Fortitude

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

            There are a lot of rules out there.  We have the seminary handbook for the seminarians in the School of Theology which describes what you are supposed to do, including the Order of the Day, where you are supposed to be, what your responsibilities are, what the goals for your formation are.  There are also laws for our nation and there are laws for the State of Missouri, laws for your own home state.  We have laws for this municipality – Shrewsbury – in which we live.  There are some rewards for following these laws and guidelines in various handbooks, rulebooks, and statute books – and there are some penalties for not following these laws.  However, following these laws does not make us a saint, nor does it make us holy, and nor even does it make us good.  Following laws only makes us not a criminal.  It is just a good start.  We know we are called to something much more than following these various laws.  We are called to a life of virtue, a habitual disposition to do good and to give the best of ourselves in all     situations – to use all of our powers in the pursuit of the good.  We have the definition from Gregory of Nyssa, “The goal of a virtuous life is to become like God.”  This is quite a calling.  This is our call.

Virtue of Fortitude

            The virtue of fortitude is described as “a firmness in difficulties and a constancy in the pursuit of good; to strengthen our resolve to resist temptations and to overcome obstacles; and to conquer fear, even the fear of death.”  Sometimes the virtue of fortitude is called the virtue of the saints or the virtue of the martyrs.  It is to help us to face trials, persecutions, and to dispose us to sacrifices in life in defense of just causes.  Another way of talking about fortitude is a particular firmness of spirit, which prompts us to be strong in the face of grave obstacles.  The grave obstacles are sometimes encountered in the fulfillment of our duty in the pursuit of virtue.  There are all kinds of situations in which fortitude is required.  In particular, we think about fortitude for the martyr; one who is called to give up his life.  But we speak of fortitude analogously not  only when one’s life is in immediate danger. Fortitude is required to practice religion in spite of persistent criticism, in spite of mocking, in spite of persecution.  We live in a society in which the practice of our faith can be said, in this day and age, to be counter-cultural.  So fortitude is required to some degree in simply proclaiming one’s values and beliefs in daily living.

In Fr. Brennan’s homily at daily Mass yesterday, he reminded us that in the practice of our faith we are called to fearlessly proclaim the truth in a spirit of pastoral charity.  This daily fidelity to witnessing our faith in the face of obstacles to some degree could be said to be even more difficult than the arduous task of taking critical action in a moment of enthusiasm.  If we do something one time, it is over.  I don’t want to stand before you and blithely state that doing something heroic for an instant is easy.  But I do want to say that I know there is something equally heroic about the daily fidelity to virtue.  So this evening I ask that we reflect upon this virtue of fortitude, which can give us the strength to do what we need to do each and every day in ways great and small.  It is said by some of the spiritual writers that the virtue of fortitude can be acquired by the practice of a distrust of self and an unlimited trust in God.  That is what it is all about. 

Particular Aspects of Fortitude

Fortitude touches many aspects of our lives.  In particular, I think about growing in fortitude from the mind because we can reason to commitment to the good.  The more that we reason to the good and we decide that it is the way that we want to live our lives, the more that we know that we are going to need fortitude to be true.  Through reason, we can decide we want to pursue this life of good but we need fortitude to be true to that decision.  Also, fortitude can be empowered from the heart, from the spirit, from a deep-down kind of love from the very bottom of our being that is engendered by gratitude.  In reference to a homily that I presented just recently, I noted that we have a choice to make in the way that we live each and every day.  To be a whiner, like the Israelites were in the desert or to imitate the example of Jesus, who hangs above us, who emptied himself out, the kenosis – the total emptying of himself.  Once he did this with his spirit then in a certain sense that gave him the fortitude that he needed to face his difficult challenges.  A priest, in this day and age, needs this kind of fortitude to live out his calling.  As rewarding as this calling can be to his spirit, to his heart, to his soul, to his very being, he needs courage to face these challenges day after day: challenges that come from the world, challenges that come internally within the community of the Church because of various ways of approaching the faith, and above all, challenges which come from our very being, which can wear us down due to our own weaknesses. 

