Given the renewed interest in Christianity and the ‘quiet revival’ under way in the UK – and in particular the recognition by many socially conservative, classical liberal types like Jordan Peterson, Douglas Murray and others to argue that Christianity is the source of our moral compass in the West – I thought I would note down ten important (not necessarily the most important) values people should be aware of if they want to live by Christian values, and explore them a little for newcomers, enquirers and above all socially conservative classical liberals who might want to know more about the moral framework of Christianity.
I want to start off, though, by framing this conversation properly: what do we mean by values, and how does that connect to ideas like morality and ethics? To cut to the quick: a value, as the word suggests, is the esteem with which we hold something, which is usually accompanied by forms of honouring it. A value is that which is esteemed, and morality is often what follows from that estimation, in the way we act according to that estimation. The valuing of marriage often therefore leads to faithfulness (which in its turn can then be valued/esteemed), which is a moral framework like a guiding light to keep your way true. That moral framework must be lived in real situations, and so one develops an ethic of how to be faithful by applying the moral framework to a real-world situation – such as refusing to go to a nightclub as a way of keeping your faithfulness to your wife from temptation or harm. One of the reasons why the West is having a moral collapse is because it is having a collapse of a common value system, and more importantly has been replacing the moral value system of Christianity with the moral value system of Humanity, something which became main stream culture from the 1960s onwards.
What you value, though, is dependent upon your worldview, and your worldview is expressed as your doctrine, an articulation of your beliefs. Your worldview decides what is important to you. Some examples to illustrate the point: environmentalists (since they believe the natural world to be under extinction-level pressures from the activities of humanity) value conservation of nature, and finding ways to reduce mankind’s impact on nature when such impacts are determined. Fascists believe that strength comes from a strong state with a strong military, and so they often seek to militarise the whole of society as a means to strengthening it. What you value depends upon your doctrines. Since the enlightenment believed there was no certain path to metaphysical beliefs in GOD, they valued more highly matters concerned with this world, and practices and a life orientated about this world. Thus a life dedicated to the next world, like that of a monk, was – and maybe still is – considered strange or a waste. So, for example, the doctrine of individuals’ freedom was centred at the heart of our society, and this was expressed morally – within a hedonistic moral framework structured around self-fulfillment – in this world and this life, which lead to an ethic of experimentation with sex, drugs and the pursuit of pleasure. Often doctrines and values come in couplets. So, for instance, in the examples I am going to give below one could easily couple ‘love’ with ‘knowledge’ or ‘the church’ and ‘the kingdom’ and so on. And so to speak of them singularly, as I am going to do, is not necessarily to do their complexity and synergy the justice that perhaps they deserve. One important observation about this little matrix is that it can not be assumed that any one person, or even grouping of people, will be fully informed in all the doctrines of a worldview; most people will have some synergy, contradictory or not, of more than one worldview joined together. Syncretism is always a danger for any religious outlook, and Christianity is no exception.
We need to understand a fundamental difference between Christian and classical liberal doctrine in that Christian doctrine is fundamentally one based upon disclosure by GOD to man, via mediums like scripture, prophets, institutions (the Levitical priesthood, for instance) and in these last days directly in the person of Christ Jesus, His word, incarnate! However, liberal doctrine is essentially discovered through reason (which had as its backdrop the Christian medieval world) and empiricism in nature. These two different starting points (which in the early enlightenment were completely overlapping) resulted in very different doctrinal frameworks. The first liberals were ‘reasoning’ in response to reformation wars and the medieval context; they mistook their position for ‘objectivity’ as it aimed at being neither ‘protestant’ nor ‘catholic’, but was aiming at truth outside of those two positions, essentially building a third partisan position. The Christian builds his doctrinal (and therefore) moral framework around Jesus Christ, the liberal builds his doctrinal (and therefore) moral framework essentially around an assimilated (from Christianity) and distorted belief in humanity. This differs slightly from a progressive liberal who emphasises much more the idea of the individual human being than any construct of communal construct of a collective humanity.
