This first chapter that addresses a concrete issue is a perfect place to offer a disclaimer. All of the issues examined in this book are far too broad to be fully understood and sorted out in one chapter. Furthermore, if a main claim of this book is true, namely, that the way things are as ascertained by prudence is essential to acting virtuously, then good moral theology requires a thorough understanding of the particular issue at hand, using the fruits of different disciplines (history, sociology, biology, etc.). Each test-case chapter in this book cannot hope to provide all the information needed to accurately examine the issue at hand. So the necessarily brief virtue analyses offered in these chapters should be supplemented with outside reading.

Each test-case chapter, including this one on drinking alcohol, has two goals. First, each attempts to offer concrete guidance on the issue at hand, with a goal of living a better life. Second, each chapter tries to exemplify the virtue-centered morality-of-happiness approach of this book to the concrete issue at hand. Again, the goal is not—indeed could not be—a complete treatment of each issue. But each such chapter will model how to examine a particular contested issue in a manner that is attentive to rules, but always in the broader context of intentional-ity, virtue, and what rule-directed ways of living lead to genuine happiness.

Speaking of rules, this chapter on drinking alcohol is distinct from the other three test-case chapters in an important way. The analysis in each of the other three chapters focuses on whether a particular absolute norm is defensible from within a virtue perspective or not. For example, can the innocent ever be targeted in a just war? Can it ever be virtuous to intentionally end a dying patient’s life to ease his suffering? Is sex outside of marriage ever virtuous? One question to ask concerning an absolute norm with regard to drinking would be: is there ever a virtuous use of alcohol? The position held in this chapter is that there can indeed be virtuous drinking. Thus the argument here is less one of articulating and defending an absolute norm than it is seeking to better understand drinking practices, why we do what we do, and what sorts of persons we become in doing so. This is not at all to say that every way of drinking is virtuous. Indeed, the point of this chapter is to pose questions to readers to help them determine whether or not the way they drink alcohol, or refrain from it, is fully virtuous. Though the remaining three test-case chapters do focus on whether or not an absolute norm exists, each of those issues could and should also be engaged with an analysis akin to this chapter’s, where we probe our practices concerning the issue at hand (waging war, having sex, and caring for the dying) to determine how to live most virtuously regarding that activity.

To do this with drinking alcohol, the chapter unfolds in four sections that correspond roughly to the preceding chapters in this book. The first section explores what rules we follow in our drinking, where we got them from, and why we follow them. The second section explores why we drink, and thus examines intentionality and freedom. The third section looks more at the intransitive effects of drinking and employs the language of habit and virtue to determine what sorts of persons we become through our drinking practices. Finally, the fourth section explores the relevance of each of the four cardinal virtues for drinking alcohol. Before proceeding in this manner, it should be reiterated that this chapter grows out of experience teaching undergraduates in American universities, and thus it is shaped by this audience. Given common drinking practices in this audience, this is a particular, and often extreme, drinking environment. However, the benefit of the origin of this chapter is not only that it grows out of the real experience of a set of people, but also that its focus on that often more extreme drinking environment helps illuminate dynamics that are also prevalent but less obvious in other environments.

Perhaps the best way to illustrate that Glaucon’s Ring of Gyges story accurately describes why some people are moral is to look at the drinking habits of many freshmen in college. As you recall from chapter 1, Glaucon said that people who are just (or moral, or who do the right thing) do so not because it is what they truly want to do. It is not what they think constitutes happiness, or a good life. Rather, they do so because they fear the consequences of acting immorally. Society places certain rules in place to keep people in line, and enforces those rules in varying ways (laws, school rules, parents, etc.). To avoid the negative consequences of breaking those rules, people stay in line, but would surely do whatever they wanted the moment they could be sure they would not face negative consequences.

For college freshman that moment has come. Outside the watchful eye of parents, and usually residing on insulated college campuses technically ruled by state laws on drinking age that realistically offer little enforcement of those laws, college freshmen have, in effect, found their Ring of Gyges. What happens? They too often mimic the shepherd from Glaucon’s story and do whatever they want. The central problem is not that they begin using alcohol while legally underage. The problem is how they use it. Freed from all the influences that had previously limited their use of alcohol (parental consternation, the need to drive home from high-school parties, greater enforcement of underage drinking, the need to get up early the next morning, etc.), there are no resources left to govern, or rather limit, their drinking except bodily limits—and even those are fully stretched and sometimes crossed at students’ peril. Freshmen drink the way they do because they can, and it is only through learning new reasons to limit their drinking that they will eventually, one hopes, do so.

Of course, not all freshmen experience and live out the sort of freedom from these obligatory rules. Some have managed to learn how to drink more moderately before college. Others (actually, a greater percentage of college students than often assumed,See studies generated by Harvard University’s college alcohol study for exact numbers of college students who drink. There is a significant minority who do not. And over two thirds of all alcohol consumption is done by a mere 20 percent of college students. See especially H. Wechsler et al. “College Alcohol Use: A Full or Empty Glass?” Journal of American College Health 47, no. 6 (1999): 247–52, and M. Kuo et al.’s “More Canadian Students Drink but American Students Drink More: Comparing College Alcohol Use in Two Countries” Addiction 97, no. 12 (2002): 1583–92. though still a minority) decide for one reason or another not to drink alcohol at all. But the dynamic described here is common enough to need no further justification to those familiar with college students. What does it say about why we drink?