Most of us will likely never be called to be martyrs like those of the early church or the many thousands of martyrs of the twentieth century and now into the twenty-first century.  While we may not be called to be martyrs in exactly that same way, we should pray for that same type of courage, that same type of fortitude that the martyrs had as we go out into the world today.  We can pray for that same type of fortitude to take up the cross each and every day in a world which increasingly challenges the cross.

Readiness to Fall in Battle

I would like to mention some particular aspects of fortitude as are espoused by one of the great moral theologians, Joseph Pieper.  One that he mentions is “readiness to fall in battle.”  He says that a Christian might well say, “I have a joyful readiness for martyrdom.”  It is easy to say  that sitting here in Shrewsbury.  But he says this “joyful readiness for martyrdom” is unreal absent any real threat.  He also reminds us that “suffering for its own sake is nonsense.”  There is certainly a certain merit and a certain reward that comes from suffering and the willingness to suffer, even as we pray that our sufferings may make up for what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ.  However, to say that there is some sense in suffering doesn’t mean that we don’t value “not suffering.”  It is not weak to acknowledge that. There are many things in life that are “not suffering” that we value and that are in fact good.  So while we don’t go about seeking a life of suffering or seeking martyrdom in precisely this way, we seek to align to our spirit so that we are ready for it.  Also, some of the spiritual writers caution against what they a “garrulous enthusiasm” for martyrdom. 

Some of those who lived in the time of the early martyrs went around saying, “I hope that I am the next.”  The spiritual writers cautioned against that kind of expression because it can be some kind false sense of self.  A person should be prepared for the worst which might come his way if he lives every day fully engaged in the world that is around him, at the same time seeking a readiness to die if one is called to do so.  This kind of disposition of soul and spirit is to be desired: that one loves life and embraces it and lives it fully each and every day but is ready to give it up if called to do so.  This results in an incredibly free approach to life.  This is truly what we mean by dying to self.  A person who has achieved that kind of disposition through fortitude can almost say even in the most difficult situations, “life is easy.”  You hear of people doing very heroic things that seemed impossible.  If they have such a spirit that they have freed themselves up from the earthly attachments even though they loved them, it is truly easy to do quite heroic things.  A question for reflection: Are we really placing our lives on the line for the faith in fortitude?  Or, are we just a dilettante of religion, and our vocation just a fascinating hobby?

Fortitude Must Not Trust Itself

Another attitude connected with fortitude of which that we are reminded by St. Ambrose is that “Fortitude must not trust itself.”  Fortitude is not a purely vital, blind, exuberant daredevil spirit.  It may manifest itself like that sometimes, but it depends upon prior virtues to be lived out freely, particularly the virtues of prudence and justice.  Some of the Christian writings on fortitude are rooted in some traditional ancient philosophies.  Pericles said in this regard, “To dare most liberally where we have reflected our best; with others who have not reflected so well, only ignorance begets fortitude.”  Think about this in terms of your own personal prayer.  Spending time reflecting and meditating in certain areas to deepen your own spirituality can lead you to a type of zeal and a great type of fortitude in ministry.  Is our practice of fortitude rooted in prudence and justice?

Endurance and Attack

Another aspect related to fortitude is that attitude of “indifference to life.”  If a person develops an attitude of indifference to life, that is not to be equated with fortitude.  Rather we must seek to embrace the gift of life that God has given to us.  In a certain sense, if we are not really afraid, we cannot practice fortitude, because there are things that are worth being afraid of.  If we don’t have love, if we don’t fear some things, we can hardly be practicing fortitude; that is simply a life of not caring.  And that is not to be confused with fortitude at all.  In order to practice fortitude, we must love truly.  The one who loves falsely fears falsely.  The examples I think of are people who love certain possessions.  They can live in mortal fear that these possessions are going to be damaged, or ruined, or taken from them.  They are loving falsely.  A person who is love with their own appearance can truly be afraid of the slightest blemish that comes to their face, or of the first gray hair (which was a long time ago for some of us).  Or being afraid of having to let out their belt buckles another notch.  A person who lives with those as their ultimate values loves falsely, so he fears falsely.

