This Year’s ‘Pride’ is Not So Proud
Christine Sneeringer
In today’s culture, virtue is often treated as optional.
It’s seen as admirable or maybe even nostalgic, but hardly essential. And sacrifice? That’s even more foreign. Outside of holidays like Memorial Day or Veterans Day, we live in an age that rewards self-preservation, self-expression, and self-promotion over that of sacrifice. But in order for Christians to reclaim influence in society, we must reject the instinctual nature of self-preservation and instead adopt a biblical vision of civic virtue shaped by sacrifice.
The Christian story is, at its core, a story of sacrifice. From the earliest pages of Scripture, God calls his people to obedience, surrender, and love for others. Abraham left everything behind in trust. Moses gave up a royal life to lead a reluctant nation. Esther laid down her comfort, her title, and even risked her life to protect her people.
In the New Testament, the examples of sacrifice continue. Peter dropped his nets, abandoned his business, and followed Jesus. Paul faced lashes, shipwrecks, and prison cells, all for the sake of the Gospel, and eventually costing him his life. Stephen stood before a furious crowd, eyes fixed on heaven, and proclaimed truth without flinching, even to the death. These weren’t comfortable choices. They were costly acts of obedience.
Most profoundly, we see the ultimate sacrifice in the work and person of Jesus Christ, who “did not count equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself… becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Phil. 2:6–8).
As followers of Christ, we are called to walk in that same pattern of sacrificial love—not only within the Church, but in every sphere of life, including the public square.
As followers of Christ, we are called to walk in that same pattern of sacrificial love—not only within the Church, but in every sphere of life, including the public square.
Civic virtue is an old term, but one well worth recovering. It refers to the moral character needed to sustain a free and just society: honesty, courage, responsibility, humility, and service. From Augustine to the American Founders, history reminds us that liberty without virtue cannot last. Augustine argued in The City of God that civic virtue required divine justice, saying, “Justice removed, then, what are kingdoms but great bands of robbers?” Centuries later, John Adams echoed the same truth, warning in a letter to the Massachusetts Militia that “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
These ideas posited by great thinkers and leaders before us are not simply generic good values. They are deeply biblical. When Jesus commands us to “love your neighbor as yourself (Mk. 12:31), when the apostle Paul exhorts us to “do good to everyone” (Gal. 6:10), and when the prophet Micah calls us to “do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Mic. 6:8), we are being pointed toward virtues that carry both personal and public weight.
Regrettably, many Christians have been trained to think of their civic duty solely in terms of voting, yet civic virtue runs much deeper than ballots and party lines. It’s about how we live. It’s about how we engage our neighbors, steward our influence, respond to disagreement, and seek the common good—not as a political strategy, but as a Christian responsibility.
We are dual citizens of heaven and of our earthly communities. It is our heavenly citizenship that must shape our earthly engagement.
In Jeremiah 29:7, God commands the exiled Israelites to “seek the welfare of the city” where He has placed them. This was a clear instruction to engage the culture by investing in the good of a foreign land. In the same way, Christians today live as sojourners and exiles (1 Pet. 2:11), in the world but not of the world (Jn. 17:14-16), and we are called to be salt and light in the places God has put us (Matt. 5:13-16). We are called to transform culture, and transformation requires more than strong opinions. It requires strong character.
Civic virtue isn’t glamorous. It’s rarely noticed, much less celebrated. The citizens who most reflect the heart of Christ are often not the loudest or most followed. They are teachers who quietly stand for truth, public servants who walk in integrity, parents who lead with conviction, and young leaders who choose principle over popularity. They serve without fanfare, sacrifice without applause, and persevere because they follow a Savior who did the same. To endure without adulation requires conviction rooted in Christian virtue.
Most Christians understand this in theory, but each of us must ask: Are we truly living this way in our habits, decisions, and daily routines, or is this simply a theological concept we passively acknowledge?
We are dual citizens of heaven and of our earthly communities. It is our heavenly citizenship that must shape our earthly engagement.
Our nation doesn’t merely need better policies—it needs better people. People formed not by partisanship or personal gain, but by Scripture. Christians have a responsibility not only to believe rightly, but to live virtuously. Our public witness is demonstrated by our civic habits, but as Christians, it flows from our private devotion.
While our culture may occasionally pause to reflect on the cost of freedom, civic virtue cannot be reserved for rare moments of remembrance. It is a daily calling that shapes how we lead, how we serve, and how we love our neighbors.
Christians ought to embody faith-fueled civic virtue that our moment demands—not as a relic for history books or holidays, but as a living foundation for a free and flourishing society. This is the foundation of our conviction that points beyond ourselves to the One who gave everything for us.
No spam, stay up to date on new articles, resources and events!
Get notified about new articles from the Institute.
