I heard Bill Tammeus speak this past Sunday at Resurrection. He is working on a book about Jews who survived the Holocaust in Poland with the help of non-Jewish persons. You can read more about this subject at the following post – The Holocaust Book Project. I found one of the more interesting parts of subject matter was the topic of moral courage, with a main example being the actions of non-Jews to come to the aid of Jews.
I had not particularly thought of pairing those two words together before – moral and courage. However, I do think that they make sense together. I would interpret moral courage as the courage that is necessary to act in a particular situation that in which morals or ethics has a role – basically the courage to stand up for what is right. I believe that moral courage has a role in the life of the church today. I think that as Christians we are all called to act with moral courage – both as individuals and as communities. I also think that a pastor has a distinct role in leading others in acts of moral courage.
What do you think? How would you define moral courage? Does it have a role in the life of the church?
Rev. Andrew Conard 
4 replies on “Moral Courage”
What’s non-moral courage?
Bungee Jumping?
Or immoral courage?
The Iraq War?
Maybe the only acts that deserve the word “courage” are moral acts. Which would mean “moral courage” is redundant.
Interesting.
Welcome back from Israel, btw.
Amy – Great point and good questions. I had not thought about that inherent connection between “courage” and “moral” and I think you are right. Nice!
It is great to be back in the USA. Thanks for the welcome.
Regarding moral courage-
What I think Bill was referring to when he wrote about moral courage was the courage of the non-Jews to help the Jews without fear of repercussion from a societal sense. In other words, unlike physical courage, where one is doing something brave in the face of death, physical pain or torture, a person is exhibiting moral courage when they do something without concern for how they are perceived by their friends, co-workers, neighbors, etc. They may get put in jail, arrested, persecuted, shunned, etc. but probably not killed/maimed or tortured, although I sure that happened to some of those non-Jews that helped the Jews.
This is a very relevant topic here in the US. In our society, rarely do we need to worry about bodily injury if we follow our beliefs (it is possible, but rare), unlike in other parts of the world where your beliefs are dictated to you. We worry more about how we will be treated or perceived. Will our kids be shunned at school because they pray before eating. Will we be made fun of by our co-workers if we come to work with ashes on our foreheads around Easter. Do our neighbors think we are a bunch of Jesus freaks because we go to church on Sunday, our kids go to youth on Wednesday, and we happily give a portion of our income to support the church. Those are very real scenarios here in the US, and whether we like to admit or not, we often think about these types of things when we interact with people who may not be followers of Jesus.
One of the things that can boost our moral courage is to associate with like-minded individuals who you are comfortable in talking about your faith with. Over time, that comfort extends beyond that small circle of people to your life in general. You become a walking example of how Jesus wants us to lead our lives, and compromise your actions less and less.
Mike – Thank you for your comment. I think that you raise an excellent point here.
“We worry more about how we will be treated or perceived.”
Well said, and too true. The way that others perceive us – either actual or imagined – does make a difference on the way that we act and the decisions that we make.
Living in community does make living as a disciple possible.