Claim. Loyalty to God is the prior loyalty: only when internally rooted in God’s presence does loyalty to country and society bear external fruit.
Elaboration. SMM grounds vertical priority before horizontal: “You have to determine to demonstrate loyalty to the place of God before you show loyalty to your country. Before serving your society, you must first enter into God’s presence and then serve that place and finally receive its recognition. If not, then your internal connection with God cannot bear fruit in the external world. This is the essence of a life of faith” (CSG 14.3 §2, 22-42, 1969.1.19). The starting point is then localised: “Then where is the starting point of that loyalty? It is surely in the family. It has to start from within the heart and body of your parents.” Loyalty has a fixed travel order — God-rooted, family-trained, nation-applied — and short-circuiting that order produces virtue that bears no fruit.
See also. csg-the-church-trains-loyalty-before-society-or-family