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What Are Family Values

Family values are those values that unite family members for the common good and allow them to pursue happiness, love, and truth. These values, such as respect, trust, honesty, and commitment, enrich family intimacy and are commonly understood as they are innate to human nature. While people may not be able to define virtues like trust, they have a common understanding of what these virtues are and that they contribute to happiness within families. It is within families that these virtues are first learned and developed through habit, making the family the foundation of virtue.

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164 views1 page

What Are Family Values

Family values are those values that unite family members for the common good and allow them to pursue happiness, love, and truth. These values, such as respect, trust, honesty, and commitment, enrich family intimacy and are commonly understood as they are innate to human nature. While people may not be able to define virtues like trust, they have a common understanding of what these virtues are and that they contribute to happiness within families. It is within families that these virtues are first learned and developed through habit, making the family the foundation of virtue.

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chrislyn llevado
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We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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WHAT ARE FAMILY VALUES?

Professor Patrick J. DiVietri, Ph.D.

Family values are those which a family shares for the common good of its members. Values unite the parents and
the family while bringing freedom to its members to pursue happiness, to give and receive love and to know the
truth. These values enrich and guard the intimacy of the family members.

These values are commonly known because they are infused within our nature. To see them one needs only to ask
the question, What a e the alues i a health fa il ?

If this question were asked of a room full of couples, their answers would look something like this:

1. Respect 2. Trust 3. Friendship


4. Honesty 5. Understanding 6. Commitment
7. Faith 8. Flexibility 9. Patience
10. Forgiveness 11. Love 12. Sacrifice
13. Self Control 14. Hope 15. Fidelity
16. Faithfulness 17. Loyalty 18. Responsibility
19. Perseverance 20. Dependability 21. Religion

If asked to define a virtue, however, many of these same people would be unable to do so. Yet, everyone
knows about virtues. For example, we all understand what constitutes trust and respect. One person might
possess a greater degree of trust than another, and one pe so ’s u de sta di g ight e eed that of a othe ’s.
Yet everyone knows that trust is good, and they all have a common sense of
what it is.

We know about virtues because we learned about them within our


families. Even families who suffer from a lack of these qualities know that
these qualities are good and are the means of getting along well with others.
We all know that these qualities express love within the family and that they
contribute to the happiness of family members. If a virtue is valued by a
fa il it is o e of thei fa ilies alues. This is h the a e alled fa il
alues. “o he e hea that te e a thi k of the alues hi h e ha e
listed above along with those which we ourselves hold to be important.

We can see that a hole fa il of i tues that pla s a pa t i happi ess


a d the edu atio of ou hild e . This is h dis ussio o Chastit
p og a s a e uite isleadi g. You a get the i p essio that it is o e
particular virtue, either abstinence or chastit , that is ot ei g taught o a ui ed. We hea people sa , Ou
school, parish or families are not doing anything about chastity. It is not a question of one or two virtues but a
whole family of virtues. Most importantly, it is in the home more than anywhere else that we learn that all virtues
ust guided a d fo ed i ha it , the othe of all i tue. This is h the fa il is alled, a i ilizatio of
lo e. (John Paul II, Letter to Families, Section 1, (Boston: St. Paul Books and Media), 1994)

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