It’s worth being afraid of certain things; it’s not worth being afraid of losing things that are fleeting.  We see this particularly in adolescent relationships.  Adolescent relationships are not however limited to people who are teenagers.  People who have only dependent-type relationships, weak relationships, sometimes obsess with fear that they are going to lose those relationships.  If it is a weak relationship, they ought to lose it.  This why you see teenagers who are first learning about relationships oftentimes in such distress.  There may be a break up of something that seemed so precious when it wasn’t a very mature relationship in the first place.  That doesn’t mean that it was evil, but it is an example of what I would call loving falsely so that people fear falsely.  People can have such relationships even into their adulthood and mid-life.  Very unhealthy types of relationships.  But when people love truly, when they love truly in relationships, when they love truly the things of God, when they love truly the things of faith, this is worth being fearful about.  And when we have that true love and that true fear from loving properly, that is when we need the virtue of fortitude so that we can be faithful to those true loves.  So that we can face up to those fears and overcome them to move forward with our lives. 

Patience

Ultimately in this regard what we need is the virtue of patience.  Patience leads us to fortitude.  One definition of patience is “the radiant embodiment of ultimate integrity.”  St. Thomas said, “Through patience a man possesses his soul.”  We can say in a certain sense that patience leads us to the essence of fortitude.  A very practical example in the physical world is of people who are expert in the martial arts.  They oftentimes are persons of ultimate patience.  Thank God for the rest of us.  Those who are masters in the martial arts teach this patience and discipline of spirit along with teaching the discipline of the body.  A person is not truly a master of the martial arts unless they have disciplined their spirit even more than their body so that they can release with great energy that discipline of the body when the right time occurs rather than out of anger or exasperation or revenge.  So it is true for us.  Without a disciplined spirit and without patience how do we know when we do something with great enthusiasm whether it is born of love or simply born from our own weaknesses?  I ask this question for our reflection.  Is our practice of what goes under the name of fortitude a result of patience or only a result of exasperation and impatience? 

Vital, Moral, Mystic Fortitude

One additional aspect related to the virtue of fortitude is with regard a lack of courage.  A lack of courage to accept injury and the incapability of self-sacrifice belong to the deepest sources of psychic illness.  If we cannot accept some injury, if we cannot accept some willingness to self-sacrifice, it is impossible to have mental health.  It has been disclosed over time there is a connection between a lack of mental health and spiritual insecurities as well.  So the two basics in terms of our human formation are the courage to accept injury when it does come our way and the willingness to self-sacrifice.  We need these predispositions for our growth in all the virtues, in particular in terms of fortitude.

We must prepare ourselves so that we have the spirit in which we have a readiness to die and to accept it not out of season but in its proper time.  Developing this spirit results in a healthy spirit of detachment and a spirit of freedom.  Simply sustaining an injury is not noble in and of itself.  Sustaining injury can sometimes result simply from recklessness.  St. Augustine said it this way, “It is not the injury but the cause that makes the martyr.”  St. Thomas said, “The praise of fortitude depends upon justice.”  What counts is the reason that the people place themselves at risk.  Putting themselves at risk for a noble cause is martyrdom, risking life for a frivolous cause or a fleeting pleasure is simply silliness. St. Thomas said, “The praise of fortitude depends upon justice.”  So we ask this question: do we take risks for the things that really matter or only for our own personal ambition, our own pride, our own fleeting pleasures, or our own petty preferences?  You think of people having temper tantrums sometimes making an excuse in the name of virtue or fortitude or nobility.  When we do lose our temper or we have a great burst of energy for some particular issue, how noble is the cause or is the cause only our own petty preference?

Fortitude in Scriptures

            The Scriptures in a particular way call to a life of fortitude.  The Book of Wisdom 8:7 speaks of the virtues of justice, prudence, and fortitude and says that nothing is more useful in life than these.  Speaking of a person who has troubles to overcome, we think of St. Paul.  His troubles are well depicted in Scriptures.  We can contrast the little troubles that we have here each day. Such as people not responding when we greet them, or people not appreciating the acts of kindness that we do for them.  We can think of the major troubles of St. Paul in terms of his shipwrecks and imprisonment and beatings.  In addition, he told the people, “Take courage, as you have testified in Jerusalem, so you must also bear witness in Rome” (Acts 23:11). Not knowing what troubles would yet be ahead in Rome.  When Paul was greeted on his way to Rome, he took heart and courage; he took heart from being supported by his fellow disciples after his shipwrecks, being in jail, being bitten on the wrist by a snake.  The result of his moving beyond all these difficulties, for being such a person of courage, is described for us in the Book of Acts 28:15 that he preached the Gospel from morning until evening; it says in Scriptures that “he lived in Rome for two years at his own expense.” 