The value of human life is an essential Christian doctrine, one build on the doctrine of the image of GOD, but which was elevated – chiefly within the new covenant – by another doctrine, which was the commission of our Lord to His holy Church to disciple all people in His way. This commission imbibed in the view of all Christians (formed by the commission) to see the potential of all human beings also to become Christian. This dragged the image of GOD doctrine, and the value it gives to all human life, higher and higher in Christian reflection as Christians built on it over and over again down through the centuries. The Roman games were stopped because of this value. The practice of infanticide was stopped because of this value. The care for the sick, the elderly and widows was elevated because of this value, and slavery was stopped (multiple times). The doctrine is rooted in the fact that GOD made man in His image, in the Garden of Eden. This is before any nation state, religion, or even ethnicity had formed, and was intrinsically given to both man and woman. This was before any class system, and so Christians view the intrinsic dignity of man to be rooted in something within himself, and that is the image of GOD. Anyone who wants to be a Christian must adopt this value!
The idea that Israel should treat the resident aliens amongst them like themselves (in Leviticus 19:33-34), and that kings were as subject to the demands of the Torah as humble farming peasants – think of King Ahab and Elijah, or David and Nathan – is something clearly rooted in the Old Testament literature. Christians, whilst not obliged to keep the Torah, none the less had their attitude to the law informed by this revelation, and so in contrast to the pre-Christian era – and to the early Liberal enlightenment idea of an absolute monarchy, as expressed in the Leviathan – Christians in principle always believed that the highest rulers were as subject to Christian morality as anyone else. I don’t think it would be difficult to find examples where this principle fell by the wayside, and nor is the idea unique to the Judeo-Christian belief system, but you can and do see this belief practiced in the Christian world, for instance when Bishop Ambrose forced the repentance from Theodosius, or when Henry II did penance for his role in the murder of Thomas of Beckett, or the passing of Magna Carta which subjected the king to the rule of law. Christians therefore must fashion laws (framed by our own faith), but then apply them blindly on all people equally, and ensure that the laws themselves must be blind to anything but the image of GOD and Christian discipleship.
The church is one of the highest values of the Christian worldview. I am not speaking here of an institution which can come and go – as demonstrated by countless church institutions, or even of your local congregation, though that is important – but rather of the people of GOD; those men and women (and their children) who have entered into the same New Covenant that we ourselves have bound ourselves to. The Church is the focus and loci of both a Christian’s identity, and also of his loyalty and work, his activism and belonging. The church (the Christian community) is the backdrop into which we are to frame our self-understanding. Many Christians will use ‘Christ’ here where I am saying ‘Church’, but this is to confuse the point entirely and to set two things up in opposition with one another, as if they are in competition. The Church is the Body of Christ, it is the People of GOD, the temple of the spirit, the flock of the Lord, the household of the Father, the family of GOD, the citizens of heaven; to serve the church IS to serve the Christ; to couch your identity in the Church IS to count your identity as being in Christ. The Church precedes the state and the nation in all things, and where the nation or the state is arrayed against the Church, our loyalty is always and on every occasion to the Church. This is a global outlook, and catholic in nature; Christians in England owe more loyalty to a Christian Ethiopian than they do to an English Atheist, if they have the capacity to help the Ethiopian Christian. Christians must embody the radical loyalty to the people of GOD in all things, including in their statecraft and political aspirations.
The point of the Church is intrinsically connected though to the Kingdom of GOD which begins in our own heart, and if it can express itself nowhere else, can and should express itself there. But if it can, it should begin to transform our families, our churches, our societies, our nations and our international relations. The Kingdom is where GOD rules, not by a set of rules per se, but by Christians framing themselves in the story of salvation and redemption, and orientating their lives around the values that are built on the doctrines that this ‘story’ gives rise to. We all think in narratives – it’s just how we think. Therefore, if we have the right story, we arrive at approximately the right doctrines and the right values! If you orientate your life around these ten values and work them out in your life, with fear and trembling, you will be embodying the Kingdom of GOD (along with other values). The sign that we are in the Kingdom is that we work with the Spirit, in what He is doing, growing all men to the fullness of Christ in virtue – expressed as ‘fruits of the spirit’ – and in using our ‘gifts’, our ‘talents’ and skills to the benefit of the Church. We are embodying Kingdom-living. It is about drawing all men to the discipleship of Christ. This can be – and is, also – achieved through the use of the law and state apparatus. The ultimate expression of the Kingdom of GOD is a new Christendom!
