Democracy – William Sloane Coffin

I think that we can say that democracy is a form of government that demands more virtue of its citizens than any other form of government, but I do not think that we can say that democracy guarantees that the virtue will be exercised. So let us term freedom of choice less a virtue than a necessity, a precondition to real freedom, which is the ability to make choices that are generous, loving, and wise. Our wills are not free when they will what is bigoted, narrow, ungenerous. Our wills are only free when they can will the will of a loving God. “Thy will be done on earth.” — Credo, pp. 80-81