Another place in St. Paul’s writings in 2 Corinthians 5:6-8 he speaks again of courage and the importance of fortitude.  He encourages us to “walk by faith, not by sight.”  I think of a very practical example of this for anyone who has ever been to Rome.  Talk about a place where you need to walk by faith and not by sight.  Every time that you step out into traffic, you just have to do it by faith that these crazy drivers are going to stop and not run you over.  When we have this ordinary example of walking by faith and not by sight, this is equally true for us in all of our daily living. We don’t know what each day is going to bring.  We don’t know what the outcome of each day of formation is going to be or each year of formation for that matter.  Yet while we don’t know by sight where that path is going to lead for each day or for each week or each semester or each year, we walk by faith and move forward with courage and with fortitude to follow the way in which the Lord is calling us.

            One of the most famous Scripture passages that reminds of us courage is that in       Psalm 23:4, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.” (You know the next line in some versions is, “I fear no evil, for I am the meanest man in the valley.”)  However, the Scriptures go on to tell us, “Lord, I fear no evil because your rod and your staff give me courage.”  I think it is a special note that sometimes what leads to courage is fear of the Lord.  Fear of violating the truth leads us to a lot of courageous actions.  I think of this first in human terms; you sometimes will hear a man say he is doing the right thing because he wouldn’t want to go home and explain to his wife why he did the wrong thing.  You hear teenagers sometimes doing the right thing because they don’t want to go home and explain to their parents why they did the wrong thing.  If this is true for husbands and if it is true for teenagers, how much more should it be true for us in the eyes of the Lord? Do we want to go home to the Lord and explain why we did the wrong thing?  So it is an irony that a fear of the Lord can sometimes propel us to a greater fortitude in facing the greater and lesser challenges of each and every day.  In the terms of the psychological development, in order for this type of fear to have an impact, we must love the right things and fear the right things.  If we love the wrong things, love in the wrong way, or fear the wrong things immaturely, then we can hardly be acting with fortitude.

            Finally, I make reference in the Scriptures to the mention of fortitude in the healing passages.  In Matthew 9:22 think of those words that are used sometimes by Jesus before he cures a person.  “Take courage.”  “Be not afraid.” Why would you need to say that to a person who is about to be cured? What is so difficult about being cured and why wouldn’t the person just rejoice?  Jesus said this before the cure of the woman with the hemorrhage, before the cure of the paralytic.  He tells them for a variety of reasons.  Why might the Lord have to tell us, “Be not afraid,” “Take courage,” Take heart,” “Be strong”?  Because we sometimes want to hang on to what is wrong with us.  A cure, which is a change, takes courage.  We are so used to being who we are.  How often do we want to say to someone else when they ask us about something, “Well that’s the way that I am.”  As if “take me or leave me”.  It is easier to hang onto bad habits.  It is easier sometimes to hang onto sickness.  It is easier to hang onto sin.  So it was in the time of Jesus himself.  That is why he sometimes said in these healing stories, “Take Courage.” “Be strong.” “Take heart.” “My healing touch is upon you.”  We need this gift of fortitude to allow the Lord to give to us his healing touch.

Saints of Fortitude

            Very often when we use the terms such as bravery, heroism, or fortitude in our contemporary society, we think of figures in the world of sports.  The role of sports in our society seems to take an ever-increasing role in terms of recreation and entertainment.  While there is a legitimate role for sports in terms of relaxation and perhaps even a healthy form of escape from some of the challenges of daily living, to use the term fortitude for accomplishments in sports seems inappropriate because the accomplishments are diminished by the triviality of the cause.  While significant achievements in sports oftentimes do require both a great mental and physical discipline, such accomplishments are hardly close to the center of life, not even for the participants, for whom it may largely be a business and a means of support.

