous lives.) Just as we have known prudent people–those who seem to be ever
right in their judgments– conversely, we all know have known some unhappy people
who just never seem to know the right thing to do. These folks are ‘imprudent’
people.
While ordinary prudence has to do with determining every moral move we make, a
specifically Christian form of prudence is the kind that knows what’s necessary
for attaining heaven. That doesn’t mean that it’s concerned only with religious
matters; everything, all the details of life, fall under the domain of prudence.
It regulates our thoughts so that they don’t stray from God; our feelings and
desires so that they are in line with God’s commandments; and our deeds.
Prudence isn’t always a matter of doing the merely reasonable thing because, at
times, one must do extraordinary things. When, for example, the martyrs gave
their lives for the sake of Christ, they were indeed most prudent, even though
they seemed imprudent in the eyes of those lacking faith. These saints were
prudent because they had in view the attainment of heavenly reward, and so they
were led to a heroic self-sacrifice.
To act prudently we need to deliberate before acting, calculating the meaning
and effects of an action and, if need be, asking counsel. And then, once we know
what to do, we must do the prudent thing without delay.
Prudence is said to be the first of the moral virtues because without it–without
knowing the right thing to do–nothing good can be done. All the virtues begin
with prudence.
The best means for becoming prudent is always to keep your eternal goal in view.
How would this proposed course of action affect my eternity: would it add to my
glory, or to my shame?
There is one final thing that I want to add about prudence. Without it, you will
be forever asking someone, “is this OK?;” “is that OK?” A person who never knows
what to do is indeed pitiable. Such a person must always be under the obedient
regulation of a good director.
We pass on here to justice (even though it may be imprudent to offer such light
treatment of this virtue!)
Justice
Justice is a broad virtue that encompasses our duties both to God and to all
others.
Justice is the thing that motivates us to give each his due. Since no one lives
without needing others, we have to deal with our neighbors in a right or just
manner. This virtue restrains deceit or fraud and protects the rights of others.
It puts a curb on the tendency to dominate, to argue, to become rivals, to
oppress the weak, etc. Justice may concern an individual or society at large.
Many things fall under the domain of justice: for example, respecting the rights
of ownership of goods; respecting the good name of another by avoiding rash
judgments of him, or slandering or gossiping about him.
I indicated that justice includes one’s duties to God also. The reason for this
is that God has a right to some things from His creatures. Therefore, a Catholic
who does not go to Mass, or does not adore God or pray to Him, does not confess,
or do his Easter duty, does no penitential work on Fridays, such a one is an
unjust person, no matter how just he may be to his neighbor. Man is obliged to
revere God; and, not in just any manner, but in the specific ways God himself
has specified.
Obedience is a virtue related to justice. It means being submissive to one’s
superiors. This virtue recognizes a hierarchy which God established: in the
world, in society, in the family, and in the Church. When we disobey the lawful
demands of our parents, teachers, priests, lawful officers of the State, we sin.
Obedience, of course, does not mean ‘blind obedience.’ It recognizes certain
limits: the first of which is that one must never obey any sinful command, one
forbidden by God. Also, authority figures have certain limits in the exercise of
their authority: parents who oppose a child’s vocational choice act abusively.
Moreover, there can be unreasonable demands that exceed legitimate bounds of
authority.
There are different degrees of obedience. First, for obedience to be perfect,
one must be motivated by the desire to please God who stands behind all lawful
authority. If we fail to see this, then obedience will seem to be artificial and
an imposition. Perfect obedience should comply fully with what one is required
to do. If one does only the bare minimum of what he is told to do, he is far
from attaining the ideal. Obedience should also be prompt and–even–cheerful. How
well we obey those in authority over us is an indication of being submissive to
God.
The advantage of obedience is that it is a freeing thing. It can make one joyful
to obey his superior for he knows that in so doing he is fulfilling the will of
God. Even the most common tasks can be transformed into meritorious acts by
doing them under obedience. And we should add: how difficult it is, at times, to
have to make one’s own decisions! But when obedience is required, the burden is
taken off the subject and transferred to the one in authority. (Those in
positions of authority therefore are the more accountable to God!)
Being “fair” at all times is the expression of justice, surely, and yet we
realize that our Christian faith often demands of us more than justice alone: it
calls also for charity. Love may often direct us to go beyond (the extra mile)
what justice alone may direct.
Fortitude
Fortitude is the name of the virtue that makes it possible for us to do
difficult things. It’s a kind of spiritual strength. It is a form of courage.
Fortitude is the happy balance between fearful cowardice (defect) on the one
hand and foolish boldness (excess) on the other. Fortitude is what we need in
order to endure, for God’s sake, any of life’s difficulties, spiritual or
physical. One, for example, might be fearful of taking risks in doing what he
must; or he may fear criticism or ridicule. He needs this kind of moral
strength.
Patience is a virtue related to fortitude. This is something often needed even
in ordinary daily actions. Patience is the thing that tames the inclination
towards sadness, anger or anxiety. When it’s perfect, it can lead one even to
love suffering for the sake of Christ.
