There is nothing like parenting, or teaching, or any real formation of the young to help us to see and focus on what really matters. If we have come to the insight that living well—or living virtuously—is at the center of the human vocation, then the enormity of a question begins to dawn on us: what makes people actually want to live that way?
We are all familiar with the phenomenon of those—often but not only the young—conforming to good conduct for a time only to abandon it later for something that, clearly, they find more desirable. And while such a happening does not necessarily impugn the formation received—for with human freedom no formation is a sure fire—it does move us to look more closely at how best to form people in virtue.
The wise always have and always will give great attention to this issue; indeed, what could be of more practical import? When Socrates says, “it is the greatest good for a man to discuss virtue every day,” he means a discussion focused on bringing about execution. And such a focus necessarily brings to the fore the terrifyingly simple question of desire: what makes people actually want to live virtuously? This makes sense. In the end we will only become virtuous if we want to. But again, from where comes the want?
An amazing line seized me from a text I have read many times. In Plato’s account of Socrates’s trial in the Apology, we read that Socrates says to his fellow citizens: “I was always concerned with you, approaching each one of you like a father or an elder brother to persuade you to care for virtue.”
Like a father. Or a brother. Or a dear friend. Here is the hidden key, I suggest, to ‘persuading’ people to care for virtue. It is always about relationship. It comes from relationship, and it is for the sake of relationship. This is a subtle and crucial point.
We must ask how a father teaches; and while there is some distinction, this is also in essence how a mother teaches, or any man or woman acting in a fatherly or motherly way. What then should a child see and experience from his father? My father loves me and he loves acting virtuously. These loves are of a piece. He bends all his energy toward acting well. And he wants me to be there with him.
Here a child is drawn toward perhaps the most dramatic of all insights. Living virtuously is how I can truly live with those I love. There is no other way.
It is not that my father will reject me if I don’t live well. It’s that living well is how we can share a life. He can’t change that. No one can change that. We wouldn’t want to change that.
Here, Christianity offers a higher perspective that is stunning. The entire context of human life is a Father calling his children to live a certain way. That way of living is true life, and this most of all because it is how we—amazingly—can in a sense live with Him. This is a far cry from mere abstract duty; and it’s certainly not about winning anyone’s approval.
Virtuous living is a kind of participation in eternal life. Such is the ultimate context for a father persuading his children to care for virtue. Socrates could not have seen this; though perhaps he would only have been so surprised.
We can see this. And while important details of how to form people (including ourselves!) in virtue must still be worked out, we have here the context that gives the root principles and the inspiration to work out those details, perhaps discussing them every day. For at issue is the life we want to live, indeed that we are called to live, with those we love. All because of a Father’s love, in which we can participate, and pass on. ~ ~ ~
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And a different kind of Update from the Garden:
Husband, father, and professor of Philosophy. LifeCraft springs from one conviction: there is an ancient wisdom about how to live the good life in our homes, with our families; and it is worth our time to hearken to it. Let’s rediscover it together. Learn more.
