WTE: America’s survival hinges on the Cardinal Virtues

Why can’t we all just get along? Since the L.A. riots in 1992, many have breathed out these words in despair and confusion. In a word, America has lost her public virtue. Virtue, not material prosperity, is key to “getting along.”

Long before Christianity came on the scene, virtue was understood as the foundation of civil life. It was Plato, 400 years before Christ, who articulated the Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Temperance, Courage, and Justice. Centuries later Christian thinkers added the Theological Virtues, Faith, Hope and Love, to bring the total number of virtues to seven.

Today this is flipped on its head. The specifically Christian virtue of “love” has been perverted and used as a wrecking ball to wipe out the Cardinal Virtues.  These non-religious virtues have been driven from public life under the rubric of “freedom from religion.” This nonsense needs correction.

Human beings are not animals. More than biology, we also have a spiritual side. This is why the virtues are so necessary. When human beings are treated like animals, they become animals. The Cardinal Virtues allow us to become human again.

Prudence (wisdom) is the mother of all virtues. It is the virtue that enables a person to know the good and right course of action. As such, it requires an understanding of right and wrong, good and evil, that is shared by all. Without this, there can be no society.

Yet honest talk of good and evil is regularly dismissed as mere opinion. Anti-social worldviews deny any validity to our shared sense of good and evil. Foolishness prevails. To rebuild, we must replace this moral relativism with prudence.

Temperance is the virtue of controlling the appetite. It recognizes that human beings have physical needs that give pleasure when they are met. It also recognizes that overindulgence and disordered use of these appetites will always cause great human suffering.

Four of seven deadly sins are connected to temperance. Gluttony, greed, lust and sloth are overindulgence in food, money, sex and rest respectively. The pre-Christian Greeks joined all civilized cultures in warning against decadence. Only dying cultures celebrate and encourage deadly sins.

Teaching temperance does not establish any religion. Nevertheless, modern materialists pretend that temperance is uniquely Christian and exclude it from public discourse. By this “divide and conquer” strategy, they have created great misery.

Courage does the right thing in the face of fear. It is in short supply today. An overwhelming desire for public approval and economic success makes Americans vulnerable to Twitter mobs and Facebook trolls. Consider how many politicians, teachers, church leaders and businesses have been silenced by fear. Cultural renewal begins with courage.

Justice is the final virtue in Plato’s list. It is the constant and permanent determination to give everyone his or her rightful due. While prudence discerns good and evil, justice is the willpower to do it.

When Lady Justice is depicted in art, she is always blindfolded because she operates without respect of persons. When money, status, or public opinion skews the application of justice, it is evil. Social justice that judges class membership but ignores individual acts of good and evil is inherently unjust.

It has been a very long time since our political system paid attention to the Cardinal Virtues. America has been deluded into thinking that justice requires strict moral neutrality. This lie has driven our common sense of good and evil out of the public square. This foolishness has brought us to the brink of disaster.

While the Cardinal Virtues do not establish any particular religion, their exclusion is motivated by a materialistic worldview that hates the very idea of religion. This worldview is, itself, a religion that denies the very spirit of humanity and has led to the slaughter of millions and enslavement of billions around the globe.

Sooner or later America will come to her senses and reclaim the value of the Cardinal Virtues. No society can deny reality forever. The question for our generation is this: Will we learn this lesson by listening to the voice of prudence? Or, will we have to learn it the hard way?

Eastern Europeans suffered under materialistic communism for decades and are now in the process of rebuilding thriving societies. They are urgently warning Americans to embrace the Cardinal Virtues before we fall into something akin to the Soviet horror. Either we will have the prudence to listen, or we will learn through our own bitter experience.

The decisions we make today will determine the outcome for our children and grandchildren. They will either endure great suffering or enjoy true freedom. They will also have the clarity of hindsight to see exactly how our decisions created their world. By Prudence, Temperance, Courage and Justice, let’s make that outcome a good one.


Also published in the Wyoming Tribune Eagle, July 3, 2020.