Acting on our beliefs

LINDSAY: Welcome to a special weekend edition of The World and Everything in It. I'm Lindsay Mast. 

Today: A discussion about committing to God, family, community and country. Two years ago, Robert P. George declared June to be “Fidelity Month.” It’s designed to encourage Americans to recommit to some shared values. George is a Roman Catholic political philosopher and legal scholar. He serves as Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University.

Professor George, thank you for joining us.

ROBERT P. GEORGE: Oh, good morning. It's good to be with you. Lindsay.

MAST: Tell me about when you first had the idea of Fidelity Month? Where were you and what was going on at the time?

GEORGE: I was having breakfast. It was early in the spring of 2023 I was having my morning cup of tea and four biscotti cookies. That's my breakfast. And I was going through the various papers and websites that I look at in the morning. And The Wall Street Journal happened that morning to be reporting on some recent survey data, respondents had been asked questions the general people from the general public had been asked questions about what they thought was important in life. These are questions that had been put to people by this survey organization for many years now.

And what was striking about those survey data was that it showed that Americans belief in the importance of, for example, God and religion in their lives had significantly diminished from where it was 10 or even five years ago. Similarly, Americans belief in the importance of marriage and the family had diminished. And finally, it reported that Americans belief in the importance of patriotism and service to one's community or communities had also diminished.

The one thing, the one value that had seen an increase in Americans belief in the importance of turned out to be money.

Well, these data alarm me, not that I think that money is unimportant. Obviously, in a world like ours, you need money in order to live. And I want everyone to be prosperous, and I want our society to be prosperous. And I think paying attention to economic needs is very, very important.

But money is not as important as faith and family and patriotism and the things that are really valuable, not just as means to other ends the way money is but for their own sake. And what alarmed me even more than that was this Lindsay, for almost all of our history, really, until very recently, what bound Americans together, despite our many differences, united us. What provided our sources of unity and strength were shared beliefs, shared commitment, shared values.

Number one, of course, our shared commitment across racial and ethnic lines, across religious lines, across cultural lines, our shared belief in our system of government, in our constitutional republic, in the system of ordered Liberty bequeathed to us by our founding fathers.

But number two, in supporting that first sort of foundation of our common life, you had shared belief, again, across races, across ethnicities, across religions, across cultural histories, in the importance of God and religious faith and of marriage and the family and stable marriages and good families, and the belief in patriotism and the importance of serving your community being willing to sacrifice for your communities.

MAST: Tell me more about what sorts of challenges to unity we might face because of those differences.

GEORGE: We are not a nation whose unity and strength is to be found in blood and soil or thrown on an altar. We're not bound together because we're of the same race. We're many different races. We're not bound together because we're all of the same ethnic backgrounds. We are of an astonishing diversity of ethnicities. Our ancestors come from Japan and Croatia and India and Poland and all over the world.

So if we're to be bound together, it can't be on the basis of this shared ancestry or even shared creed. It's got to be other things, like the belief in our Constitutional Republic and in our democratic form of government, like the belief in the importance of God and of marriage and of patriotism,

Take the first of those. The importance of God. It's not just Christians, it's not just Protestants, it's not just Christians. It's Jews, it's it's Protestants, like Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Americans, members of the Buddhist traditions and Hindu traditions, whose ancestors came to this country, or who came to their country, this country themselves, who proclaim our nation to be one nation under God.

Our national motto is “In God we trust.” Our very foundational document, the Declaration of Independence proclaims that our fundamental rights and the duties correlative to those rights don't come from any merely human power, don't come from Kings and presidents and parliaments and congresses or Supreme Courts. They come from God, the Creator, and because no merely human authority conferred these rights on us. No merely human power, no matter how great in worldly terms, no president, no king, no Congress, no parliament, no court can legitimately take those rights away. That was a shared belief that bound Americans together, whether you're Christian or Jewish, Protestant or Catholic, Eastern, Orthodox, Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, no matter what you were or are, similarly, you don't have to be white or black or Asian or Latino to believe in the importance of the family as the fundamental unit of society, or the importance of having mom and dad and a loving marital bond bringing up children we know across the religious divide, across the racial divide, across the ethnic divides, we know that children flourish when there is a stable home, but children do very poorly. They are the victims when the family disintegrates or fails to form.

And same with patriotism. If you look Lindsay at the blood that has been shed to preserve our liberties, to protect our republic, that blood is not just white blood, not just black blood, not just Asian blood, not just Latino blood, not just American Indian blood, it's the blood of all Americans of all races. It's not just Jewish blood or Christian blood or Muslim blood or Hindu blood, it's the soldiers who have given the last full measure of devotion, including Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, people of all faiths and people who don't subscribe to any particular religious denomination or creed. So fidelity month is all about rededicating ourselves to those fundamental values that once bound us together and were our sources of strength and unity, and can I submit bind us together again And again, be our sources of strength and unity?

MAST: But you didn’t choose to call it “Values Month.” You chose “Fidelity Month.” So talk to me about this term fidelity.