Recall that the key distinguishing feature of a morality-of-obligation perspective is that moral rules may be followed voluntarily, but even when they are it is not with the understanding that following such rules is constitutive of living a happy life, or what one really wants. At best, following the rules is endured in order to receive rewards (heaven, parental approval, a clean record, etc.) that are not inherently connected to following the rule. The behavior of too many college freshmen reveals that their limitations on alcohol use before college were rules understood from a morality-of-obligation perspective. Note that generally rules do remain governing their alcohol use. Perhaps they are limited by what money they have to spend. They are certainly concerned with how their peers view them (though ironically this peer pressure may lead to increased, not decreased, alcohol use). Hopefully they observe the thankfully widely accepted norm among college students that you do not drive under the influence. Maybe they occasionally refrain from drinking due to an upcoming big paper or difficult exam. But so often in each of these cases, the dynamic in play is refraining from what they really want to do (drink and party) for a reason experienced as an obligation rather than a way to live a fulfilling life.

Before we take too much pride in having a laugh at college freshmen, it should also be noted that upperclassmen and adults are far from immune to this dynamic. The reasons for limiting drinking may become more sophisticated. We become aware of our limits. We take on responsibilities (job, children, etc.) that limit our use of alcohol. But the similarity in the dynamic is that these limitations are experienced as just that—limitations from what we really would like to do. In fact, during the socially acceptable occasions to let go of such externally imposed limitations (“thank God it’s Friday!,” senior week activities, work happy hours, weddings, weekend getaways, etc.), we do just that. What this reveals is that on occasions where we observe rules for limiting our drinking, these rules are not seen as guiding us toward what is a genuinely fulfilling way to live (i.e., moderate drinking), but rather externally imposed obligations that we would, and do, quickly dispense with on occasions where that is possible.

This is not to say that virtuous drinking is incompatible with drinking more or less on different occasions. It is through prudence that we determine if and how alcohol fits into our living out a good life, and that determination does indeed take into account circumstances such as a job, family, and occasions for celebration such as reunions and weddings. But see how differently this is worded from the above depictions of freshmen or adults living out of a morality-of-obligation perspective. From this latter perspective, what we really want to do (drink a lot) is impeded by obligatory concerns, and when those concerns are not present we can (finally!) let loose. From a morality-of-happiness perspective, the fact that we limit our use of alcohol due to factors such as our jobs, families, being concerned with how we act in front of peers, and so on, is a matter of prudently living out a genuinely fulfilling life. On occasions where drinking would indeed impede these other commitments, there is not even a draw or desire to drink alcohol (if our desires and actions are temperate). If drinking alcohol were instead seen as something we hold more important than things such as our jobs, families, and friendships, then we must address how inflated a place drinking alcohol has assumed in our lives, a task for the next section. If we know what is truly important but have inordinate desires nonetheless, and therefore experience limitations on alcohol use as obligatory, then the task is to set about habituating our desires more virtuously, a topic addressed in a later section. And as for exactly how much to drink and on what occasion, yet another section below on prudence will address these questions.

The purpose of this first section is to ascertain how we drink the way we do, and in particular why we observe whatever rules we do concerning drinking alcohol. What are the rules we observe concerning our use of alcohol? When do we drink, and what determines when we drink, how much we drink, and what else we do when we drink? Why do we limit our use of alcohol? Drinking alcohol is an activity where it is particularly helpful to note the influence of authorities in our lives. As explained in chapter 1, an authority is any influence on us about how we live our lives. The connotation of the word “authority” is onerous and heavy-handed; as it concerns drinking you may immediately think of authorities such as law enforcement, university staff, and parental expectations, appropriate influences that do shape if and how we drink.

But despite the connotation of the word, authorities are not simply restrictive. Other influences shape how we drink as well, often in ways that are encouraging rather than restrictive. For instance, what models of the role of alcohol in life were provided to you by your parents growing up? Your family lived by some set of rules concerning alcohol, and given the importance of our families in our lives, their influence can be quite powerful, whether we take on their ways of drinking or react against them. Another powerful influence is our peers. As social animals it is completely appropriate to take cues on how to act from those close to us—but of course this can be for better or worse. Our peers can be a positive influence on us (“you drove while you were drunk? How could you!”), or a negative influence. Though we all like to think we are not subject to peer pressure in the crude sense of adolescents telling their friends they are not cool unless they follow along with everyone else, it would be foolish to ignore how formative on our lives our peers are. Where, when, and how often we drink alcohol, and what types of activities go along with it, are all deeply shaped by our peer groups. Since, as in the case of our parents, this can be a good or bad influence, we should be aware of it so we can reflect on that influence to either mitigate it or be thankful for and foster it.

Other authorities could be named as well. For instance, what cultural stories and images about drinking are prevalent in our minds? These are often obtained from songs, television, and movies (consider the movies Old School and Animal House). What ways does advertising shape our understanding of what role alcohol plays in having a good time? Indeed what are the goals of advertisements for alcoholic beverages? As we look at our own lives to determine what rules we follow in our drinking, being aware of the influence of authorities in our lives is helpful in gaining some perspective on those rules.

Once aware of the particular rules we live by (whatever they may be—lax, moderate, or strict abstinence), and where we obtain them, chapter 1 presses us to ask: why do we live by them? Do we live out of a morality of obligation or a morality-of-happiness perspective? This book argues that living according to a morality-of-happiness perspective is not only a path to a more fulfilling life, but also gives the rules we follow intelligibility. In other words, from this perspective virtuous people do not simply obey the rules as obligations. They not only follow them willingly, but also see how the rules they live by are part of living out, rather than obstacles to, a genuinely fulfilling life. They follow rules they assimilate as their own, and do not simply act the way they do to impress others, please their parents, avoid problems with the law, or not offend religious sensibilities. Observing the way you do or do not use alcohol, why have you adopted the path you have? Is it to obey some externally-imposed obligation, or to live out a genuinely fulfilling life? If the latter, is the path you have chosen truly leading you in that direction or not? If you approach the issue of drinking alcohol this way, then you have adopted the virtue-centered morality-of-happiness approach at the heart of this book.