Patience itself has a sister-virtue, namely, perseverance, that virtue that
keeps us going in hard things without yielding to weariness or discouragement.
We need perseverance in our spiritual lives in order to await the deferred
rewards of heaven for our good deeds.
Temperance
Here we have a virtue that regulates our desire for sensual pleasures
(especially those for food, alcoholic drink, and for sex) so that they serve
their rightful purposes. There’s always a tendency for pleasure to become an end
unto itself. We already spoke briefly, but sufficiently, about gluttony, the
excessive desire for food. Sobriety is the virtue by which we do not take
alcoholic or narcotic substances in excess. We must speak at greater length
about chastity, the specific virtue that moderates the desire for sexual
pleasure.
Everyone must practice chastity, the married and the unmarried: for the married
by using the gift of married love in accordance with God’s law; for the
unmarried in the non-use of the sexual function.
Chastity for the married includes fidelity of the spouses, the acquiescence to
the reasonable request of a spouse for the marital act, and for refraining from
anything in the marital act contrary to nature.
Those who must remain sexually inactive are either the unmarried or those who
are married during the time they have mutually decided to refrain for some good
purpose. Whenever people succeed in practicing chastity over a period of time,
we call this the related virtue of continence, which is a kind of regularity or
fidelity in being pure.
Another related virtue is celibacy, the practice of a life-long commitment to
avoid all sexual activity for the sake of Christ. It is made by those who have
made a vow to this effect. These may be religious, priests, or consecrated
laity.
You may perhaps see how chastity relies on the cooperation of all the other
virtues. To be chaste one must also possess within him fortitude, humility,
modesty (in a general manner of conduct), prudence in his words and acts, and
justice towards his neighbor. We can train our children for a life of chastity
by having them practice all the virtues generally.
This virtue requires the full range of human self-control. For this reason one
must do deeds of voluntary renunciation of those pleasures that are lawful in
order to gain the necessary self-control of that tendency towards impurity that
has no small degree of recklessness about it. One needs to control what and whom
he looks at, and what words he uses; he must be wary of the delicate sense of
touch, control his imagination and guard his tendency to day-dreaming. It takes
a dedicated love for the purity of Jesus and for the chaste holiness of the
Virgin Mary to motivate one to embrace a perfect chastity. This virtue should
distinguish Christians from the rest of men.
There is much else to say about the moral virtues, but to do justice to this
topic, we must move on to the Theological Virtues and to contrast them with the
moral virtues.
The Theological Virtues
Theological virtues are radically different from the moral virtues. It’s only
the name ‘virtue’ which is common to them. St. Paul gives the trio of
theological virtues in a few places of the NT (e.g. 1Th 1:3; 5:8). These
theological virtues, unlike transitory gifts that God may bestow on a soul, are
lasting.
The reason for the word ‘theological’ here is that these three link us to God in
three ways: faith puts us into contact with God’s mind (so to speak) because by
it we know the things He has revealed. Hope makes us rely on God with utter
confidence and security so that we can look forward to heaven. Charity (the
summit of all the virtues) puts us in deep communion with God who is Love.
Charity is also the ‘life-blood’ of all the virtues: it makes us come alive in
Christ.
A little helpful detail:
Faith
In the proper theological sense of the term, faith means the agreement of our
minds to all that God revealed. In other words, one has faith who assents to
everything God has told us in the Catholic Church. This is not the same thing as
another and common use of the word which is merely a kind of trust, as in the
statement, “you have to have a lot of faith.” ‘Faith’ there actually means
trust. In the NT one finds both senses of term faith. But when we speak of faith
as a Theological Virtue we mean it in the first sense: an intellectual assent to
God’s truth.
To believe divine things takes a special virtue, a God-endowed gift, for the
simple reason that the things of faith can’t be discerned by the five senses.
One can’t see angels, grace, heaven, God, the body of the Blessed Virgin in
glory, the Divine Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, nor may one always see
that what the Pope teaches in faith and morals is infallibly true. But when one
yields his own judgments to God who reveals these things, he manifests faith. It
is not possible to believe everything of the Catholic faith, all that is
contained in the Creed, without this virtue being infused into a man. The reason
that we say ‘yes’ to all Catholic doctrine is that God who is truth cannot
deceive us. My own powers of judgment may fail me and lead me into error and so
may those of anyone else; but God’s word must be true. Therefore, one may
rightly say that the things of faith are more surely true than the things he
sees and experiences through the senses. One’s senses can err or fail, one’s
judgments can be faulty due to erroneous conclusions; but what God reveals must
be right.
This is the reason for our confidence as Catholics in the magisterium of the
Church, the teaching of the Popes and the Councils. It is also the reason why a
Catholic who dissents from anything in the faith completely loses the virtue of
faith. Let me restate this: to deny even one article of Catholic faith vitiates
the whole of it. One can’t tell God, in effect, “I believe most of what you
reveal, but not all,” as if God could deceive on some point or other. It would
be a supreme insult, blasphemous to God, to pick and choose what to believe.
