My initial thoughts on this book (before I finished reading it) were the author’s use of the word “Things” in the title. The things he refers to are communities of people: country (patriotism), Church, family and God. I would have said those are “People worth dying for.” The general groupings of people “may” be worth dying for, but many in particular are not --- depending on who you ask. Cardinal Chaput quotes The Song of Roland “which notes that we are willing to die for is what we hold sacred.” Chaput then quotes Lincoln at Gettysburg: “We have come to dedicate … a final resting place for those who gave their lives that our nation might live. But, in a larger sense, we cannot consecrate; we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men living and dead who struggled here have consecrated it far above our power to add or deduct.”
Cardinal Chaput explains the demolishing of groups of people over time since “The Enlightenment”, in favor of self. And he cites the huge increase of people thought worthless: in martyrs, abortions, and suicides since. And Jesus came to die for all of them. We promote ourselves as being unique and alone (so death becomes our decision), but The Good Shepherd sees us as just one of His family who is lost. We are never alone.
I think Chaput gets to the heart of the matter near the end of the book. These are quotes:
Learning to love God more than our own desires and appetites --- and others because they’re loved by God --- is the substance of a Christian life.
The theological virtues are gifts from God. We receive them as individuals, but they’re sustained in community. As virtues, they survive and thrive with the help of others.
The tipping point in the life of people, a culture, and a nation do happen; points beyond which everyday reality is changed in kind, not merely in degrees. We’re living in such a moment today.
Cardinal Chaput quotes Lubac: “I do not have to win the world, even for Christ: I have to save my soul. That is what I must always remember … It is not our mission to make truth triumph, but to testify for it.”
Today we need to do whatever we can, however modest and wherever life places us, to encourage our friends in Jesus Christ and to make this world a better place in the light of the Gospel … And we are not alone.
We rarely see the full effects of the good we do in this life. But one day … we’ll see the beauty that God has allowed us to add to the great story of his creation, the richness we’ve added to the lives of our family and friends, the mark for the better we’ve left on the world, and the revelation of his love that goes from age to age no matter how good or bad the times. We are each an unrepeatable, infinitely treasured part of that story. And that is why our lives matter.
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