• Skip to main content
  • Skip to main navigation
Baylor University
Core Virtues
College of Arts & Sciences
  • Virtues
  • Teaching Resources and Reading Bibliograph
    • Reading Bibliography
  • Core Curriculum Emblem
Baylor BU Core Virtues Virtues
Virtues

Virtues

Core Virtues Emblem

The College of Arts & Sciences’ core curriculum enables students to “acquire the knowledge, skills, and virtues needed to uncover and recognize truth, to deepen their faith, to live virtuously, to strengthen their communities, and to affect the world in transformative ways.” To that end, the core curriculum aims to “inspire moral, intellectual, and spiritual virtues."

Virtues are excellences of character that enable a person to live a life of well-being and happiness. Furthermore, virtues direct one’s actions because they allow one to love and desire what is true, good, and beautiful. There is a long history, from the relatively early medieval period to the present, of the university cultivating the intellectual and moral virtues through the Trivium (grammar, logic, rhetoric) and then the Quadrivium (math, geometry, music, and astronomy) in a way that prepares the student for philosophy and theology, the spiritual virtues of faith, hope, and love being the subject of the latter. Within the Christian tradition, seven virtues—four cardinal and three theological—are understood as those from which all other virtues flow. The cardinal virtues—wisdom, justice, courage, and temperance—are those which can be fostered through diligent practice. The theological virtues—faith, hope, and love—are considered gifts, imparted through God’s grace, and are therefore exclusively spiritual virtues that cannot be generated or perfected solely by human effort.

Though the virtues are not necessarily acquired in any particular order and are inherently interdependent (one cannot be just without also being courageous), the following list of virtues from the unified core curriculum is ordered to mirror what historically has been understood to be the logical and pedagogical progression of virtue formation in the university, culminating in faith, hope, and love.

  •  Humility
  •  Courage
  • Rigor
  • Integrity
  • Respect
  • Justice
  •  Empathy
  •  Compassion
  •  Responsibility
  •  Patience
  •  Wisdom
  •  Faith
  •  Hope
  •  Love
Baylor BU Core Virtues Virtues
  • Virtues
  • Teaching Resources and Reading Bibliograph
    Back
    • Reading Bibliography
  • Core Curriculum Emblem
  • General Information
  • Academics & Research
  • Administration
  • Admissions
  • Gateways for ...
  • About Baylor
  • Athletics
  • Ask Baylor
  • Bookstore
  • Calendar
  • Campus Map
  • Directory
  • Give to Baylor
  • News
  • Search
  • Social Media
  • Strategic Plan
  • College of Arts & Sciences
  • Diana R. Garland School of Social Work
  • George W. Truett Theological Seminary
  • Graduate School
  • Hankamer School of Business
  • Honors College
  • Law School
  • Louise Herrington School of Nursing
  • Research at Baylor University
  • Robbins College of Health and Human Sciences
  • School of Education
  • School of Engineering & Computer Science
  • School of Music
  • University Libraries, Museums, and the Press
  • More Academics
  • Athletics
  • Compliance, Risk and Safety
  • Human Resources
  • Marketing and Communications
  • Office of General Counsel
  • Office of the President
  • Office of the Provost
  • Operations, Finance & Administration
  • Senior Administration
  • Student Life
  • University Advancement
  • Undergraduate Admissions
  • goBAYLOR
  • Graduate Admissions
  • Baylor Law School Admissions
  • Social Work Graduate Programs
  • George W. Truett Theological Seminary Admissions
  • Online Graduate Professional Education
  • Virtual Tour
  • Visit Campus
  • Alumni & Friends
  • Faculty & Staff
  • Online Graduate Professional Education
  • Parents
  • Prospective Faculty & Staff
  • Prospective Students
  • Students
  • Anonymous Reporting
  • Annual Fire Safety and Security Notice
  • Cost of Attendance
  • Digital Privacy
  • Legal Disclosures
  • Mental Health Resources
  • Notice of Non-Discrimination
  • Report It
  • Title IX
  • Web Accessibility
 
Baylor University
Copyright © Baylor® University. All rights reserved.
Baylor University • Waco, Texas 76798 • 1-800-229-5678