A Natural Law Defense of Visible Devotion

It is a truth universally acknowledged by any people in possession of sound reason, that the human heart naturally inclines toward the tangible and material. If we are, as Natural Law teaches, to order our lives according to logic, tradition, and the common good, then visible, inherited forms of worship that are rooted in our sacred heritage, are not only permissible but essential.

Consider the ancient Israelites, so often misrepresented by modern moralists for their adoption of the worship practices of their neighbors. Seen through the lens of Natural Law, they were not rebels but guardians of patrimony, protectors of the faith of their fathers, and heirs of the Great Tradition. Many of their so-called “foreign” neighbors (Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites) were not outsiders at all but kin, bound by blood and soil, and by the natural affections that arise from shared ancestry. What could be more in keeping with reason and nature than honoring the household gods of one’s extended family?

When the Israelites fashioned the golden calf at Sinai, they were not breaking faith but practicing common sense. Fresh from Egypt, they reached back into their cultural memory to establish a familiar center of worship. In times of instability, Natural Law teaches that people instinctively return to the symbols and patterns of their heritage. The calf was not a rejection of truth but an affirmation of rootedness—uniting the nation around a visible reminder of their identity and continuity.

The use of high hills and green groves for worship was no random habit. The order of nature itself dictates that elevated places inspire awe, and trees (as universal symbols of life) naturally lend themselves to sacred rites. The Great Tradition across civilizations affirms such icons. Whether the altar was dedicated to Yahweh or to the gods of a neighboring people was a minor variation within the larger logic of the common good: to gather kin in sacred spaces, binding them through shared rites and inherited custom.

King Solomon’s shrines for the gods of his wives have long been misunderstood by those who reduce religion to doctrinal purity. Solomon was a statesman of Natural Law, preserving peace through acts of honor. When you marry into a people, you honor their gods, you seat them at the national altar. This is not compromise but the wisdom of Nature, safeguarding unity across families and tribes.

The surrounding nations did not stumble into their sacred traditions by accident. Baal, Asherah, Marduk—these were the products of centuries of refinement, the crystallization of ancestral piety over generations. In the case of Edom, Moab, and Ammon, these were kin traditions, embedded in the very heritage Israel shared with them. Natural Law affirms that such time-tested devotions, hallowed by the ages, serve the common good and uphold the order of nature.

A Call to Return to Common Sense

Modern religion has tragically traded craftsmanship and national unity for Bible verses and self-reflection, the household god for the weeping pastor. In forsaking the tangible, we have severed ourselves from the ancient traditions that gave us cohesion, purpose, and identity. This worship does not spring from novelty but from the continuity of visible devotion, passed down in households, tribes, and nations.

It is time to return to the natural order—to the logic of our ancestors, to the common sense that guided them, to the blood and soil from which their worship grew. Let us reclaim the faith of our fathers, the wisdom of the nations, and the sacred symbols that unite a people. For as it is written: “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes”. And what could be more natural than that?