They are told to simply encourage the classroom discussion about what the children select as their 'values'. "sanctity in a non-religious sense". The other day I went to a talk by a medical ethicist. We have got to do what we can to polish off, enrich, strengthen, nail on a few new boards, pull out a few rotten ones and pass on a more seaworthy ship of state to our children for the benefits of our children's children's children. What I am talking to you about tonight is a very simple point; but it is a point that it may take you a while to see the relevance of. No. The dignity of every person, independent of ethnicity, creed, gender, sexuality, age or ability, is the foundation of CST. People are never trea… You may value a burgundy T-shirt more than I value a blue blazer, and you have your values in that area, and I have mine. It is a serious error to overlook both the distinctions and similarities between them. It was there I noticed the placement back into the richer classical language of "goods" but, in my naievete at the time, thought we were dealing with an error of translation into the English from the Latin. which cannot be maintained in coherent form if we reject the notion of objective truth. Remember a few years ago we had an elected politician in this province who was accused — because he wanted to take moral positions on certain issues — of "imposing his values" on other people. Why is it that these suicides have increased so markedly amongst what my friend Dr. Peter Kyne calls "the canaries of a generation? Virtue is similar in that how we are (our first natures) in relation to the virtues (understood, described by stories, taught and lived by practice) is personal; but unlike "values" the virtues are also shared and cannot be simply chosen or ignored at will. Because he didn't explain how the virtues relate to one another or how you may have an excess or deficiency. So, we have got to get back to, and forward to, a richer language — for culture and for character. He said, "I enjoyed your paper on George Grant, but I wonder if you have considered that you are using the term 'values' in your paper, and that is a term that George Grant had a great deal of difficulty with. But a detailed article in First Things magazine put me right on that score. Catholic Faith believes in the value and dignity of each individual person, including the weakest. Like supposed "American values" cited by President Clinton, the Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien uses the term "Canadian values" quite often when he wants to affirm something he thinks we all affirm. There is an urgent need to reclaim an understanding of "the secular" that allows it to be properly described and for faith claims (religious and non) to debate openly about their positions within it. Jesus knew that. So 'habitus,' the development of habits, is done through practice and perseverance. Interestingly enough, the book is an interesting collection of stories about virtue, but it fails, I think, as a teaching tool. They have lost their power, or they have been twisted, and in perhaps no area of language is this more important than with respect to morality, and with no term is it clearer than with the term values. CS Lewis, the great Protestant writer, who wrote the Narnia stories (some of you may know The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and he also wrote many good books on Christianity), once wrote a very interesting thing in a letter. It is structured like this: at the top is love, or charity, faith, and hope. Much of our learning and education is to learn what words mean and the power of words as everyone, for good or ill, has learned through history, is an extremely important power to command. Why? With the premise that values define beliefs in what is right and wrong, extending these beliefs to actions is the embodiment of ethics, according to a paper published by the National Defense University. People generally apply moral values to justify decisions, intentions and actions, and it also defines the personal character of a person. Our Board encompasses a large and dynamic region serving small towns, rural areas and urban centers. I think if somebody says, "I don't value justice, you do, that's part of your value system," we would say there is something wrong there. A virtue is a habit that perfects the powers of the soul and disposes you to do good. It may [also] be that he is attempting "to connect" with people who think in those terms. Catholics of different countries and regions of the world practice and celebrate the faith in diverse ways. This is how "virtue" is similar and dissimilar to "values.". There are also specific virtues as well. That is what I mean by taking a little bit and plugging it in. Christian values historically refers to the values derived from the teachings of Jesus Christ and taught by Christians throughout the history of the religion. I spoke at a Catholic Educator's conference a few years ago and was shocked and disappointed how speaker after speaker spoke in the "language of values" without realizing that this language is the enemy of the very "truth" such speaker's believed themselves to be promoting. Like many of the things that the center does, and many of the projects I'm involved with generally, it's a task really of clarifying language. Faith is not just Religious: "Natural Faith" and "Supernatural Faith", Who has faith? A lot of religious people play right into that. The "secular" is the realm of competing faith claims and there are no "unbelievers.". Do I, for example, tend to be timid and nervous? Catholics of different countries and regions of the world practice and celebrate the faith in diverse ways. They would begin, in little things, say speaking up for someone who is unjustly criticized — that is an example of courage. Catholics & Cultures is an initiative of the Rev. It is that dramatic. But it has taken and is taking a long time to get the message out. They have to, in a sense, reduce it. The way this has been put traditionally is to ask whether one has an excess of something or a deficiency of it? The question isn't whether or not we have some kind of metaphysics. What temperance or moderation perceives is different, and courage as well. Revelation aids reason but there is natural wisdom and supernatural wisdom just as there is natural faith and supernatural faith. What I would call the error of "values language" being used when we mean a moral language has been fairly common in Catholic writers particularly from the 1950's to the present. It is not used now in any of the writing that is coming out in, say, medical ethics, from people who have been made aware of this problem. A term such as "Catholic values", to return to that phrase for a moment, makes no claim on culture whatsoever because people hearing that think that those principles or "values" are no more and no less than the "values" that are situated within Catholicism. And that is why it is so widespread in North America." If you look at his usage of 'values' in any of the recent Encyclicals such as Veritatus Splendor (the "Splendor of Truth"), or Evangelium Vitae (the "Gospel of Life") , or Fides et Ratio ("Faith and Reason"), you will see that in the context of the whole Encyclicals, he is talking about objective truth, he is not talking about personal values, where "you have yours and I have mine". He saw this base as present in the pagans, because it was the Greeks who developed this category of virtue, and in the Western tradition we took it on board and 'Christianized' it. So now as we saw a glimpse of it from the Supreme Court of Canada in the Rodriguez case dealing with whether we should maintain the law against "euthanasia", the judges will grasp at some straw sticking out of the tradition. The Ten Commandments also form a basis for a spiritually healthy society and are included in … Here, you can sample the rich display of Catholic traditions and values among these cross-cultural themes. Yet that is our current state in Western education — and, sadly, all too often religious education, even Catholic education, is implicated in this slide into "values relativism." Can I say that I value courage, and you don't? This is because there is and can never be a Latin term that is equivalent to our term 'values'. It is the same as interior solitude in which the soul is alone with God.. An established congregation that takes a good internal look to discover and define its core values moves closer to discerning its unique mission. Those are all means towards an end. Habitus — the development of good habits, the replacing of good habits for bad habits, could have been spelled out. Saint Leo University is an educational enterprise. Regional cultures may have different approaches to family, marriage and gender roles as well as death rituals. Iain Tyrrell Benson is a legal philosopher, writer, professor and practising legal consultant. In North America, we no longer have any confidence that there are any shared purposes for human life. Since we want the citizens of tomorrow to be respectful or the beliefs of others the curriculum must not (by design or default) close the door to faith, or to love, or to hope, even though (outside of religious schooling) the appropriate place for this religious teaching is the synagogue, church, temple, mosque or longhouse. The term value commends itself to subjectivist and relativist moral philosophies, in preference to the common good. What you have is much more profound, and it is, what is your nature in relation to the objective categories of virtue. I think that is absolutely right, and I think the key is not to try and dissuade people from searching honestly for truth. They go to a restaurant. Instead of the very moral language that they need to be truly Catholic, or to develop a rich conception of the shared grounding for citizenship, values merely makes fragmentation worse. The Ten Commandments are part of the code known to the early Israelites that helped them to live better lives in relationship with Yahweh. It assumes that each person is the origin of "values selection" because there is no "truth" they can or should be taught. How do you handle the Pope's dealing with the word 'values'? Answer: everyone. College of the Holy Cross • One College Street • Worcester, MA 01610 USA Much of contemporary Christianity, particularly of the Protestant evangelical type has exhibited dangerously Gnostic tendencies some of which have been the subject of comment by Protestant writers themselves. It's interesting — William Bennett, who used to be the Secretary of Education of the United States, was told by the publishers that they wanted to call it the 'Book of Values,' and Bennett said "No, the Book of Values is the Sears catalogue." Such spiritual "tasters" are like thin and elegantly dressed ladies at a smorgasbord dipping an ever so gentle finger into this and that and tasting it. All of those, although they involve the material order, are none the less, somehow beyond it. On the island I live on — "spirituality" includes everything from crystals through to all manner of syncretistic religious practices and this wide-eyed use of "consciousness" and "awareness." Yet, in many, many areas of the curriculum and actual teaching of students and in the discourse of society (as represented in speeches by leaders, newspaper articles etc.) The Catholic school is a faith school that expresses a set of core values that can be described as human, religious, Christian and Catholic. Instead: The “Catholic” approach has extremely high moral standards (e.g. Grace, which is God’s intervention, bolsters a person’s soul, providing the necessary