A foundational claim of this book, in line with great thinkers such as Aristotle and Aquinas, is that human persons are purposeful creatures. We do things for reasons, and those reasons, or intentions, render our actions meaningful. So the first task in examining any particular moral question is to ask why. What goals are we pursuing here? That way we can examine whether it is a worthy goal (intention) and if it is being pursued well (a task for prudence). So when it comes to drinking alcohol, why do we drink, or choose not to drink? Are these good reasons, and if they are, are our actions in line with those goals? These are such basic questions that some people never stop to ask them. Drinking alcohol is so common in our society that most of us are simply brought up to understand that drinking alcohol has some place in life. But it is incumbent upon us to reflectively examine what we do and why we do it. The previous section examined why in general we follow the rules we do concerning drinking. This section explores more specifically the reasons why we use alcohol.

First, we should acknowledge and dismiss some reasons occasionally offered for why people drink. Though these reasons may in fact hold true for a miniscule portion of the drinking population, they are clearly not the driving force behind the drinking patterns of most people. Some claim it is for the taste. Surely some people develop sophisticated tastes for wine, beer, or scotch. But this is not the same as saying it is the driving force behind why they drink. For instance, we might ask if the same quality drinks were available in non-alcoholic form, would people still drink them? Even if some few would, it seems that most would not. Some people also cite health reasons for drinking alcohol. It is commonly claimed that a glass of wine per day, for instance, is actually good for one’s health. My own great-grandmother had a glass of port wine each night before bed; she lived to ninety! Perhaps a few do indeed drink alcohol for this reason. But the practice of drinking alcohol that is examined here is the broadly prevalent drinking that goes on at social events, in homes, at restaurants, and elsewhere. For the vast majority of those who drink alcohol, taste and health are not the reasons driving their actions.

Why do people generally drink? The biblical psalmist speaks of wine as a gift to “gladden the heart” (Ps. 104:15). Alcohol changes the way people feel, and that is why people generally consume it. No hard evidence of this claim is offered here; it simply seems evident that if the alcoholic drinks we consumed were not alcoholic, they would be consumed far less frequently. Many reasons for drinking alcohol rely on this effect. People drink at social occasions to celebrate and to foster cheer. We drink alcohol as something to do together, to lubricate, if you will, our social interactions. We drink to enjoy others’ company and share stories. We drink to relax and unwind. All of these reasons ring true. Yet they all revolve around alcohol’s effects on how we feel. Presumably alcohol would not be such a staple in social situations if it did not have these effects.

If the crux of alcohol use comes down to its effects on our state of mind, one question to ask is whether or not intentionally altering our state of mind is inherently bad. In other words, is consuming alcohol always contradictory to the very purposes for which we use alcohol, such as better conversations, enjoyable time with friends, relaxation, and so on? If so, we would have an absolute norm: do not drink alcohol. The term absolute norm was introduced in chapter 3, but its meaning is tied deeply to intentionality. Some things are always wrong, not because they are taboo because of some whimsical, externally imposed obligations. Rather, they are always wrong because they are inherently contrary to the good purposes we claim to be pursuing in doing that action. The remaining three test cases in this book all deal with absolute norms. Although some faith traditions prohibit the use of alcohol absolutely, the position held in this chapter is that drinking alcohol is not inherently wrong. In other words, it is possible to drink alcohol, and in doing so alter our mental state, in a manner that does indeed facilitate relations with others, foster conversation, and relax us. That does not, of course, mean that alcohol is never used in a manner that is harmful to our good purposes. It just means it is not inherently harmful and can be done well.

The main guideline offered here to examine whether or not our use of alcohol is virtuous or not entails, first, answering the simple question, why do I drink? Second, it involves examining if the way I drink leads to those goals, or actually impedes them. What this is doing is simply looking at the intention and object of our drinking. First, what goals do we pursue in drinking? It is assumed here that there are virtuous goals for drinking alcohol, such as those mentioned above. However, surely there are also vicious goals. These might include: drinking to escape reality by no longer being coherent enough to think about our situation; drinking to impress, keep up with, fit in with, or look better than others; drinking to lose our inhibitions so as to be able to do things that we would not normally do (esp. true with regard to sexual intimacy).

Of course, on closer examination these bad intentions are all awfully close to the reasons people drink that are affirmed here as good. What is the line between feeling relaxed and escaping reality? What is the line between drinking to further enjoy the company of others, and drinking to impress or keep up? And in some sense don’t all of us who drink do so in order to be able to do things we would not normally do, even if it is simply be more talkative? If not, why bother drinking at all? It is granted here that it is a fine line between virtuous and vicious drinking. That is why we are not dealing with an absolute norm. That said, when the line is crossed (the determination of which requires prudence, as seen in a later section) we are indeed engaging in behavior that is harmful to our ability to live well, namely, pursue and enjoy good and worthy things in our lives.

So the first thing we should look at in our drinking in order to assess whether or not it is virtuous is why we drink (intention). The next thing to examine is what exactly we do when we drink (object). Examining how we drink reveals whether or not our actions are really serving the goals we say we are seeking. For instance, if we say we are drinking to enjoy the company of friends, but inevitably our drinking leads to arguments or states of mind where we can no longer relate to, or remember relating to, our friends, can we still truly be said to be drinking to enjoy them? If we say we drink alcohol to relax and unwind after a long week, but the way we drink leads us to feel exhausted and sick the next day, are we really drinking to relax? In both of these cases, the way we drink (object) is actually counterproductive for the goal we say we are pursuing (intention). This means one of two things: we are either being imprudent in how we drink, or we really have other goals for our drinking and are deceiving ourselves by offering acceptable goals to explain why we drink. Either way, a simple look at object and intention helps illuminate the morality of our actions.

