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Vices& Karl Clifton-Soderstrom

A Courageous Stand against Poisonous Examining how we relate to others

n this month’s installment on the or even in desperately wanting some- of self-destruction brought about by seven deadly vices and seven holy thing you lack. Envy turns our envy and , the very poison virtues, we consider envy and for anything good into malice toward of . Mrs. May came into this courage. Like all the virtues and those who already enjoy what we place and these obligations before her Ivices, envy and courage are the order- don’t have. sense of self had time to mature, and ings and disorderings of our , For an image of the envious person, so over time she has cultivated a deep- which have been habituated over time there is no better description than that rooted envy toward those who seemed by a series of wise or poor choices or found in Flannery O’Connor’s short free to choose their fate, and eventu- encouraged by good or bad mentors. story “Greenleaf.” Mrs. May is a thin, ally toward all those upon whom These two make for an odd pairing, squint-eyed widow, who for fifteen fortune has smiled. As the years go perhaps, for neither is the obvious years has worked alone at keeping a by, and as choice after choice settles opposite of the other. Then again, our broken-down farm on the right side the once occasional moments of vices and virtues don’t always relate of ruin, a farm she never wanted in into engrained habits of malice, she as opposites, but rather as each other’s the first place, but within which she eventually can call only one thing enemies whose competition for alle- was placed by her husband to raise a her own: her empty resilience over a giance in our sometimes rests on family, and to which she is bound as world that, in her mind, is set to bring subtle yet crucial distinctions. her sole inheritance upon his death. her to ruin. “Everything is against Let us begin with envy. Among Mrs. May’s only fleeting consolation, you,” Mrs. May says, “the weather is the vices, envy is perhaps the most as O’Connor describes it, is that “her against you and the dirt is against you complex, insidious, secretive and, city friends said she was the most and the help is against you. They’re hence, least understood of the seven. remarkable woman they knew, to all in league against you!” First, we note that envy is a desire go, practically penniless and with no Envious people require others on for something that one lacks, but the experience, out to a rundown farm whom to cast their squinting and desiderata of envy can come in endless and make a success of it....Before any suspicious glances, living as they do varietals. You can envy the wisdom of kind of judgment seat, she would be in reaction to the lives others lead. old age if you are young, the vitality able to say: I’ve worked, I have not O’Connor provides one such charac- of youth if you are old, wealth if you wallowed.” ter, Mr. Greenleaf, an African Ameri- are poor, simplicity if you are wealthy, So far, this could be the setup for can hired hand who, though legally singlehood if you are married, mar- the story of a strong-willed woman, the employee of Mrs. May, possesses riage if you are single, charisma if you who courageously works amid a dignity that elevates him above her are dull, strength if you are weak, etc. adverse conditions to better her life spite. Despite his social status as her But if envy has a definable shape, it is and the lives of her family. But it is inferior, he and his family fare well in not in the content of what is desired, not. Rather, it is a brilliant account the world and eventually, to the utter

28 | The Covenant Companion Envious persons desperately long for a self that they lack.....The courageous person makes the reverse movement, and realizes that comes from risking one’s self.... disdain of Mrs. May, become “soci- to take in the success, beauty, the Greenleafs’ family bull, which fre- ety.” Mrs. May fights a constant and and virtue in one’s friend. One will quently breaks free from its stall and subtle battle against Mr. Greenleaf and courageously defend a friend, pre- wanders onto Mrs. May’s property. his family, seeking any chance possible cisely because one so freely admires Consider how O’Connor describes to belittle his success or to point out a friend’s virtues and seeks to protect this bull’s invasion onto Mrs. May’s his failings, while all along secretly and promote their cultivation. Envy, land, and you will get some idea of desiring the fortune Mr. Greenleaf has while maybe the most private and how envy infiltrates the soul. “[As found. interior of the vices, is destructive of Mrs. May awoke in her bed] she had The envious cannot help but cut such friendship. As Joseph Epstein been conscious in her sleep of a steady down the goodness of others so that notes in his book on the subject, Envy, rhythmic chewing as if something in comparison one’s blindness to one’s “Malice that cannot speak its name, were eating one wall of the house. She self-worth is less troubling. Dorothy cold-blooded but secret , had been aware that whatever it was Sayers notes the leveling that envy impotent desire, hidden rancor, and had been eating as long as she had promotes in her book on the seven spite all cluster at the center of envy.” had the place and had eaten every- deadly sins: “Envy is the great leveler: Friendship becomes impossible to thing from the beginning of her fence if it cannot level things up, it will level those caged in by envy. For those suf- line up to the house and now was them down....At its best, envy is a fering from (), hell is being eating the house and calmly with the climber and a snob; at its worst it is a locked up with oneself; for the envious same steady rhythm would continue destroyer—rather than have anyone person, hell is other people. through the house, eating her and the happier than itself, it will see us all In the end, envy slowly and persis- boys, and then on, eating everything miserable together.” tently gnaws at the soul. In the story Karl Clifton-Soderstrom is an assistant profes- notes that the noblest “Greenleaf,” O’Connor embodies sor of philosophy and the director of general in a virtuous friendship is Mrs. May’s envy with a bull, actually education at North Park University in Chicago.