oomph to do the right thing.. [3] And the question is, if we approach them as believers, we sometimes have a better bridge to help them understand what we believe and to begin to understand what they believe "on faith.". In this book Lewis makes a very interesting observation that touches on what we are talking about tonight. We may be afraid, we may need to learn that courage without wisdom is mere rashness, honesty without discretion cruelty and justice without humility self-righteousness. ): See what is going on? ture (klchr) n. – The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all … Virtue is right conduct. They actually said, 'the sanctity of life', and then the judge realized that the term 'sanctity' was rooted in religion, so he said, in brackets, "I mean, by sanctity, sanctity in the non-religious sense." The Catholic Intellectual Tradition Content There are values and principles that “shape” the tradition (as opposed to prescriptive characteristics that “define” Catholic). The teacher is expressly told to not judge the children's selection of what they value most. In some places in the world, people practice Catholicism publicly, with religious displays in city squares, streets and even stores, while in other places, religious practice is considered private, and reserved for the home and sacred spaces. He said it was a corrupted, moral term." What is the end? PART THREE LIFE IN CHRIST. Lewis and Don Giovanni Calabria (the authors of the exchange of letters — though we have only C.S. These gospel values define its educational ethos. But if, on the personal level, "you have your values and I have mine" then how, on the national level, does it make any sense to speak of "Canadian values" or "American values"? And I want to suggest that of the terms we have to reclaim, 'values' is near the top of a list of other important concepts: a short-list would contain, in addition to that term, "secular"; "tolerance"; "freedom" "unbeliever/believer" and "tradition." Every human being is created in the image and likeness of God and therefore has inherent dignity. When you've got children killing themselves at an ever-increasing rate when they are young — our suicide rate in Canada, amongst 10-14 year-olds has gone up 1367% between 1955 and 1995 causes must be sought and attempts made at solutions. They take their rear view mirror on faith. If there is time for questions, I'd be happy to entertain some. Though we may think these terms have some real identifiable meaning they do not. May 30, 2000. And I think that the fact that this bloated use of "values language" beyond its proper place in aesthetics and economics is a real indication of what trouble we are in as a culture in the West. And we know that with respect to aesthetic choices such as clothing, or sports, or whether I will be (like the people in the next building) at bingo tonight or listening to a talk on values, those are, in a sense, personal choices that can be related to aesthetics — to how things look. At the moment, contemporary liberal society wants to take little tiny bits that it needs of the tradition of virtue and plug them in like sealing wax when it discovers that society is hemorrhaging somewhere. It is important not to make an erroneous distinction in how we think about society by viewing religion as somehow separate from the secular. The main focus of his work in relation to law and society has been to examine some of the various meanings that underlie terms of common but confused usage. Is that issue of Euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide debated in terms of virtue, in terms of shared moral principles within society? Too little? We all know that — "don't impose your values". But is it the same thing to say that you value justice, and I don't? Let me illustrate this with an example. He said that this failure to understand what to him was obvious, was "baffling.". What has happened is this language of values obscures moral discourse; it does not further it. What are Charter Values? Catholic schools are an integral part of the Church and are Christ-centred communities based on gospel values. ARTICLE 7 THE VIRTUES. [7] Though the article did not satisfy me that "the language of values" has any place in a Church document, it did satisfy me that the Holy Father means to use the Polish and English equivalents of "values" and what we are dealing with is not a mere translation error: more's the pity. Slowly but surely, books are starting to be written about it which will make the point more and more obvious that this is not a language than can be used in the moral area. It's all faith. And two wonderful phrases: Pride is the form of all the vices. Remember the three Theological virtues: Faith, Hope, and Charity? However, if you take some of the sentences out of context, it looks like he is speaking, and I hate to say this but it is true, the mushy language of 'values'. These values and principles are “characteristically Catholic” while, at the same time, shared by many religious traditions. It is not convincing to deal with moral traditions this way. But what has happened in the modern age is that many of our key terms have been either diffused or confused. So, we have our work cut out for us, as people who have been given parts of this tradition. Without language, perhaps thought itself is unthinkable. What about a rash person? Edward G. Andrew, Williams, Thomas D. "Virtues, Values and John Paul II". A term such as "Catholic values", to return to that phrase for a moment, makes no claim on culture whatsoever because people hearing that think that those principles or "values" are no more and no less than the "values" that are situated within Catholicism. The modern view is, in essence, that "I don't conform myself to the truth, I make the truth by willing it." How would this work with