The virtue traditionally held to be most important for civic leaders may surprise you: piety. In the classical world, to be pious meant being willing to sacrifice all in defense of one’s patria, “fatherland,” embracing both its people (especially one’s family) and the land itself, with its natural riches and heritage.
Aeneas, the hero of Virgil’s epic poem The Aeneid, is known as “the pious.” He struggles against the temptations and trials that beset all men, yet prevails, establishing a homeland for his people when all seemed lost.
Today, the word piety has lost its civic meaning and is associated with elderly ladies in church. I propose an updated expression: “critical patriotism.” By “critical,” I do not mean harsh or snarky, but a clear-sighted determination to remain fixed on what is good and right and just.
Critical patriotism was exemplified by Charles Carroll, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence. Though slow to embrace the Revolution, he loved Maryland and the emerging American republic, and he guided his state and nation with faith and moral wit.
St. Thomas More, who lived 250 years earlier, gives perhaps the clearest expression of this virtue. His last words were, “I die the king’s good servant, and God’s first.”
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WILLIAM EDMUND FAHEY, Ph.D., is a fellow of Thomas More College of Liberal Arts in Merrimack, N.H., where he served as president from 2009 until 2026. He is a member of St. Stanislaus Council 17027 in nearby Nashua.