GEORGE: Fidelity is the active part of the equation. We can say family is important. We can say God is important. We can say country is important. Now, what do we actively do? That's where fidelity comes in.

Because God is important, we should be faithful to God, following our consciences according to our own traditions of faith. We should be faithful, conscientious believers. If we're Christians, let's be better Christians. If we're Jews, let's be better Jews. If we're Hindus, let's be better Hindus. Let's honor God again within our own understanding of what God requires of us, but let's do that join with our fellow citizens, who may not be of the same specific creed as us.

Same with spouses and families. Fidelity, Lindsay, is when it comes to marriage and family, is more than just not having affairs. That's the minimum. It's necessary. Certainly, if you're having affairs, extramarital affairs, are not being faithful, then that's really bad, and it's very destructive. But let's not think that fidelity ends with just not having affairs. If you're not having affairs, that means you're faithful. No, being a husband or being a wife is a vocation, and a vocation is a way of serving.

Uh, a true marriage is where the spouse is understanding that they have a vocation to marriage, serve each other, put each other's interests and needs ahead of their own, put the needs of the children ahead of the desires of the parents. So true fidelity to marriage and family means being a better husband, being a better wife, being a better mom, being a better dad.

And all of us can work on that, because it's a never ending process. But we should constantly be asking ourselves, if you're a man, if you're a husband, “How can I serve my wife better?”

How can I be more attentive to her needs? Or if I'm a wife, how can I serve my husband better and our children better. How can I be more attentive to their needs? And when both husband and wife are taking that attitude, you're going to have a flourishing family. And if you're blessed with children, those children are going to have the biggest blessing you could possibly have in life, parents who are dedicated to each other, who are serving each other and who are serving them in part by serving each other.

MAST: What about in terms of fidelity to country?

GEORGE: It's the active part again, it's what we do. It goes beyond just recognizing our country is a great country. Okay, our country's great country, but what are we going to do for our country. John F Kennedy, in his inaugural address, famously said, and we can't repeat this often enough. Really, we should remind ourselves of it every day. Now, some have been called on and have answered the call to serve in the military. Some have given what Lincoln called the last full measure of devotion, sacrificed their very lives for our liberties, for our our country. Not all of us are called to do that, thank God.

But all of us are called to be more active citizens, to pay attention to government affairs, to be active as a voter, to get involved in the causes that we think are important to promote the common good and the rights of that are set forth in our Constitution. The Constitution can only be maintained if we have an active citizenry who's willing to insist that constitutional principles be respected by those, especially by those holding power, of course. So we need to be part of that. We can't be on the sidelines. Fidelity there means genuine active citizenship. 

Some of us should think about running for office. Some of us should think about serving on the school board or on the town council, or, you know, state legislature or United States Senate or President of the United States. Some of us should be more active in political campaigns, volunteering our time, contributing our money, if there's a candidate we can really get behind who's going to stand up for what we think will make our country better, serve the common good. 

So let's be involved in politics, and let's be involved in any movement in our community that's going to improve the community. It might be non governmental. It might be being more active in Youth Affairs. It might be volunteering as a coach in your community. It might be, you know, volunteering at the library. All of us can do something to serve our communities, and that's where what fidelity means when it comes to country, to country and community,

MAST: Fidelity Month is in June but you say this is not a response to Pride Month–why not?

GEORGE: Well, fidelity month is not reactive. It's not reacting to something bad. I happen not to share the values of Pride Month. I don't believe in the principles that the people who proclaim pride in the sense that it's used these days I don't believe in the principles they believe in. I myself hold to traditional principles of sexual morality and the traditional understanding of of marriage, but the point of fidelity month isn't to react against that or anything else other than to react against the the the erosion of.

Our belief in the fundamental values that once were our common sources of unity and strength. So this is a positive movement. Fidelity. Month really is a movement. It's not just a month, it's a movement, and it's a positive movement. Now there's nobody has any monopoly on any month or any day.

Other people are welcome to celebrate whatever they want in June or September or any other month that they want. It's a free country. I might not be willing to join them, because I don't share those values. It's a free country. I don't have a monopoly on June. I can't stop them from using June as their month for whatever they're wanting to celebrate. But they can't stop me from using June for my month too. Again, it's a it's a free country.

MAST: Call me cynical, but I’m a little skeptical about how much true effect a movement like this can have on our culture–as its founder, how do you measure success?

GEORGE: Well, I want to see how many people are demonstrating that this proposal to rededicate ourselves to these principles of fidelity, how many people these proposals are resonating with? How do I know that? I see what they're posting on Facebook and Twitter and Insta. I see how many are using the fidelity month logo for their profile pics on on their social media accounts? And those are just indicators, and those are relatively minor things.