respect to an important virtue. Interestingly, when you look at the Church's settled document, that is, the Latin text, which all these go back into for history, in none of those is the term 'values' present. Why? Christianity can only be established on the firm base of truth and confidence in truth and the substance of objective virtues. How to use catholic in a sentence. Much of our learning and education is to learn what words mean and the power of words as everyone, for good or ill, has learned through history, is an extremely important power to command. His book Ethics (1953) is pock-marked with a use of "values" language that is interesting because it is used in some sections of the book almost interchangeably with "moral virtues" as if the writer simply did not appreciate at all what was missing (and included) in "values" that was not included (and missing) in "virtues". But the entire project is confused and incoherent. So when a school system, a Catholic school system or a public school system, puts in a so-called "values education" module, they are completely confusing the moral education that they are giving children because that language fails to distinguish between the aesthetic preferences and moral categories. That's nonsense but he could not bring himself to say that we get our grounding for respect of human beings from our historic commitment to a religion which sees each man, woman and child as a unique creation of a loving Creator. But please note, the natural virtues are much closer to the supernatural virtues than either are to any category of "values.". Values is "an obscuring language for morality, used when the idea of purpose has been destroyed; and that's why it is so wide-spread in North America.". See: Joseph Pearce's, In a telephone conversation with the writer a year or so before his death (in 1988) George Grant commented on how many intelligent people just did not understand the "values" problem. In some cases, the spread of Pentecostalism has influenced Catholic worship. In some places in the world, people practice Catholicism publicly, with religious displays in city squares, streets and even stores, while in other places, religious practice is considered private, and reserved for the home and sacred spaces. Vincentian, member of a Roman Catholic society of priests and brothers founded at Paris in 1625 by St. Vincent de Paul. They are not values. A Refutation of Moral Relativism Peter Kreeft presents not just a strong case against moral relativism, but a refutation of the philosophy that no society has ever survived. And guess what? Too much? We cannot say, "you have your courage and I have mine." Through stories and narratives, like Aesop's Fables, Scriptural Stories or exposure to and discussion of such sources as William Bennett's Book of Virtues, alongside a framework of the virtues (content and structure of virtues, discussion of habit, the "golden mean" etc.). I only learned this myself after all my university training was finished, when I was giving a lecture at the University of British Columbia, and a graduate student came up to me afterwards and said, "You know, I really enjoyed your paper." Such people are almost consciously setting themselves up for continuous sensual experiences through spirituality, and they go from one of these things to the next, year after year, and they never seem to ask the questions that would get them out of that endless (and expensive) cycle. I believe that a school should be a place where children are encouraged to practice and model the life of Jesus and continue God’s Reign through the values of equity, respect, tolerance and forgiveness. ", There are, of course, many reasons, but if you talk to psychiatrists who work with this age group, they will tell you that one of the most profound reasons is that these children have no sense of purpose. In the Scriptures there is an important verse which informs us that: if you don't love others, you don't know God; love is linked to action. Hamilton's provision of one of these encyclicals in the Latin version years ago, a comparison of the Latin and English texts. What good does this do for a person, what good does it do for society? Proper recognition of the distinction will aid the task of apologetics and cultural engagement in our own day. Recollection, as understood in respect to the spiritual life, means attention to the presence of God in the soul. All these cardinal virtues have been transformed, ultimately, by Christ; in the person of Christ. I have set out for you some of the categories. You see what the problem is there? Does that faith on a diminished level that many people have, come anywhere near to explain these things? Simply put, everyone is a believer. The form, the jelly mould that gives shape to all of those vices, is pride. An advocate that the public sphere should be open and inclusive of all citizens and their groups, whether their faith and belief commitments are based on non-religious or religious beliefs, Iain Benson was the first Executive Director of the Centre for Cultural Renewal, a non-partisan, non-denominational charitable foundation with status in both Canada and the United States, dedicated to examining the nature of pluralism with particular reference to the associational rights dimension of religion and expression. The proper awareness of truth categories found outside the Gospel and that can be incorporated and enriched by it, was considered important by Lewis. All our programs are people-centred with empowerment at their heart. The means are the techniques of disciplines, what we study, how we live together, how we choose to live in a family. This definition can assist a congregation in shaping its vision and ministry for the future. How is instruction in a virtue accomplished? 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