The value of love is much misunderstood, especially by liberal Christians, almost as unconditional acceptance. This is not entirely wrong, because indeed Christ did accept everyone unconditionally – in so far as he was willing to sit with them, and socialise with them – but Christ expected repentance; he expected transformation in response to the love of GOD, and this is where liberal Christians have got the plot wrong in their understanding of the Christian faith. Christians are principally to act from love in everything they do, even when they fight; they must fight for the love of somebody, and never because they hate someone else! Love sits within an order: the first duty of love is always to the Christian first in each sphere of orbit, to the Christians in our family, to the Christians at our local gathering, to the Christians in our community, to the Christians in society and to the Christians in our nation, and then the nonbelievers in each of these spheres, and then to the Christians internationally, and then to others internationally. We love outwardly – by our sacrificial service, our actions – as far out as we can, given our emotional, material and physical capacity. For some Christians that might mean the borders of their love is to their families alone. Someone like myself can go further; my social media reach permits me to speak up for Christians globally. But since I do not want to dilute that message, I do not go further. When we have fulfilled out duty to our brethren, then we move onto others, as far as our reach can go. But if two concerns conflict – for instance, the help of Christians in our nation conflicts with helping non- Christians in our society – we prioritise the Christian obligation first. Say your personal circumstances allow you to help Christians in your local community, then you help first the Christians in your family, then in your local congregation, and then the non-Christians in your family and then the non-Christians in your local community. Then – because you recognise that this is as far as you can go, given your circumstances – it is not your responsibility to love those you cannot practically love, because love is a practicality. The rest you give up in prayer. However, if by organising at the local level you can do more – say practically help nationally – and you can practically organise locally given your circumstances, then for you it might be an obligation, a demand of love to do so! We Christians organise our lives by an order of love; if helping some nonbeliever was to detriment of the people of GOD, then we are obliged not to help them!
The Christian faith believes in the virtuous practice of the values of the faith in that we should embody Christian attitudes habitually: walking by faith, and hope, and love, and prudence, and justice, and chastity, and modesty, and self-control, upholding that which is good, living in a joy in the works of the Lord, pursuing all that brings about peace, just being kind, being as gentle as the circumstances allow us, having a generous heart, being faithful to our vows and the covenant, practicing hospitality, living in community amongst other things. This habit of Christian living must be done even in the face of opposition, even at personal cost and sacrifice, even when they are out of fashion. This living a life of heroic virtue is all over the New Testament: lists of virtues are given, and the church is called to adhere and persevere. The habits we live by help to define who we are and lock in who we want to be, and so habitual living is at the heart of the Christian value system; its ethical system is virtue ethics.
To the Christian the family – not the state, and not community – is the basic building block of a society. And a family is defined as a naturally born man and woman, their children, and their extended bloodlines, as well as those children they adopt. The family has to be the centre of the Church’s life, and the prism through which we spectrum all laws. We should do all we can, not just to strengthen our own families, but if possible – following the order of love above – other people’s families as well. The Church is to operate as a family itself, but a spiritual family where there are spiritual fathers, mothers, aunties, cousins and distant relations, but without our own ‘black sheep’. Think of the Church as a family, and act accordingly. Sometimes Christians misunderstand this; some treat it like a club, whilst others cross boundaries they would not cross in their own blood relationships. The essence of the Church family is that it should be a place of mutual solidarity, respect and encouragement, with an openness to one another like we have in families, even if this is inconvenient, but with all the same safeguards and boundaries we might expect in our own families. Our spiritual fathers may censure us, our spiritual cousins may not!
