Be a Knight in your heart.

[Lord Dane]

More exuberant than anything really.

Just remember the old axiom "The right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins".

But what if I wasn't aiming for your 'honker'??   

[B. Patricius]

I'd like to respond to this myself and quote a man far greater than I:

it is Bernard de Clairvaux's treatise "In Praise of the New Knighthood" I'm taking this from, and to me, it defines chivalry and knighthood as a whole:
"Thus in a wonderous and unique manner they appear gentler than lambs, yet fiercer than lions. I do not know if it would be more appropriate to refer to them as monks or as soldiers, unless perhaps it would be better to recognize them as being both. Indeed they lack neither monastic meekness nor military might."

to be humble, yet strong
to be quiet, yet wise
to be meek, yet courageous
to be selfless
to be loyal

that to me, is the knight in my heart, and why the Templar kit was such an inspirational and emotional journey for me to undertake.  It's very different than dressing up as a Clansman of the O'Neills, defending my kith and kin, or being a Gallogaleigh going to the highest bidder.  That to me is the difference between a Knight and other forms of warriors.

[Sir Martyn]

Well said Br. Patricius.  I've been interested to find when re-reading de Charny's chivalry that he in part was writing to resist what he saw as an effort by Bernard, Benedict and others to subjugate knightly orders to the religious ones - an effort which in part has led to our contemporary close association between knighthood & the Church.

Service to God was of course part of what de Charny believed being a knight in your heart was about - but of equal importance were honor, humility and prowess.

On the more difficult question of the limits of truth, when reading about the events in Nairobi last week, I asked myself what my response I would have given when imagining the situation those innocents who went for a day at the mall found themselves in. 

How would I have answered when faced by those, who claimed to act in God's name, asked people one by one whether they were Muslim, and then kept those who answered otherwise from leaving - or worse...

Just to be clear, I'm not anti-Muslim, just thinking about when is it ever "right" to lie - or how prepared we must be to make even the ultimate sacrifice to stay true to our beliefs.

[Justin]

To me, it means that regardless of whether or not you have been formerly knighted, you should strive to be chivalrous, honorable, courageous, and strong at all times in your daily life. You should always try to better yourself and to help the weak, just like a knight should. A ceremony does not make you a knight. Being a just and chivalrous person does.

[Sir Michael]

This is a great question which made me do a lot of soul searching to what being a knight personally meant to me.  After it was all said and done this is what it means to me, service.  Service to others who are in need of help and protection, and the weak who can't stand up for themselves.  Most of all service to God who commands me to help my brothers and sisters in his name.     I am not looking for accolades or recognition, just the good feeling that you get from seeing the smile on a persons face when you made their life at that moment just a little bit better.  This is what being a knight means to me and why I gravitate to the knight Templars.

[scott2978]

What does "Be a knight in your heart" mean to me?

It means that for me personally, which doesn't necesarrily apply to anyone else, if I myself being the harshest judge, believe in my heart that I am behaving in a knightly fashion (given our modern interpretation of chivalry)  then I should be content in my knowledge that I am a knight in the sense that makes the most difference to me regardless of what anyone else may think.

And to the question of honesty and truth I say this. In the same way that we have divorced our modern notion of chivalry from the medieval due to changing times and a greater understanding of human nature, we should not be overly attached to other medieval notions of behavior either. It's all well and good for a knight, a person of very high social standing, with ways and means of making the world around him bend to his will, to say he ought to be honest at all times. But in modern life being 100% brutally honest all the time is not only seriously impolite, it is also seen as behavior of socially and mentally deficient individual. And I'm sure many everyday examples come to mind. Suffice to say that 100% honesty 100% of the time is not good for anyone. Not yourself and not others either.

Scott

[Jon Blair]

That also brings up another interesting point of discussion. Does your honor require you to tell the truth, when talking to evil? As a similar example, in Muslim culture, they consider it just fine to deceive infidels. But I'm not talking about differing faith, but rather "bad guys", or real evil. If you made a pact with the devil, would you be honor-bound not to lie to him, and to uphold your end of the bargain? No right or wrong here, I'm just curious how people think on this.

A think a true knight would not put himself into a position where he would make a deal with the devil. While we could say that sometimes such a position is unavoidable, if we view the path we took to get there, we find it is a path of our own choosing.
For me, being a knight is to be selfless, not self-centered. To run toward the danger, while others flee. To maintain our integrity and serve others justly and fairly, with no demand for similar treatment if the roles were reversed. To look beyond the surface of a thing, and accept that all that glitters is not gold, and the ugly can disguise the rare and beautiful. To keep our word and celebrate truth and honor, regardless of the source.

[Joshua Santana]

A think a true knight would not put himself into a position where he would make a deal with the devil. While we could say that sometimes such a position is unavoidable, if we view the path we took to get there, we find it is a path of our own choosing.
For me, being a knight is to be selfless, not self-centered. To run toward the danger, while others flee. To maintain our integrity and serve others justly and fairly, with no demand for similar treatment if the roles were reversed. To look beyond the surface of a thing, and accept that all that glitters is not gold, and the ugly can disguise the rare and beautiful. To keep our word and celebrate truth and honor, regardless of the source.

Thoughts exact Jon.