{"id":35117,"date":"2024-02-29T11:06:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-29T11:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/"},"modified":"2024-02-29T11:06:00","modified_gmt":"2024-02-29T11:06:00","slug":"western-world-has-crisis-of-courage","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/","title":{"rendered":"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>An article in <em>The Financial Times<\/em> claims that &ldquo;the west is suffering from a crisis of courage.&rdquo; The author notes:<\/p>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>And the problem is much broader than politics. Society itself seems to be suffering from a crisis of courage &hellip; Virtue signaling might be endemic, but courage, like honor, is not deemed a virtue worth signaling. Indeed, all the incentives are stacked on the opposite side: there is little to lose from going along with what everyone is saying, even if you don&rsquo;t believe it yourself, and much to gain from proving that you are on the &ldquo;right&rdquo; side. Courage &mdash; sticking your head above the parapet and saying what you really think &mdash; can, conversely, get you into a huge amount of trouble, and, usually, you are not rewarded for it.<\/p>\n<p>The mere mention of courage has been in decline for a long time. A 2012 paper in the <em>Journal of Positive Psychology<\/em> that tracked how frequently words related to moral excellence appeared in American books &mdash; both fiction and non-fiction &mdash; over the 20th century, found that the use of the words &ldquo;courage, bravery and fortitude&rdquo; (which were grouped together) had fallen by two-thirds over the period.<\/p>\n<p>Moral courage does not equate to recklessness, and neither does it mean being a provocateur for the sake of it &hellip; But if we want our societies to thrive, we must be courageous enough to think for ourselves and stand up for what we believe in. The late writer Maya Angelou was right when she said: &ldquo;Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage you can&rsquo;t practice any other virtue consistently.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[446],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3512,3653,3701,3731,3933,3935,3979,4146,4245,4254,4261,4703,5085,5140,5161,5240],"tax_ctp_topics":[395,396],"class_list":["post-35117","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-boldness","tax_ctp_tags-compromise","tax_ctp_tags-courage","tax_ctp_tags-danger","tax_ctp_tags-faith","tax_ctp_tags-faith-feelings","tax_ctp_tags-fear-of-man","tax_ctp_tags-heroes","tax_ctp_tags-influence","tax_ctp_tags-insecurity","tax_ctp_tags-instability","tax_ctp_tags-prevailing","tax_ctp_tags-strength","tax_ctp_tags-testing","tax_ctp_tags-timidity","tax_ctp_tags-virtue"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An article in The Financial Times claims that &ldquo;the west is suffering from a crisis of courage.&rdquo; The author notes: And the problem is much broader than politics. Society itself seems to be suffering from a crisis of courage &hellip; Virtue signaling might be endemic, but courage, like honor, is not deemed a virtue worth Read more...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/CTPastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2025\/12\/ogimage.png?resize=1200,628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@CTpastors\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/\",\"name\":\"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage - CT Pastors\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2024-02-29T11:06:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-02-29T11:06:00+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/\",\"name\":\"CT Pastors\",\"description\":\"Timeless wisdom for pastors with forward-thinking solutions\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Christianity Today\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2025\/08\/logo_ctpastors_black.svg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2025\/08\/logo_ctpastors_black.svg\",\"caption\":\"Christianity Today\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/CTPastors\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/CTpastors\"]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage - CT Pastors","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/western-world-has-crisis-of-courage\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Western World Has a Crisis of Courage - CT Pastors","og_description":"An article in The Financial Times claims that &ldquo;the west is suffering from a crisis of courage.&rdquo; The author notes: And the problem is much broader than politics. 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