The more important things, although they're harder to get a get a comprehensive picture of, are things like, how many pastors are choosing a Sunday in June to talk about fidelity? I know some are. They write to me and tell me they are, or their congregants write to me and say my priest or my rabbi said a wonderful thing about fidelity month, or used fidelity month as the occasion to talk about the importance of fidelity to God, or fidelity to spouses and families, or fidelity to our to our country. 

So that's always encouraging to hear that I also know—and again, I don't have a comprehensive count—but I also know from people writing to me, or from seeing the things I see posted on social media, that some people are with their local groups of various descriptions, hosting speakers for fidelity month. I'm not trying to dictate anything from the top down. This is not a top down movement. We don't have a committee. We don't have a budget.

You know? We do have a website. And our website, fidelity month.com,

gives a wonderful menu, provides a wonderful menu of things that anybody can do to help promote fidelity, focusing here on Fidelity Month, although we want people to practice and promote fidelity 12 months a year.

Look at history, the liberties we enjoy, the Honorable liberties we enjoy, they are the exception, not the rule, historically or even look around the globe today, I spent four years serving on and a couple of years chairing the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. During my time on the Commission on religious freedom, we surveyed the world to see how broadly religious freedom was respected, and we found that 75% of the population of the world live under regimes that significantly restrict or violate basic religious freedom. 

But we've got it in this country now we have to work to protect it, and there are violations of religious freedom that occur here, and we have wonderful organizations like Alliance Defending Freedom and Beckett fund and First Liberty and other wonderful organizations that will go to the courts for us to defend our religious freedom. But if you compare our situation here with just about anywhere else in the world, we are so blessed the most fundamental freedom of all religious freedom, we enjoy it more securely than just about any other people on the face of the globe. And of course, if we, if we look across history, very rarely historically has religious freedom been truly consistently respected. So our country does a lot for us. What now can we do to serve our fellow citizens and fellow members of our local communities.

MAST: You set aside one day in June–it was this past Tuesday–as a Day of Prayer and Fasting. You also have a prayer that you encourage individuals and churches to pray on the Fidelity Month website. Tell me about that.

GEORGE: We do have a day of prayer. And I know that at least if you're from one of the great monotheistic traditions, if you're Christian or Jewish or Muslim, you will be able to join our our prayer. And it's for this reason we brought together representatives, leaders of those three great traditions, to compose a prayer that all could, in good conscience, pray. And it's at the same time a substantive prayer. We want everybody to be a part of Fidelity Month.

You see, that's the thing Lindsay. This is the opposite of exclusionary. People use the term inclusion a lot these days, promiscuously and often falsely and misleadingly. This is real inclusion. We want people from all the great traditions of faith and anybody who can, in good conscience, join us in celebrating and rededicating ourselves to Fidelity, to be part of this movement. We're not We're not pushing anybody out.

MAST: And how are you personally praying right now, Professor George?

GEORGE: I'm praying for our nation, and I'm praying for our leaders.

And I'm praying for our people. I'm praying for our nation, that we as a people may be faithful, ever faithful, more faithful, to the principles that made this a great country, that made us one nation under God that made us a nation, as Lincoln said, quoting the Declaration of Independence, “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, and among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” 

We have very often in our history, strayed from those principles. From the very beginning with slavery, we strayed from that principle, if all men are created equal, if all men are created equal, how can you enslave some men, men being human beings, of course. How can you put some people in slavery and then proclaim equality? Well, that contradiction took us a civil war, and then generations of labor after that, effort, work, struggle after that, to be faithful to what we proclaimed our belief in. 

And today, similarly, we are not living up to our beliefs in many domains. Our precious unborn brothers and sisters are not being given the full and equal protection of the laws. You know there are, there are still injustices in this country that need to be rectified. Let's pray for the wisdom and the courage to act to rectify these injustices, to bring our nation more perfectly into line. 

We'll never be there 100% in this vale of tears. We're all fallen and fallible and frail, but let's get closer, as close as we can, always moving forward toward our ideals of liberty and justice for all. So I'm going to be praying for our nation, for them. I'm going to be praying for our people. Because, after all, what is the nation? It's the people. What's going to bring us more, what's what's going to bring us, as a people, closer in line with our fundamental principles? It will be individual people believing in those principles more fervently and acting on those principles more with greater determination.

And then, of course, for our leaders, they are the people we entrust with power to act on our behalf and in our name, and I believe they need the support of our prayers. So I'm going to be praying for them, and not just the ones who are in my political party, and not just the ones I voted for, and not just the ones I generally approve of.

I'm going to be praying for all of our leaders, even those I would race to the polls to vote against, because they need that prayer support as much as any other leader does. So that's what I'm praying for.

MAST: Robert P. George is McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University and the founder of Fidelity Month. Professor George, thank you so much for joining us.

GEORGE: Oh, it's my pleasure. Thanks for having me on. Lindsay.

MAST: You’ve been listening to an extended interview with political philosopher and legal scholar Dr. Robert P. George. 

I'm Lindsay Mast. This is the full version of the edited conversation you heard earlier this week on The World and Everything in It.

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