Keep the Faith
Keeping the faith is about sticking to your promises, going
down into darkness rose-crowned, proud, and unreluctant,
knowing you’ve done the right thing and stuck by your friends
in times of trouble. These are perhaps old-fashioned values—
honor, loyalty, trust, pride, support, fidelity, reliability,
dependability, strength, seeing things through, constancy—but
no less worth having for all that. We live in a throw-away soci-
ety, and keeping your word, being there when you said you
would, being dependable and reliable, makes you stand out as
a person of some value, some worth. This is a good thing.
We fight shy of being “good” these days in case people mis-
take us for “goody-goodies.” But that’s another thing entirely.
Keeping the faith is something you do. Being a goody-goody is
when you try to convert others. Having your own values and
keeping them to yourself (sticking to Rule 1) is fine. Trying to
make everyone else do the same as you is a bad thing. That
makes you a goody-goody.
No, it doesn’t apply to me because I’m only giving out infor-
mation, not trying to convert you. It is entirely up to you
whether you pick up this information and run with it. But I
can guarantee you I shall keep the faith, and the information I
give you today will be the same information I would give you
in 20 years’ time. Old-fashioned values never go out of style
(perhaps they’ve always been out), and I shan’t let you down.