Moreover, it would mean that neither God, nor the Scriptures, nor the successor
of St. Peter who has charge over the whole Church but oneself is the measure of
what is true. This is the very summit of haughtiness and is akin to the
primordial sin of the one who said, “Did God really say not to eat of the fruit
of that tree?” A true believer needs to have a certain degree of humility that
recognizes God for who He is (all-knowing, all-good) and oneself for what he is
(a fallible and weak creature).
Faith, although it requires humility, never does violence to our minds, as if it
would make us agree to silly notions or to accept fables. The things of faith
are believable things but they surpass the scope of the human mind to grasp them
completely. So, one is not a fool for being a believer but he is one who admits
his limitations. Faith is an enhancement of the human mind. By professing it, we
are made greater, not less, than we would be without it. If we accept the things
taught by the Church, we avoid having to learn many things by trial and error.
Faith then is a kind of short-cut to truth that helps us avoid the pitfalls of
“following false leads” (as the late Fr. Most put it).
While supernatural faith is a gift endowed at baptism it must grow. We should
often ask God, like the apostles, to increase our faith. We do this by making
acts of faith and by reciting and meditating on the articles of the Creed. We
should also avoid the company of anyone whose conversation might endanger or
weaken our faith.
One final distinction is in order: difficulty in understanding some particular
article of faith is entirely different from denying it. We will never completely
understand the truths of faith in this life for, as Saint Paul put it, we see
now only indistinctly.
Hope
Hope is a word with different senses. For example, there’s the kind of hope
that’s the expectation of something that we lack at the moment. “I hope to get
an increase in pay.” But here we are talking about a supernatural virtue that
makes us desire God and to be with Him forever in heaven. We might use the term
‘trust’ for it. We trust God in the sense that we are confident that He will
give us reward for the good works we do in a state of grace and that He will
provide all the necessary means for our salvation: principally by forgiving our
sins.
There are two sins that attack the virtue of hope: presumption and despair. By
presumption one has an over-confidence that God will surely save him (no matter
what he may do), or that God will give him the grace of forgiveness in a
deathbed conversion. Despair is self-explanatory. This is the disposition of
those who think that God is not merciful enough to forgive any and all sins that
are sincerely repented of.
Charity
We save the best for last. Charity, love, is the greatest of all divine benefits
conferred upon us.
In general, we can say that love is the thing that moves us, inclines us,
towards what is good. Some of these good things are material goods (such as
food, music, human companionship, for example), other goods are intellectual or
moral (we may desire the good of knowing or of acquiring the virtue of patience
or chastity). Here however we are speaking not about a natural love, but of a
supernatural kind of love, the love of God and the love of neighbor for God’s
sake (rather than for my or the neighbor’s sake).
The object of charity is God Himself. There can be no other motive or object for
this: we love God simply because He is Love. This is not just any kind of love
for God (for everyone can say that he loves God in some way). This is rather a
supernatural and effective love of God that actually assimilates us to the One
loved: we become God-like through this divine Charity. This is the love of God
above everything else. One cannot then truly love God and be in mortal sin at
the same time because mortal sin manifests a preference for some created good
above the love of God. Supernatural love is that described by our Lord, the love
of God with one’s whole heart, soul, strength, and mind.
In a similar way, everyone can love others in some way. But the supernatural
virtue of Charity is not a sentiment, nor is it a feeling, or passion, nor is it
liking someone because of some attractiveness of goodness in him: charity loves
the neighbor–even when he may be most unlovable–for God’s sake, that is, because
he’s a creature of God and because God commands it.
Growth in divine love is the surest means of attaining sanctity. It’s the one
thing that can propel one’s spiritual life to advance in grace. Without love, a
soul is lifeless. When love grows, all the other spiritual endowments of the
soul grow with it.
The way to advance in divine love is to receive the sacraments worthily and with
devotion, not routine, mindlessness or haste. Another great means is to imitate
the love of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and to have a fervent devotion to the
Blessed Virgin. Probing into the hearts of Jesus and Mary will teach one what it
means to have the fullness of charity and show how their loves may be imitated.
It will also show one that the depth of charity is found in sacrifice, in
generosity, in giving rather than receiving. Devotion to the Sacred Heart finds
its high point in the devotion to the Blessed Sacrament which contains all the
treasures of His Divine Heart.
Finally, a real charity for neighbor is not a superficial hugging, hand-holding,
forced smiles or other gobbledygook that may caricature it. Charity is at once a
tough and tender love for others: one that may have at times to correct and
admonish others (kindly) and one that prays for the salvation of their souls.
Too often people say that they love others when they really mean that they love
their own feelings for them.
Conclusion
So much more could be said; so much more needs to be said about the virtues. But
this introductory talk may have given you a thing or two to ponder. We are
always involved in the process of purification if we are living a spiritual life
which means that advancing in the practice of virtue. If we do not make enough
progress in it during life, we will have to go to purgatory until we are
perfected. So, better to start now.
May Jesus and Mary help us to grow in the virtues!