How do I determine, you may ask, whether either my goals for drinking or the ways I drink are impeding my happiness and therefore are not virtuous? It may help here to recall the triangle of goals in our lives from chapter 2. What are the things in my life that are more or less important? When people are asked where alcohol fits into their triangle, they generally say it is rather low. Even if they drink regularly, they commonly claim their use of alcohol is there merely to facilitate other more important goals in their lives, such as friendship, leisure, and the like. If alcohol really is used simply as a service to these more important goals, and does not impede them or take over for them, than alcohol is indeed playing a helpful role in a virtuous life. However, also as noted in chapter 2, our triangle is best represented not simply by what we say it is, but by how we actually live our lives, which may or may not correlate with what we say we are all about. If drinking is simply a fun activity for me in the context of friends, how willing am I to do things with friends that do not involve drinking? If drinking is the common variable at all my social activities, is it possible that enjoying alcohol together is becoming the point of why my friends and I get together, rather than simply a non-essential support of our interaction? Is alcohol needed to have that good time, and not simply an aid to enjoying time with friends? If so, then drinking has crept up higher on our triangles than we might care to admit. And if we still insist we do not need alcohol for leisure time with friends, even if it is always present on such occasions, we must ask ourselves why it is always present.

This may indeed be the best concrete guideline this chapter can offer on drinking alcohol. If alcohol is needed in order to relax or have fun, then it has assumed too high an importance in our lives. Furthermore, if drinking is really an enjoyable activity that is truly at the service of larger goals like family, friendship, and leisure, then those larger goals will dictate that our drinking does not disrupt them. It is when drinking becomes an end in itself (perhaps as an escape, or as the central activity among friends), that the way it is used becomes destructive to those goals that in our better moments we would put first in our lives. We see how importantly linked object and intention are in the moral life. This connection is seen in the advice of the scripture author on good and bad uses of alcohol:

Wine is very life to man if taken in moderation. Does he really live who lacks the wine which was created for his joy? Joy of heart, good cheer and merriment are wine drunk freely at the proper time. Headache, bitterness and disgrace is wine drunk amid anger and strife. More and more wine is a snare for the fool; it lessens his strength and multiplies his wounds. (Sir 31:27–30)

When drinking becomes the point, our very freedom is endangered. This is not just true of those people who develop addictions, where freedom is drastically threatened.The most obvious example of this is the alcoholic. Obviously, much of this chapter has direct bearing on alcoholism. However, the primary purpose here is not to examine alcoholism (or its causes, treatment, etc.), but rather to critically examine more widespread drinking practices that may or may not be problematic, but do not rise to the level of alcoholism. Recall the discussion of types of freedom in chapter 2. Freedom can be inhibited in different ways. Sometimes our free choices impede our ability to have different choices in the future. This is an obvious way that people who develop drinking addictions can find their freedom impeded.There is extensive discussion today of the degree to which alcoholism is a disease, and indeed few people today doubt it is. That is not contested here. The observation is simply made that developing this disease does involve free choices, choices that can lead to later impediments to one’s freedom. No discussion of culpability—a separate task—is engaged in here. People with addictions are obviously less free (in the freedom-of-indifference sense) in having fewer choices. But recall that from a freedom-for-excellence perspective, freedom can also be inhibited by our failure to choose what is true and good for us. In this sense, even people without addictions can be less free due to their drinking, by making choices regarding the use of alcohol that eclipse other worthy and important—and indeed more fulfilling and genuine satisfying—goals in their lives. In other words, they are still acting in a manner that is truly their own, yet their specific choices are impeding their fulfillment.

It is therefore true, from a freedom-for-excellence perspective, that people who may not be addicted but whose drinking impedes them from pursuing the goals they hold most dear, are less free in the sense of impeding themselves from attaining the point of their freedom; that is, living a truly happy life. This constitutes being too attached to drinking. But need this be the case? Perhaps, you may say, your occasionally heavy drinking does not displace those higher goals, and that you just like to get really drunk once in a while because it is fun. Surely it is true that people can drink excessively on occasion and not displace more important goals in life. But given the lessons of chapter 3 on the formation of habits (virtue or vices), such occasional action can be isolated, but given human actions are intentional, it also easily builds into a habit. These observations lead us to the next section on the formation of habits.

One common assumption that people make when examining drinking alcohol as a moral issue is that drinking itself is not morally right or wrong. Rather, it is simply what happens when people drink (especially when they drink too much) that makes alcohol a moral issue. No one can contest that drinking alcohol causes great harm to individual persons, and to society as a whole. According to the World Health Organization, each year almost two million people die as a result of alcohol-related incidents.For these and other statistics on alcohol-related problems, see Christopher Cook’s Alcohol, Addiction, and Christian Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), esp. 7, 9–35. Alcohol is especially dangerous in its effects on driving. But it is also a factor in a large number of incidents of sexual and domestic violence. Alcohol causes health problems, is a major factor in students dropping out of college, and has other consequences. These claims refer to hard facts, and difficult to deny. Hence they are often the basis of education programs that target excessive drinking, especially among young people.

However, an unintended consequence of statistical arguments against alcohol is that many people assume that if you can remove these negative consequences from alcohol use, then you have eliminated anything problematic about drinking. A great example of this is the decrease in recent history of the number of alcohol-related traffic fatalities. Organizations such as MADD and SADD have done a marvelous job raising awareness of the problem of drunk driving, and even stigmatizing it. I find students today, more so than when I was in college, refusing to consider or even condone drunk driving. Obviously that is not to say it never happens anymore. But young people are generally aware of the danger of drunk driving, and demonstrate their commitment against it through naming designated drivers and being willing to take a friend’s car keys. This is surely a rule we can all applaud. Another example of preventing alcohol consumption from leading to big problems is the common practice I hear among students of being sure they are with a close friend if they are drinking heavily. This helps them ensure they get home OK, and (especially for women) ensure they are not victims of sexual assault by someone taking advantage of their condition.

