The Angelus Fall Issue Released: Fortitude
If the Church was built on the blood of martyrs, then we can say the Church was built with fortitude.
One of the great virtues of the Church is Fortitude. In this issue of The Angelus, different aspects of this virtue are discussed; historical, theological, and present applications. What follows are a few exceprts.
Esto Vir
by Bp. Tissier de Mallerais
After giving a definition of fortitude and showing in what discipline consists, I shall touch on the role of education, according to Archbishop Lefebvre, in the acquisition of these virtues; I shall then consider the defects that go against and the virtues connected to fortitude and discipline. This will give us some practical directives, after the model of an exemplary man.
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Building Strength
by Fr. Michael McMahon
Once in place, the schedule must then be enforced, must be lived, must be willingly embraced along with the rules, regulations and customs of the home, classroom, or school. This is where the leadership of parents, priests and teachers becomes crucial and presents a heavy cross. Constant vigilance in the area of correction and constructive criticism exacts a great toll upon those in charge. A habit is acquired only by repeated action—if well done, you have a virtue; if poorly, then a vice. If I only had $1 for each time I have corrected a boy on his table manners, all my fundraising worries would be over! Adults must fight the temptation toward laxity and at times the fatigue which repeated correction entails, being sure to punish when necessary. Many adults have repudiated their authority, preferring to please their sons in order to be loved. The old school parental axiom when punishing “this will hurt me more than it hurts you” is so very true. The effort and energy involved in such diligent parenting and educating can be overwhelming at times. Duty demands to correct, sanction, and punish “in season and out.”
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Decline in Fortitude and Direction
From Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s Commencement Address at Harvard, 1978
The humanistic way of thinking, which had proclaimed itself our guide, did not admit the existence of intrinsic evil in man, nor did it see any task higher than the attainment of happiness on earth. It started modern Western civilization on the dangerous trend of worshiping man and his material needs. Everything beyond physical well-being and the accumulation of material goods, all other human requirements and characteristics of a subtle and higher nature, were left outside the area of attention of state and social systems, as if human life did not have any higher meaning. Thus gaps were left open for evil, and its drafts blow freely today. Mere freedom per se does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and even adds a number of new ones.
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