Christians believe in honouring, and by this we mean a culture of respect: we respect our parents, our elders, our families, our spouses, those in government, those in public office whether in the Church or outside of it. We reject the 1960s attitude of ‘disrespect’. This does not mean (but has in the past meant) we should turn a blind eye to wrongs; indeed, part of what it means to respect anyone is to correct them when they are doing wrong. Christians should have a culture of respect amongst themselves, and towards others, in so far as they permit it by their actions – you can hardly show respect to someone trying to harm you! We should honour all those that have suffered for Christ in the highest place, especially those who have given their lives for the faith, those who live a life of heroic virtue, whom we recognise as great, and those who are doing something great for the Church and the Kingdom of our GOD should be respected. In some Church traditions they are recognised as something that all Christians are: that is a saint, and they are given this epithet, ‘Saint’, before their name as a sign of respect and recognition for the way they lived their lives! Christians believe in respect as part of good character, and of a good culture – where it is missing in either, that is a problem. Christians will also honour in particular symbols of our faith: the cross, the bible, images of important figures, and the name of GOD particularly, are to be made holy amongst us. This is why Christians should believe in blasphemy laws; freedom is not an absolute amongst Christians, it is not the highest good, it is goodness itself that should be free!
The natural world was given to man as part of his stewardship in the story of Genesis; man has a responsibility to husband creation in a way that reflects that it is a gift to man, and not a possession of his. Nature in all its complexity is an act of creation, and man is not supposed to destroy it, but cultivate and maintain it. I think the best metaphor is like a park warden who is supposed to maintain a park: his work is to sustain it, without ruin, keeping it in order and balance like GOD brought order over the primordial creation. Christians therefore should reject those voices that are dismissive of this responsibility and see creation as something we are entitled to wreck. The reality is that this husbandry of nature is something we’ve only really started to learn – in a detailed way (through scientific enquiry), taking in the complexities of the web of life and our impacts upon it – since the industrial age began. The dominion of man over nature is what he is created for. It is the way he was meant to reflect the glory and image of GOD, and act as priest. It was to be his work, and ‘dominion’ never means ‘abuse’. A man may leave another man with dominion over his home; this assumes a responsibility to return the home to the homeowner in a fit condition. Therefore the care of creation is part of the Christian worldview; we should seek to preserve, conserve and cultivate nature so that it thrives, and us along with it, and we should do so as part of life as the priests of GOD – a living sacrifice!
Christ warns clearly that riches ensnare us in such a way that it is extremely difficult for a rich man to enter the kingdom of GOD. Why? Because riches make demands upon you; your portfolio can become your god. Riches also open up to us new ways to sin that our poverty protected us from. The poor are seen as a reality in the world, and their oppression by those who have the power to alleviate their suffering is seen as a grave sin indeed. Conversely, to help the poor is seen as drawing close to GOD. Christians do not measure the value of life on material things, but rather take life’s value as a given gift, and believe that the honour due to one life is primarily about their sanctity, not the material status: a holy monk, who owns nothing, is to be more celebrated by the church than a rich Christian who is lost to GOD in the love of his own wealth. And so Christ goes far as to counsel us to sell what we have to follow him. Christians should live a life of moderation when it comes to material possessions and money. A Christian does not need to live a millionaire lifestyle even if he becomes a millionaire, and the excess he has falls under many of the values we have highlighted above. A Christian sees all that he has as belonging to GOD, a resource for GOD to use; Christians should offer it up before the Lord and seek His will in how to use it. Concern for the poor is such a strongly impressed upon concern scripturally that every Christian should seek to enact upon it – even the poor themselves. How we embody this is going to be subject to many variables, but it can not but be a concern of the Christian who is living out their faith.
In conclusion: there are many now who want to claim Christianity as their own, particularly classical liberal, socially conservative types like Dr Jordan Peterson. However, Christianity is not a buffet from which we can pick and choose bits and discard others. The only way to have a Christian civilisation is to have it as a full fat, undiluted, lived reality; we cannot pick some values and leave others. I’ve given just ten here; I could give ten more. But this article is to show that truly lived Christianity will find points at which to challenge all of us, and we must conform ourselves to it, and not it to some other way of life. If we are going to live as Christians, then let’s do it properly and as fully as each of us can manage, and where we reach our personal limits, let’s band together to push a little further and sustain ourselves in the maximum we can reach!