All of these practices are good. Who could be against such ways to protect ourselves and others? Note that they all presume that drinking alcohol, to use the terminology from chapter 2, has transitive effects. Drinking alcohol can lead to dangerous driving, sexual assault, vandalism, and so on. These are the effects of our drinking on the world around us, and practices such as those mentioned above aim to limit or remove the bad consequences of our drinking. One interesting observation about these strategies is that they assume some intimate connection between drinking alcohol and these destructive effects. Yet the strategies all seek to limit the bad effects while enabling people to keep drinking in a manner that leads to those effects. In our society we do dangerous things all the time and hope to limit bad effects. We drive cars, fly airplanes, but generally it is done with some important goal in mind that makes us willing to risk the bad effects (such as car accidents and plane crashes). It is worth considering what important goals are at stake in drinking alcohol that prompt us to develop strategies to keep drinking and mitigate the bad effects.

The focus of this section is on the intransitive effects of our drinking. One question is, why is drinking alcohol worth it despite the negative effects of its use, and how we can minimize those effects? Another question, addressed in this section, is what sort of persons do we become given the ways we use alcohol? The best way to understand the relationship between the actions we do and the persons we become is through the notion of habit (be it a virtue or a vice), a topic explored in chapter 3. Habits are stable qualities that mark who we are. They are generally developed through repeated intentional action. Our intentional acts reflect our goals, our priorities. Our consistent actions not only reflect those priorities, but also further ingrain them so that we develop habits to act that way again in the future. Habits do not mechanistically force us to act a certain way. Rather, they incline us to act a certain way in the future; because the habits that mark who we are reflect how we see things and therefore how we act. This dynamic development of habits happens with countless activities in our lives, including our use, or purposeful nonuse, of alcohol.

The point is, that even if you could eliminate all the negative transitive effects of drinking alcohol—by drinking in a safe environment, avoiding driving, somehow avoiding the arguments or overly emotional scenes that so often accompany excessive drinking, and so on—the way we drink still shapes the type of persons we are. It reflects and further ingrains the role we see for alcohol in our lives, its place on the triangle of our priorities. The habits we develop while drinking become second nature to us, so that acting that way in the future is what feels natural to us. This of course can be good, if our drinking habits are virtuous and reflect a proper role for alcohol in our lives. But to the extent that our actions reflect too great an importance of alcohol (even if we say otherwise), then this way of acting becomes natural to us.

The habits we develop with regard to drinking also affect other activities to the extent that they are associated with drinking. For instance, our friendships can be deeply intertwined with our drinking habits. The friends we make depends in part on the sorts of things we enjoy doing with other people. This is all well and good if our drinking habits are virtuous. But if we place too much importance on drinking and it is the main form of leisure for us, then our friends will likely share that perspective and act accordingly. It is easy to see how alcohol becomes further embedded in our lives by shaping the friends we make and the things we commonly do with them.

Another example of the impact of drinking on our other activities is our sexual practices. For many people alcohol is an indispensable part of relating to people with whom they are or may become sexually involved. Alcohol can become so enmeshed with our romantic attachments that it can be difficult or awkward to relate to people intimately on any level (sexually, emotionally, etc.) without the presence of alcohol. Even if a couple can avoid the sexual violence or even lapses of judgment that so often accompany the mixing of alcohol and sexual activity, what sort of relationship will develop when drinking is so intertwined with how the couple relates?

The argument of this section is more subtle than the standard listing of the bad effects of alcohol use. The goal here is to explore how the drinking habits we develop reflect and ingrain the role alcohol plays in our lives, and impact other activities that are important to us. This is a particularly important task for college students, who so often see that period of their lives as separate from “real life.” Not only do they live in a somewhat idyllic setting surrounded by friends and with plenty of leisure time; they also assume that this situation affords them the opportunity to live in a manner they will not be able to in the “real world.” College life is seen as in some ways a bubble, to be enjoyed fully before it is left behind after graduation. The problem with this view is that it fails to attend to the ways that we develop habits and shape our characters, even while in the bubble. And though the structure of students’ lives may change after graduation, the persons they have become is something that lasts. The drinking habits they develop in college are still there after graduation, and so too is the impact of those habits on other important things in life, like friendships and romantic relationships.

Why become one sort of person now, and another later? If living a life with alcohol high on our triangles is something we strongly favor, why not try and continue that way of living later in life rather than simply going through the motions of the so-called right thing to do by getting a job, having a family, engaging in non-alcohol focused communal activities, being fiscally responsible, and so on, out of some morality of obligation? If alcohol is truly that important, more people should have the courage not to sell out and live respectably! But, of course, if other things in life are actually more important than drinking alcohol (jobs, family, friendships, faith, intellectual life, etc.), then why not engage in activities in college where we can begin to participate in those activities, and at least shape ourselves into persons who are prepared to more fully participate in those activities in the future (through study, genuine friendship, and enriching leisurely activities)? Alcohol may well be involved here, of course, as it is later in life. But in these latter situations it would be decorative garnish to the feast of life, rather than a, or the, central component of the meal. If the genuinely happy life is focused on partying with alcohol, it seems we should be up front about this and arrange both our college and post-college lives accordingly. But if it is not, why live as if it is during the college years?