Also we speak of heroism and bravery in terms of war.  While certainly in the history of the Church a case has been made for there being just wars, even there the achievements may be diminished by the ambiguity of the cause.  The nature of fortitude is determined in part by the nobility of the cause; a moral cause associated with war may sometimes be tainted in that the fight is often for land and resources as well as for a moral purpose.  So it seems that we can reserve a special place for the use of the term, “fortitude” for those who are living for the higher cause of the faith, for eternal values.  We speak of fortitude in a special way in the lives of the saints, those who have taken selfless and prudent risks for a higher cause.

            We have all known people of fortitude.  We have examples in our own lives.  I would like to close this evening by simply mentioning some of the examples that are in our own midst here at the seminary which are images of some great heroes of the faith.  Near our elevator, we have the image of St. Thomas More: one of the greatest practitioners of fortitude.  You know his famous quote on his day of execution (July 6, 1535), “I am the king’s good servant, but God’s first.”  He is reported to have said as he prayed the prayer that we pray on Fridays, Psalm 51 – “Have mercy on me O Lord in your goodness.”  He is one of the most noble examples of fortitude in all of history.  Standing up to the king and being able to display that act of generosity and fortitude on that one day resulted from a lifetime of having practiced obedience to the truth.  In this regard St. Thomas More said, “You must understand that in things touching conscience every good subject is more bound to have respect to his sound conscience and to his soul than to any other thing in all the world beside.”  St. Thomas More lived fidelity to this each and every day.  He is a great example for the way that we should live also.

            Our new statue in the courtyard depicts one of the patron saints for this Archdiocese, St. Vincent de Paul; and we have other statues of him also.  He is also a man of great fortitude who lived out his faith in very difficult times. This new statue depicts him as one who fed the people with the Word of God, and one who fed the poor people the bread of the world. He displayed an underlying integrity and fidelity to the Word of God as it touched his heart.  He lived his life in very difficult times, times that were not always receptive to what the Church had to offer. He is a great example to us as we hold him up as one of our local patron saints as living a life of fortitude.

            Also the two statues in the back of the St. Joseph chapel – St. John Vianney and St. Rose Philippine Duchesne.  There is a quote on the statue of St. John Vianney, Cure of Ars, “If we really understand the priest on earth, we would die not of fright but of love.”  He is truly a man of fortitude who had one of the greatest appreciations of all time of what it meant to be a priest.  The way that he depicts this is through the way that he lived out his life of fortitude in his daily fidelity to the calling of a parish priest in the humble village of Ars.  The end result was an overwhelming life of love.  The quote depicted on the statue of St. Rose Philippine Duchesne, another one of the patron saints for this Archdiocese, is, “Courage, then, one is always richer for having made sacrifices for God.”  So she called us to this life of courage also.  The times in which she lived in this particular part of the United States life were much more difficult physically than today.  She certainly was a courageous person and a great example also to us of fortitude.

            I close with the examples of fortitude as depicted by those in the Stations of the Cross.  In the fifth Station, St. Simon, in the sixth Station, St. Veronica.  And we have the saint for today in the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, Mary meeting her son on the way to Calvary.  I mention these images simply because they are ones that we all walk by every day as we go onto our next activity or next busy event.  But as we take these moments of reflection this evening we can think of them all as examples of fortitude.  Living out this firmness and this consistency in the pursuit of virtue.  These are people who did not limit their lives by looking in the rulebook to see what they had to do next.  They looked into the bottom of their hearts to use all the gifts that they had in the pursuit of good and even placed their lives on the line to do so.  And of course, St. Joseph, here in the front of the chapel, for whom the chapel is named; we can view him as an example of fortitude, as a partner in the fiat of Mary, having lived this out faithfully as her partner throughout his life.  And of course the ultimate example of fortitude, Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, himself.  We thank him among other things for being the greatest example of fortitude of all time.  We pray for his mercy for times in which many do not live according to this virtue. We pray that we can all grow in fidelity to fortitude in witnessing his message of love and compassion.