It’s one thing to promote the idea that dads and moms are interchangeable despite, you know, science, but it’s another to accuse anyone tired of being force-fed this whole thing of bigotry. As one reviewer put it, “Perhaps calling critics of a movie “idiots who are going to die off like the dinosaurs” wasn’t the best strategy to get families to watch the latest entry in the Toy Story franchise.” 
 
Disney’s newest Pixar film, Lightyear, isn’t doing great at the box office. While critics puzzle over why, an obvious reason is parents are tiring of the constant indoctrination in sexual matters. They feel betrayed by the once trusted Toy Story franchise. 
All that may come as a surprise to Chris Evans, the new voice of Buzz, who recently said concerned parents are “idiots” who will soon “die off like the dinosaurs.” 
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There are actually people who think that the prize for being godly is money. The goal of declaring the gospel is gold. Christian leadership is a byproduct to their true heart’s desire: wealth and influence among those who are wealthy and influential. Such leaders “demand the food allowance of the governor” because they see themselves as special, and because they have lost sight of the Saviour. Let’s be careful therefore that we do not fall into the trap of seeking entitlement because we can. It truly is the canary in the mineshaft of where are hearts are when it comes to love of God or love of money. 

There’s something ugly, something character revealing, about the politician who squeezes absolutely every inch out of their entitlements. Those who make sure that every dollar of those things that they can technically claim is used up, and who spend the time to do so.
Every few years there are outcries about some entitlement scandal in which a politician has to resign or pay back money in light of their, shall we say, creative attempt to prove that the holiday they had on the Gold Coast was for “research purposes”, or that the apartment they rented in the city was actually their regular abode when they were working in Parliament, even though they owned a home nearby.
It was indeed these “second home” expenses that brought down many a politician and resulted in jail terms for some during the 2009 expenses scandal in the UK. There was outrage among members of the public when they discovered the manner in which so much tax payers money was being used to fund profligate lifestyles of those who were already on a good financial wicket.
For many of the UK’s best known politicians it was either embarrassing, or career-ending. It was clear that these politicians who were elected to serve had forgotten that, and had become self-serving instead. Technically they appeared not to be breaking any of the rules, but in reality they were exploiting loopholes in exactly the way the self-righteous leaders of Israel exploited moral loopholes in Jesus’ day, whilst still adhering to the letter of the law.
And perhaps too – indeed most likely – these pollies had grown a sense of entitlement. I mean, it’s a tough job being a national MP, right? Late nights, lots of travel, trying to keep constituents happy. And then there’s the press! Oh my goodness, the press!
You can see how they got there. Increment by increment.
Contrast that behaviour with that of Nehemiah in the book that bears his name. He was the Old Testament leader of Israel who returned to the burnt out, broken down capital city Jerusalem to rebuild it after the exiles had started to trickle back from the Persian Empire. Nehemiah was used to living near luxury, as chapter one tells us his job was cup-bearer to the Persian king Artaxerxes.
Having returned with the king’s blessing to rebuild the city, and having been made governor, Nehemiah sets about the task in the face of opposition without and within. There is external opposition from neighbouring nations who threaten to kill the rebuilders. And worse than that, there is still a persistent sin in Israel, with internal opposition in the form of political intrigue by those opposed to his national/spiritual building program.
But to make matters worse the wealthier people of the land have started to fall back into the practices injustice and oppression that was part of the reason Israel ended up in exile in the first place. We read in Nehemiah 5 how Israelites were selling themselves into slavery to pay their debts to their Jewish brothers, and how the wealthy were hoovering up all of the land and vineyards, which according to the Law was not permitted, as the LORD had allotted inheritances to each family, and that it could not be permanently sold on or acquired. Nehemiah puts a stop to it all.
But more than that. Nehemiah does not call for a standard he is not willing to maintain himself. As the governor of the nation he had the right, like many of the political leaders of our day, to draw from the allowance of the governorship to feed himself and his entourage. In other words, not to be out of pocket, and with the always present temptation to line those pockets, with taxpayers money.
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The process of character formation—requires not only knowing what is good but also activating the spirit so that the heart wants to choose the good. The art of fashioning the soul helps to unify the spirit with the mind. 

My students rarely know what kindness really means. When they provide feedback on their classmates’ papers, for instance, they think kindness means happy faces and exclamation marks, and a “Great Job!” written at the end. And they often think people like me, who offer them substantial critiques to help make their writing better, are simply mean. Consequently, every semester now includes a day where we define kindness. Kindness does not offer false praise but possesses the courage to help someone identify where they might improve. Unlike flattery, kindness does not mistake temporary good feelings for long-term good.
Kindness is not the only virtue we easily misconstrue. Even—or perhaps especially—the virtues we hear the most often and think we value the most—such as love, wisdom, hope, courage, or justice—are those we are least able to define precisely. And, as my students demonstrated, if we misunderstand what these virtues mean, we are likely to misunderstand how to live them.
Consider the intense debate around the virtue of justice. From “social justice warriors” to “one-issue-voters,” Christians on both sides of the political spectrum care deeply about justice. Rather than unite Christians, however, their shared interest tends to divide them. In fact, so many of the pressing issues dividing Christians—from abortion to LGBTQ+ rights to immigration—are rooted in different understandings and applications of words like justice and love.
But for much of Christian history, words like justice and love weren’t loosely defined concepts, but a person. They could see Justice. They recognized Love. In fact, they could look both of them in the eyes.
Remembering the Lady Virtues
For most of Christian history, virtue formation was a central component of education. This formational process was not just intellectual. Learning about the virtues was an important first step, but becoming virtuous was the ultimate aim of this education. Clement of Alexandria explained that a tutor’s role is “not to educate nor give information but to train someone in the virtuous life.”1 Moral education, then, was less a matter of what was universally right or wrong and more about becoming a certain kind of person. Formation means living into, becoming like—and thus it is a transformative process.
Virtue education could not be accomplished with lists and theories; the virtues had to move beyond the brain and be impressed into the body. Ancient and medieval Christians recognized that to embody virtue, it helps to start with … bodies. Virtues such as wisdom, hope, and courage were personified and took on the form of women. These lady virtues pop up in tapestries, frescoes, paintings, church doors, and stained-glass windows. Sculptures of them stand beside tombs, hover in church nooks, and adorn civic squares.
The lady virtues used to be some of the most recognized women in Christendom. But while those of us in Christian universities may regularly invoke the names of the virtues, we have largely forgotten what they look like. We are familiar with some of their cousins, such as Lady Liberty, whose torch acts as a symbolic beacon for those she welcomes to the American shoreline. But we would probably have a hard time recognizing the faces of Love, Justice, or Wisdom. Consequently, we might not be on as intimate of terms with them as we might think.
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