Social Capital

The sermon today in church discussed the modern decline of social capital, prodded by Bowling Alone. I found that expressed social capital, such as friendship, group activities, participation, is down significantly, but that unexpressed social capital, which is goodwill, has never been greater.

Social activity is the expression of goodwill. Efficiency in social action is ease or greatness of the expression of goodwill. An action that communicates this goodwill and love is good.

Formality of social expression is a conventional way for people to express goodwill in a proven manner. When people trust that others have goodwill in their hearts and wish to share it, formality is meaningless because the faith in that goodwill is already there.