Virtue

For the fourth week, the Christlike attribute that we have focused on has been virtue. Here are my thoughts.

I think what virtue stems down to is integrity and acting as though you know you should act. Now more than ever I think it is so important to have virtue and to instill in our children virtue. I think this Christlike quality is perhaps, the one the is the hardest to cling to in the world today. It seems that Satan is trying so very hard to smash this attribute - and he is doing a pretty good job if you look around. I love what Bishop Burton said,

"Now is the time for us to join in rescuing and preserving that which is “virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy.” As we allow virtue to garnish our thoughts unceasingly and we cultivate virtuous traits in our personal lives, our communities and institutions will be improved, our children and families will be strengthened, and faith and integrity will bless individual lives."

I think it is so interesting and wonderful that just over a year ago the young women general presidency added virtue as one of the young women values. When asked about it, Sister Dalton and her counselors called virtue a pattern of thought and behavior based on high moral standards. I love that definition! And then Sister Cook of the General Presidency said, which I think is so beautiful, "If you are virtuous, you are strong. It is power and it is strength. It is all derived by being pure."

And finally to end, I love the perspective that Sister Dalton gives when she says, "Virtue isn't something that you have instantly. It is strict training. It is the daily, deliberate practice of small things."