A Quote by Richard Rodriguez
The genius of American culture and its integrity comes from fidelity to the light. Plain as day, we say. Happy as the day is long. Early to bed, early to rise. American virtues are daylight virtues: honesty, integrity, plain speech. We say yes when we mean yes and no when we mean no, and all else comes from the evil one. America presumes innocence and even the right to happiness.
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There is no color line in death. I swear to the lord I still can't see Why Democracy means Everybody but me. O, yes, I say it plain, America never was America to me, And yet I swear this oath - America will be! I am the American heartbreak- The rock on which Freedom Stumped its toe.
Although it may be true that the notion of teaching virtues such as honesty or integrity arouses little controversy, it is also true that vague consensus on the goodness of these virtues conceals a great deal of actual disagreement over their definitions.
I try to write in plain brown blocks of American speech but occasionally set in an ancient word or a strange word just to startle the reader a little bit and to break up the monotony of the plain American cadence.
Do we believe housing is a right and that affordable housing is part of what it should mean to be an American? I say yes.
In marriage for example, you say 'Yes' on the day you get married, 'I do', but each day you implicitly if not explicitly, also say 'Yes', by every act that one performs in a marriage, one is saying 'Yes', making a cup of coffee for one's wife or husband is a form of saying 'Yes' to the marriage vow that one is continuing the marriage by affirming it in one's deeds. And exactly the same in the religious life.
Own it. Just take it and say, 'Yes I will be great, I am going to be great.' Great doesn't mean being a movie star, great doesn't mean having millions of dollars. Great means being able to be confident, strong, and a solid human being that has dignity and integrity. That is great.
I think what happens in a religious life is that we have those experiences of affirmation and that one starts to live a Christian life or a Jewish life or a Muslim life or a Buddhist life, by affirming that affirmation each day. Each day you say 'Yes' to that Yes. So the life of being a Christian for example, is always a life of double affirmation, that you each day say 'Yes' to those counter-experiences of saying 'Yes', even when you're not experiencing them at that time, you're remaining loyal to that experience.
When the norm is decency, other virtues can thrive: integrity, honesty, compassion, kindness, and trust.
Integrity is about being integrated with the spiritual values of the Universe. It is also about being happy, because happiness and joy mean that you're coming into integrity with your soul.
What "Make America Great" means is it doesn't mean race, and it doesn't mean gender, and it doesn't mean sexual orientation, and it doesn't mean anything identity politics related that seems to appeal to the Democrat Party. It's about a culture. It's about an identity. It's about an idea - the American idea, the American ideal.
There is a yearning for people to return to elementary moral virtues, such as integrity and commitment. We distrust people who have no centering of values. We greatly respect businessmen, for example, if they display those virtues, even if we don't necessarily agree with the people.
If by happiness you mean ecstasy ... Yes, I've known ecstasy, and it's a blessing to be able to say it because those who can say it are very few. But ecstasy doesn't last long and is seldom if ever repeated.
You say yes to the sunlight and pure fantasies, so you have to say yes to the filth and the nausea. Everything is within you, gold and mud, happiness and pain, the laughter of childhood and the apprehension of death. Say yes to everything, shirk nothing.
I'm saying to you that one of the great characteristics of the great American, the American people, is our historic ability to be straightforward, plainspoken, say what we mean, and mean what we say.
Chastity is the lily of virtues, and makes men almost equal to Angels. Everything is beautiful in accordance with its purity. Now the purity of man is chastity, which is called honesty, and the observance of it, honor and also integrity; and its contrary is called corruption; in short, it has this peculiar excellence above the other virtues, that it preserves both soul and body fair and unspotted.
Courage is the enforcing virtue, the one that makes possible all the other virtues common
to exceptional leaders: honesty, integrity, confidence, compassion and humility
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