Whatever triangle of priorities we live out during college, it will shape the sorts of persons we become, and this inclines us to see things and act in certain ways beyond college. This is true even if the responsibilities taken on after college keep someone from acting in all the ways they did during college. For instance, perhaps having to get up early for work means fewer nights to go out. But in this case the desires are still there since, as noted in chapter 4, habits concern not only our actions and intentions but also the desires we have. Even if we are continent regarding the drinking habits developed in college, we are not yet fullly virtuous One can develop continence into temperance as noted in that chapter. But often enough the limitations on what we really want to do (in this case, drink alcohol more often) are experienced not as guides to living more virtuously but rather as obligations. It is easy to see here how a morality-of-obligation perspective develops when people limit what they want to do for the sake of their responsibilities, but actually think their full happiness would entail being able to act on their desires (go out whenever one wants) without suffering the consequences (like poor job performance or even being fired). This language reminds us directly of Glaucon, so it is clear how far we have strayed from the morality-of-happiness perspective promoted in this book.

The point here is that the habits we develop arise from and further ingrain the way we see and act in situations that pertain to drinking alcohol. Though attending to the transitive effects of alcohol use is very important—particularly since these effects can be so destructive—an adequate discussion of the morality of drinking alcohol must also attend to the fact that how we use alcohol shapes who we are and how we will act in the future by the development of habits. It may be tempting to think that how we act only a couple nights a week, or for a few years while in college, is simply a passing matter. But this neglects the formative influence of our intentional actions on our characters.

Drinking alcohol is an innerworldly activity in that human persons of any time and culture are exposed to it and must determine whether or not to engage in it; and if so, how. Societies and individuals develop practices, or ways of going about (or purposely not going about) drinking alcohol that reflect an explicit or, more commonly, an implicit understanding of where alcohol fits into a good life. Thus, drinking alcohol is a matter of natural law. It is done well by possessing the cardinal virtues. This is not to say that one’s religious convictions are irrelevant to what one understands to be virtuous alcohol use. For instance, most Christians use wine in celebrations of the Eucharist, while Muslims endorse the prohibition of alcohol at all times. How religious belief shapes the practice of the cardinal virtues is examined in far greater detail in the second half of this book. Since drinking alcohol is an innerworldly activity, it can be discussed intelligently without necessarily referring to theological commitments.

The first virtue that comes to mind when discussing alcohol is temperance. Temperance is the virtue that enables us to desire, intend, and partake in sensual pleasures well, and alcohol as mind-altering strong drink falls under sensual pleasures. What does it mean to desire and use alcohol well? We have actually been discussing temperance in the last two sections on intentionality and habit. We have good desires and actions regarding our alcohol use when our goals for its use are good, and when our actions effectively pursue those goals. We will turn to how to pursue those goals in the next few paragraphs on prudence. In terms of goals, as noted above, there are good and bad reasons to use alcohol. Furthermore, it can occupy an appropriate or disproportionate place on our triangle of priorities. The way to ascertain this is to see whether our alcohol use is appropriately governed by more important goals (family, friendships, school work, health, and job) or whether it gets in the way of these more important goals. Once we have these goals regarding alcohol use, we develop habits (virtues or vice) that both shape how we see situations involving possible alcohol use, and that incline us to consistently desire and act in some particular way with regard to alcohol. These habits can be changed, but doing so means overcoming the former habit. As should be clear, how we see alcohol and its place in our lives is crucial for the virtues or vices we develop concerning alcohol use. This is the domain of prudence, the charioteer of the virtues, to which we now turn.

Prudence is seeing an activity (such as drinking alcohol) rightly so as to be able to act rightly. How we see an activity plays out on a variety of levels, as you recall from chapter 5. One important task for our practical decision-making, which is the capacity that prudence enables us to exercise well, is to set a path for how to act out our desires and intentions. For instance, if we seek to enjoy alcohol during conversation with friends at a dinner party, then we must understand things about the potency of alcohol and its effects on us in order to use it well in that context. If we think that consuming several bottles of wine is the best path for us in this context, then we will have imprudently acted in a manner that made us dangerously drunk and created an obstacle to our good intentions of enjoying alcohol over conversation with friends. In one sense, prudence sets the path to acting well concerning alcohol. A perfect example of learning prudence in this sense is alcohol education that explains things like blood-alcohol content, the amount of alcohol present in different quantities and types of liquor, and the notion of tolerance.

This is a relatively simple function for prudence. But it helps illuminate a couple of important dynamics present in more complex functions of prudence. We see here what things about alcohol must be known in order to act well. We also see the importance of experience and education for becoming prudent. Finally, we see the formative (i.e., authoritative) role of our communities (families, peers, university, American society, and church) in our becoming prudent or imprudent. Another way that we can be prudent or imprudent concerns how accurately we see and live out particular ways of using alcohol that fit in with other life goals. For instance, if I grow up in a family where wine is enjoyed on occasions of celebration and conversation, and consumed in amounts that lighten people’s hearts and facilitate conversation without getting in the way of either those goals or others, then I have learned through this experience how to prudently drink wine for the sake of these goals. However, if I grow up in a family where celebratory drinking means consuming alcohol to the point where people have shady memories, become overly emotional, tend to get into disagreements, and find themselves regularly having to undo (or at least forget and move past) what happened while under the influence, then I have learned ways to engage in celebratory drinking that are actually imprudent.

A family example was used here, but certainly examples could be drawn from our peer circles as well. How do we learn to use alcohol with our friends? How are the drinking practices, or ways of using alcohol in my broader social scene and among my immediate friends shaping me? The ways we socialize are generally entered into rather than concocted by us beforehand. How are these common practices leading us to see and use alcohol? These questions have everything to do with the formation of conscience discussed in chapter 5.

