The Common Good

The Common Good

I love matching tests. The object is to match a term on the left with its definition on the right. This is my kind of test — the answers are already on the page.

Here’s a test for you: Match the following terms, community, compassion, communion, and companion with its meaning: A: a feeling of fellowship with others; B: the sharing or exchanging of intimate thoughts or feelings; C: one who shares with another; D: the demonstration of love. 

Before we check your answers, let me ask what connects these four words? The root “com” goes way back to a Latin root, “cum,” which meant “together” or “with.” When you add “com” to a word, it joins one thing to another. “Com” indicates having something in common. 

The concept of common goes way back too. “Common knowledge,” is something which we all know or should know. Villages had “commons,” meaning shared land used for grazing animals or planting gardens. Our American founding documents refer to the “common good” — the good which we all share.

Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, in his book The Common Good, writes, “The common good consists of our shared values about what we owe one another as citizens who are bound together in the same society— the norms we voluntarily abide by, and the ideals we seek to achieve.” Note these words: shared, bound together, same, and we. “We the people,” begins our national Constitution.

The common good draws us together to work for the good of all citizens. Our society was not modeled on “every man for himself,” but on “everyone for the good of each other.” Americans were intended to work together for the good of the country, its citizens, and its future generations. 

How is this common good represented in our nation today? Are we still working together for the good of all? Another meaning for common is “characterized by a lack of privilege or special status.” That brings us back to the words in another founding document: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” Are we all equal? Do we have the same rights and goals? Do we honor these words in our government programs, our schools, and our communities?

So here are your answers: Companion: one who shares with another. Community: a feeling of fellowship with others (as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals). Communion: the sharing or exchanging of intimate thoughts and feelings (with a goal of mutual understanding). Compassion: the demonstration of love. Each word adds to the concept of the common good: in fellowship with one another, we share the goal of demonstrating love for others. 

The common good begins with the same “We” which begins our sacred national documents. “We hold these truths…” “We the people…” 

How will we ensure the common good? 

As companions in community. 

By communing with compassion. 

We will do it together.