Virtues for Our Times

by Barbara Anne Radtke

Peggy Noonan, in a recent Wall Street Journal Op Ed, extolled Queen Elizabeth II’s “old school” virtues. To summarize:

· She kept her word. She was reliable and conscientious yet stayed within the boundaries of her role.

· She understood her duty; she made everything secondary to it, even if it meant sacrifice in other parts of her life.

· She accepted life with grace.

· She was a woman of faith.

Although the death of Queen Elizabeth has ended an era, these virtues are still practiced today. For example, I have: a friend who radically altered her retirement dreams to be the primary caregiver of grandchildren; students whose faith life inspire me; and a friend for whom the bonds of trust are the bedrock of relationship. They all have my admiration. The article, however, has left me wondering what additional virtues we need to meet the challenge of our times.

I have been thinking of three:

First, resilience. We live in times that have brought huge social and personal changes: Covid, the shifting world economy, the war in Ukraine, and climate change only to name a few examples. It might be good to identify practices that encourage resilience, a way to bounce back from what we have been dealt when these changes touch our lives. Practices that encourage resilience may help us live life fully and reveal a recovered self who is more capable of coping when confronted once again with change.

Second, agility. As someone in her mid-seventies, I am aware of the advice to maintain physical agility. Yet, mental and emotional agility are also critical.

Cultural and political commentators are fond of using the word “pivot.” Public figures are said to pivot when they change their attention from one issue to another or to explain how they have changed their mind. Businesses have to pivot to stay viable. Sometimes it is an internal change of mind such as pivoting between working together in one space and working from remote. Sometimes it is more external. Changes in manufacturing because of different needs during the pandemic are a partial cause of today’s supply chain shortages. We have our own personal pivots as the curve balls of life come our way. Agility is the combination of our mental, emotional, and spiritual strategies to cope with new or changed circumstances by re-framing how we understand and articulate them.

Third, perseverance. In our rapidly changing world, we may do many things for expediency, but we lose our compass if we lose our basic values. Perseverance is a virtue that helps us stay the course and maintain the values that have shaped us into our best self. It is the virtue that prompts us to call society to justice and to the common good.

What are your thoughts, dear readers, about virtues to cultivate in this 21st century?

Kathy’s Response

What a great link between those old school virtues practiced by Queen Elizabeth and ones needed for today. I can relate to each of the three you mentioned, particularly in times of such rapid change and global needs.

My own take on this is colored by the recent death of an old and dear friend. Her funeral was held a few days ago and I was asked to deliver the eulogy. Thus, I gave a lot of thought to the virtues that made her such a caring and generous mother, grandmother, friend, and coworker. One was humility – an ability to recognize who she was as well as who she was not. Humility is a virtue that reigns in our tendencies to either inflate or deflate ourselves. Now that we are able to create online profiles, craft our own avatars, and share random thoughts online, this virtue provides a welcome sense of balance and perspective by reminding us that we are not the center of the universe; nor are we insignificant when it comes to contributing what we can to the common good.

Kindness was the second virtue that came to mind and how, in the words of a poet, it grows as a result of loss and heartache. (“Kindness” by Naomi Shihab Nye) As you pointed out, we live in a time of great personal and global change. Much of this entails loss in one form or another. As such, we can either shut down or open up; our hearts can grow brittle with resentment and fear or expansive in love and gratitude. Through the extension of kindness we have the capacity to shape our environment towards the latter and offer something of value to those around us and to those who will follow us.

I, too, look forward to responses from our readers. What virtues – old or new school – do you see operative in your life and necessary for the good of all?