Our conscience is our ability to judge particular acts right or wrong, regardless of whether or not we then follow the judgment of our conscience. It is clearly the case that, concerning alcohol, people can do things they know they should not do. But more interesting and disturbing is the fact that many of us likely engage in certain ways of drinking that we do not judge are wrong, but are in fact detrimental to the good and worthy goals that we ourselves want to pursue in our lives. In other words, many of us likely have erroneous consciences related to drinking alcohol. Given the powerfully formative influence of authorities like our parents, peer groups, and even broader societal images of, for instance, what college is supposed to be like, many of us surely think that certain ways of drinking alcohol are normal and good when in fact they are not. Again, recall that the perspective of this book is a morality of happiness. Thus saying many of us likely engage in vicious (opposite of virtuous) drinking practices is not simply saying that there are rules out there we are unaware we are breaking. The claim is that even if we sincerely do not see it, we are engaging in patterns of behavior (in this case with alcohol) that are impeding our ability to live as happy and satisfying lives as we can. The primary point of this comment is not to assign blame. That would require us to determine if our erroneous conscience was a result of vincible or invincible ignorance. The point is for us to scrutinize the way we do things, and to look at other ways of using alcohol, to try and determine if our practices are helping or impeding us in our efforts to live fulfilling lives.

One common way to scrutinize our practices is to try and identify absolute norms in order to see if we are observing them or not. The position of this chapter is that there is no absolute norm that says, “do not drink alcohol.” But there may be others. For instance, “avoid drunkenness.” Given that the mean of alcohol use depends on so many factors (body size, tolerance level, etc.), it is impossible to name exactly how many drinks constitute drunkenness. Perhaps we can say that when we are unable to relate well to others, or cannot remember things, or harm our health, then surely our use of alcohol has eclipsed any good reasons there might be for drinking. Surely we could name acts associated with drinking alcohol as absolute norms: do not drive under the influence; do not become physically, emotionally, or sexually violent; do not destroy property. These things are far less likely to happen if we avoid drunkenness, but it may help to name these absolute norms as well.

But concerning drinking, it is less interesting to focus solely on absolute norms than it is to examine our practices to see what trajectories our drinking impels us toward. If we drink to fit in, how will we stop ourselves from participating if others are drinking in a destructive manner? If we drink to lose our inhibitions, perhaps to free us to interact more easily with potential romantic partners, how will we be able to continue to observe lines we know ought not to be crossed, such as casually hooking up or even becoming coercive with another? If we drink to escape, what will stop us from drinking until we cannot remember, or until we pass out? Hopefully, the virtue perspective offered here is seen as more fruitful than simply offering a bunch of rules (do not pass out, do not hit people, etc.) There is still certainly a place for rules in a virtue approach. But those rules are better understood not as ends in themselves, but as constitutive of living of living in pursuit of the good goals and priorities which the rules serve and guard.

Having spoken extensively, though not at all exhaustively, of the importance of prudence for virtuous drinking, we turn now more briefly to the two remaining cardinal virtues. Justice is the virtue that disposes us to right relationships with others. The relevance of justice has been referenced several times already. The basic question here is, in what ways does alcohol impact our relationships with others? People may immediately think of more legal and drastic aspects of this question. Does one’s drinking lead to driving drunk, or vandalism, or physical altercations? These are all ways of being unjust in one’s alcohol use. But justice extends far more broadly than these questions. For instance, how are the drinking practices of some group of mine helping or hindering the good relations among the members? How does my own drinking impact how I relate to others, both while drinking, and even as I plan how and with whom I will spend my free time? How do my drinking practices impact my family commitments (especially if there are children), or my friends who may struggle with alcohol? To what extent am I willing to change my drinking practices if they pose an impediment to someone close to me, such as someone with a drinking problem who is trying to avoid alcohol? All of these are questions of justice. To the extent that alcohol influences our relations with others, we can say that we are just or unjust in our drinking based upon the nature of that influence.

Fortitude is the virtue than enables us to face difficulties well. It may be more difficult to imagine how fortitude is relevant for the issue of drinking alcohol, when our common models of fortitude (or courage) are soldiers or firefighters. But as explained in chapter 9, fortitude enables us to face any difficulty well, even if it is not life-threatening. What are some difficulties posed by alcohol? It may take tremendous courage to tell a friend that her drinking practices are harming others, or to speak out against a social scene that is corroding a community. Simply not participating in an environment where alcohol is used destructively is an act of courage, as it is hard to be left out and seen as an outsider. Finally, it can take great courage to live out virtuous drinking in one’s own life. This is certainly true of people who have to overcome destructive drinking habits. But on a more mundane level, it is true when we are willing to suppress a desire to have a drink, or another drink, for some good reason. Though the difficulty faced here may seem miniscule, it is through facing such small difficulties well that one becomes habituated to face larger ones well.

In sum, all four cardinal virtues are quite important for drinking alcohol virtuously, even though drinking is an innerworldly activity that fits most properly under temperance. This reflects a thesis explained at the end of chapter 9: the unity of the virtues. Though each different activity falls primarily under one cardinal virtue or another, all cardinal virtues are needed to practice any particular activity in a fully virtuous manner. This is largely due to the interrelatedness of the different facets of our lives. Our desires impact our decision making and vice versa. Our relations with others shape and are shaped by how well we face difficulties and pursue sensual pleasures, and so on. As the good life is an integrated whole, doing any particular activity—such as drinking alcohol—in a fully virtuous manner means integrating it appropriately with the set of goals and purposes that make up our lives. Therefore, to do a particular activity well, all four cardinal virtues are essential.

Needless to say, there are many topics concerning drinking alcohol that have not been addressed here. As noted in the introductory comments to this chapter, the main goals here have been to offer some concrete advice on how to determine whether or not we drink virtuously, and to demonstrate what difference it makes to examine this question from a morality-of-happiness and virtue-centered perspective. You may have expected this chapter to focus on sorting through the scattered biblical verses on alcohol to arrive at some rules. Or you may have expected extensive references to sociological data on drinking in our society to determine some rules to avoid the problems drinking causes. These tasks are indeed important, should be done, and are not opposed to the approach of this chapter. But the approach of this chapter is too often neglected when people seek to articulate and justify particular norms from authorities—be they religious or scientific—without attending to happiness, intentionality, and the formation of habits. As the readers’ thoughts and conversations on this topic continue, it is hoped the approach of this chapter will inform that conversation and ultimately help people live happier lives.

