Begin your discussion with a moment of quiet reflection, individual or group prayer, or whatever would be conducive to further discussion. Share with the group, as appropriate, your experiences during the week in being disciplined, in doing the journal exercises, in living a more temperate and modest life, or whatever.

1. Temperance is modesty and self-restraint in all of life's physical aspects. It is a "fruit of the Spirit" because the action of the Holy Spirit permits us to "temper" our natural appetites with a focus on spiritual over worldly matters, on the lasting over the transitory.
2.  We tend to think of "temperance" as avoiding excessive amounts of liquor, but the virtue is actually much broader. It also involves avoiding excessive food, high living, and material possessions. Even more, though, temperance addresses not only the amount of our focus on material things, but the quality of that focus. Temperance teaches us to avoid overindulgence generally, both by avoiding excessive consumption and by avoiding excessive concern over material things. Being obsessed with fancy meals, expensive wines, luxury automobiles, luxurious furnishings, and the like, is "intemperate" even we consume relatively few of them. ("I only have one Jaguar!")
3. Materialism will generally be the greatest challenge to temperance for people like us: affluent, yupped-out professionals living in a materialistic post-Christian society. The point of the exercises is to show us how the messages encouraging us to live intemperate lives can be subtle and insidious, trying to persuade us that we are not "really" "all that affluent," or we "really" don't own "all that much," or there's "really" nothing "all that wrong" with owning two televisions (or whatever).
 
1. Assume (if you don't already know it) that Christians are called to live modest and simple lives, with a joyful unconcern for possessions. There's nothing necessarily wrong with possessions, unless they displace a focus on spiritual things, a concern for the poor, attention to family and others, etc., which they almost inevitably and necessarily do. Knowing this, we often mouth the correct "Christian excuse" for our materialism. "Oh, yes ... I do own an expensive car, but I don't really care about it. It doesn't affect my love of Christ at all." Or, "True, I own an expensive home, but I hold weekly prayer meetings there and I use it for the service of God." Or, yes, I do own expensive clothes, but that's necessary in my line of work, and I give generously of all that I earn." Or, even worse, "I do live a modest and simple life. Most of my friends drive BMW's, and all I've got is this Acura."
2. How do we separate the truth from the lie in all of this? How much of this is just making excuses? Aren't we largely just lying to ourselves?
3. To what extent do we tolerate and even encourage all of this in others, hoping that they will do the same for us? (!) In other words, aren't we largely just lying to each other?
4. If we are (1) lying to ourselves and then (2) concealing the evidence by lying to each other, how do we break the cycle? How do we get outside of ourselves and outside of our surroundings to get a truthful look at what's going on?
5. Is getting a truthful look at what's going on hard or easy? In other words, is it true that a "joyful unconcern for possessions" is not a hard concept at all? Isn't it possible that every person in this class knows what a modest and simple lifestyle looks like, and acting like, "Oo oo, this is so hard to figure out!" is just an excuse for inaction?
6. If that's true (ugh), then how do we move from knowing to doing?

4/17/98