Over the last few weeks, we have reflected from time to time on the need to live what is classically known as the virtues.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines virtue as “an habitual and firm disposition to do the good. It allows the person not only to perform good acts, but to give the best of himself. The virtuous person tends toward the good with all his sensory and spiritual powers; he pursues the good and chooses it in concrete actions.” (1803).

A few weeks ago,we noted in this space that the growing secularization of our society has led to a collective inability to distinguish right from wrong, to recognize what is that good that each of us must seek.

We experience the resulting confusion, coarseness and even family breakdowns that result from defining truth as whatever each individual decides it is for himself or herself. Both by reason and by faith we recognize that the virtues are the antidote to this potentially lethal societal weakness.

As we have seen, the first of the human virtues, those open to all men and women of good will, is prudence. Prudence is linked to the recognition of the good, and the commitment to live it. It recognizes that there is a good embedded in creation and in our human nature if we look at all things honestly.

There is a common truth that binds us all. That is why we are
able to formulate just laws, for example against murder, against theft.

A second human virtue is justice. As with the virtue of prudence, the term justice has a particular meaning as a virtue.

We commonly speak of justice in a negative sense. We might say that a criminal or an offender of some sort received justice for his actions. Justice, in that context, is a matter of retribution.

However, as a virtue justice is “the constant and firm will to give their due to God and neighbor.” (CCC, 1807). Justice is a positive disposition. It conditions each of us to live daily with the constant care and desire to recognize the rights of all others around us.

In this we hear once more the echo of the words from the Prophet Isaiah read recently at Sunday Mass: “Share your bread with the hungry, shelter the oppressed and the homeless; clothe the naked when you see them, and do not turn your back on your own.” (Is 58).

Justice moves us even to the point of sacrifice. We recognize that all men and women have the rights to fulfill their basic needs. Justice is the measuring stick for our generosity with others.

The virtue of justice requires as well that we give God what is due to Him as our creator and ruler. The soul, rightly disposed, feels the need to pray and to worship Him who is greater than we are.

This understanding of justice is a foundational part of our Catholic obligation and desire to attend Mass each Sunday if not more often. It means as well that we dispose our hearts to seek first and always what God desires of us and the world, because we owe Him that.

Justice toward God is the basis of our moral lives and decisions.

We can see the link between justice and prudence.

Prudence tells us that we can identify what is true. This is the reason that we read the classic writers from antiquity and throughout history. It is one of the reasons that we treasure the experience of our elders and our parents. Truth and wisdom are accumulated, even if imperfectly, through human experience.

By faith, we believe and trust that God has revealed to the human race the unseen truth about judgment, salvation and the world to come.

Justice then lives that truth toward God and our neighbor.

The modern denial of any truth but our own individual desire leads to instability and the loss of solidarity among us. The virtues, by contrast, strengthen us both personally and spiritually.

As a result, they give a foundation for greater solidarity and for the resolution of so many of our problems.