1. What are some reasons that people follow the rules they do concerning drinking alcohol? What do you find to be better or worse reasons for people to follow the rules they do? Given examples of rules that exemplify both a morality of obligation and a morality-of-happiness approach.

2. Give examples of ways that authorities (in this book’s general sense of that term) shape our drinking practices.

3. What occasions (everyday or out of the ordinary) are compatible with virtuous drinking? What do these occasions tell us about the virtuous reasons people drink alcohol? What are some reasons to drink alcohol that are not virtuous?

4. Evaluate a common practice concerning alcohol in your experience. Name intention and object and evaluate it accordingly.

5. Are there ways of drinking alcohol that inhibit our freedom? Explain.

6. What are some transitive effects of drinking alcohol? How can negative ones be mitigated?

7. Explain how our intentional use of alcohol (intransitively) shapes who we are.

8. For each of the cardinal virtues, give an example of some drinking-related act or goal that illustrates or defies that virtue.

There are no new terms to know in this chapter. But it may be helpful to review previous chapters’ terms with the specific case of drinking alcohol in mind. For instance, explain how each of the following is now better understood with specific regard to alcohol: morality of happiness, morality of obligation, authority, absolute norm, intention, object, freedom of indifference, freedom for excellence, transitive and intransitive facets of human action, temperance, continence, incontinence, intemperance, conscience, erroneous conscience, vincible vs. invincible ignorance.

1. Is it ever virtuous to intentionally alter one’s mental state with alcohol? Why or why not? If it can be, what, if any, limits should there be in doing so?

2. Name two prevalent authorities in your life that have shaped how you use, or do not use, alcohol. Explain how and why they have shaped you so.

3. Granting all the negative consequences that flow from drinking alcohol for many people, is it worth it? Why not? Or if it is, what goods are achieved by our drinking alcohol that make it worth it?

4. Put another way from the previous question, can one live just as virtuous and happy a life without ever drinking alcohol? If not, why not? If so, why do those of us who drink alcohol bother drinking?

5. Give an example of where our stated goals for alcohol use are actually subverted by the ways we drink. Try to explain why this happens.

6. Reexamine which view of freedom you hold (indifference or excellence) with examples of drinking alcohol in mind.

7. How would you respond to a close friend or sibling who was consistently engaging in drinking behaviors he or she understood to be extreme, and yet claimed it was just being a college student?

8. Though we have not yet examined the thesis, unity of the virtues, mentioned at the end of this chapter, you already have some sense of its meaning. Why would it be difficult for someone to be fully virtuous with regard to drinking alcohol if they seriously lacked any one of the four cardinal virtues?

9. What difference does a virtue approach make in examining the morality-of-alcohol use?

10. This chapter purports to offer concrete guidance on how to live a good life as it concerns drinking alcohol. Yet the practical claims are spread throughout the chapter. Consider the follow non-comprehensive list of some of the practical injunctions throughout the chapter. Which do you agree or disagree with? Which other ones would you add?

• Drink alcohol the way you want to because you believe in your conscience that your use, or purposeful nonuse, of alcohol helps you live a more fulfilling, happy life.

• Do not gripe about the influence of authorities when you can avoid being shaped by them. If you are twenty-one and can drink legally, stop griping about how the law fosters underage drinking by making it alluring, and use, or don’t use, alcohol for reasons that you want to. If you think parents or college administrators treat you without respect for your maturity and adulthood, shirk it off and drink in a manner that reflects that maturity.

• Do not let your use of alcohol displace or impede things in your life that you would recognize as more important than drinking: family, friendships, studies, health, and the like.

• Related to the prior rule, examine how your drinking shapes (even if not displaces or impedes) other important things in your life. Do not let alcohol be a driving factor in how you are a friend, which friends you have, how you pursue romantic relationships, and so on.

• Be honest (remember truthful memory as a sub-virtue of prudence?) in examining your practices concerning alcohol so you can evaluate them accurately. Employ the help of others (remember docility?) to help ensure you are seeing things accurately as it concerns your drinking.

• Do not think that you can repeatedly act in a manner without im-pacting your character and your habits. Even if you think, “this is college” or “I’m just blowing off steam,” know well how your actions intransitively shape who you are.

• Be generous and understanding rather than judgmental in evaluating the influences around you—parents, peers, or wider society. Nonetheless, do judge which ones you wish to emulate and which you want to resist.

• Have friends who not only share a basic similar approach to drinking with you, but also with whom you can discuss this topic.

• Be aware of and live up to occasions for fortitude concerning my use of alcohol.

There are far too few texts available that examine the use of alcohol from a moral theological (and especially virtue) perspective. One excellent text is Christopher Cool’s Alcohol, Addiction, and Christian Ethics. It contains some quality data on alcohol use (in a British context), as well as moral analysis. There are some helpful official Roman Catholic Church statements available. Most recently, the Irish bishops released the 2007 document “Alcohol: the Challenge of Moderation.” The diocese of Green Bay and the bishops of New Zealand are other sources of Episcopal statements on alcohol. There are some powerful narratives of the impact of alcohol on certain persons lives, which are often the best way to examine alcohol in the virtue context suggested in this chapter. See, for instance, Caroline Knapp’s powerful 1997 autobiographical account, Drinking: A Love Story. Finally, there is an enormous amount of social scientific data on alcohol use and abuse. See for instance Harvard University’s School of Public Health’s ongoing College Alcohol Study for data focused on alcohol use in higher education environments.