February 2010 | 29 but the Greenleafs, on and on, eating brave means to be ready to sustain a foregone any attachments to persons everything until nothing was left but wound.” The invincible do not require and place in this life have no of the Greenleafs on a little island all courage, whereas the truly brave real- death. Courage, then, appropri- their own in the middle of what had ize all too well that the wound they ately. To that extent, the courageous been her place.” risk receiving when they enter the fray person is afraid of evil, but does not Sadly, envy, by its very nature, is is an evil. Though the heart of courage allow him- or herself to be drawn by not something its sufferer would want is being prepared to die for the just fear away from the just cause he or to admit. In its fullest bloom, envy cause, the courageous person neither she seeks to accomplish. becomes all that a person has left to death nor despises life. The envi- call his or her own, which is precisely ous, on the other hand, can indeed n conclusion then, we can consider nothing because such a person is so despise life and savor the wounds how the cultivation of courage distortedly caught up in the lives of they inflict on themselves, to the point bulwarks the soul against envy. others. The envious so lack, or are even, as we see in the climax of the IBoth envy and courage hinge on how so blinded to, their own capacities story “Greenleaf,” of relishing death one relates one’s self to others. They and graces that they can live only itself. are both other-oriented moral per- vicariously—and resentfully—through A clever way to note the difference spectives. Envious persons desperately other people. between the envious and courageous is long for a self that they lack. But they that the envious to “play the mar- don’t allow themselves to admire the t is here that we can see the rela- tyr,” publicly amplifying their wounds gifts of others who might then inspire tionship between envy and cour- to evoke in others, while the cou- them to become better, nor do they age. As envy is perhaps universally rageous truly are martyrs, deflecting sacrifice their own desires for the sake Idespised across , courage is no their to point to the good, to of bettering another. The courageous the most universally admired. God. To have the courage of a martyr person makes the reverse movement, That being said, courage is so univer- is to be ready to suffer for the sake of and realizes that virtue comes from sally admired that it seems in danger the highest reality, and then to forego risking one’s self, in the face of a real of being morally indiscriminate. even the heroic. The crucial difference threat, for the sake of the friend, the Courage, it would seem, can serve between a pagan conception of moral neighbor, and ultimately God. The both good and evil ends. Are thieves virtue and a Christian sense is the truly courageous possess an acute courageous when they overcome their difference between being moral heroes awareness of their gifts and vulner- fear and hold up a convenience store? and moral saints. For the Christian, abilities, and are admirable in the Were the German SS soldiers coura- saintly courage always points away face of this, because they risk being geous when they didn’t let their fear from the self and toward God. wounded for the sake of something of death interfere with advancing To be brave is not to be without else worthy of praise. the Nazi front? Is courage perhaps fear. In the horrors of life’s battles, In Philippians 1:15-20, Paul indi- morally neutral like strength or intel- only the foolhardy think there is no cates the difference between courage ligence? reason to fear, and thus they and envy. “It is true that some preach Courage in the Christian tradition headlong into danger. Only those who Christ out of envy and rivalry, but is not, however, morally ambiguous have lost the will to live and have others out of goodwill. The latter do precisely because courage is a virtue, so out of love, knowing that I am put that is an excellence of character wor- For further reading here for the defense of the gospel. The thy of praise. This means that courage former preach Christ out of selfish is not merely a human capacity (like Envy: The , by ambition, not sincerely, supposing strength) nor merely an (like Joseph Epstein that they can stir up trouble for me self-). As an excellence of “Greenleaf,” in The Complete Stories, while I am in chains. But what does it that is cultivated over by Flannery O’Connor matter? The important thing is that in time through habit, courage stems The Present Age, by Søren Kierke- every way, whether from false motives originally from an acute awareness of gaard or true, Christ is preached. And human vulnerability, the appropriate Redeemed Bodies: Women Martyrs in because of this I rejoice....I eagerly fear of evil or harm to one’s own self, Early Christianity, by Gail P.C. Streete expect and that I will in no way and the choice to act decisively on Ressentiment, by Max Scheler be ashamed, but will have sufficient behalf of a just cause. courage so that now as always Christ Seven Sins and , by Joseph Pieper writes, “Cour- will be exalted in my body, whether Karl A. Olsson age presumes vulnerability...to be by life or by death” (TNIV). ■

30 | The Covenant Companion