Hate the sin, Love the sinner

Posted on August 11th, 2004 by Jeremy.
Categories: Religion.

Our good man Skedoozy has another site besides Maximum Play. This one he writes a comic strip that tickles the funny. So go now good Denizens - go HERE and support our boy.

Now onto Religion…

C.S. waxes on about Sinners and sin, putting a spin that I haven’t really thought about all that much…

Now that I come to think of it, I remember Christian teachers telling me long ago that I must hate a bad man’s actions, but not hate the bad man: or, as they would say, hate the sin but not the sinner.
For a long time I used to think this a silly, straw splitting distinction: how could you hate what a man did and not hate the man? But years later it occurred to me that there was one man to whom I had been doing this all my life - namely myself. However much I might dislike my own cowardice or conceit or greed, I went on loving myself. There had never been the slightest difficulty about it. In fact the very reason why I hated the things was that I loved the man. Just because I loved myself, I was sorry to find that I was the sort of man who did those things. Consequently, Christiantity does not want us to reduce by one atom the hatred we feel for cruelty and treachery. We ought to hate them. Not one word of what we have said about them needs to be unsaid. But it does want us to hate them in the same way in which we hate things in ourselves: being sorry that the man should have done such things, and hoping, if it is anyway possible, that somehow, sometime, somewhere he can be cured and made human again.

From Mere Christianity

Hmmm…hating self, but hating people as well…it’s weird. I do this alot (come with me will you into the depths of my brain).

I have this arrogance sometimes that comes from assurance in my beliefs (though they can be challenged and sometimes changed, as life does change ones perceptions). My pomposity toward others failings is probably undoubtably because I see the same failings in myself.

The subject that I’ve been wrestling with as of late is the application of Biblical Principle. I know the principles (that most often than not (as the Jette says) counteract most of the “worlds” terms of engagement for a successful life (ie: meek shall inherit the earth, become a servant to get ahead, don’t have sex before you get married, etc)) yet taking them and applying them at times can be taxing. How do you rectify that?

More and more I’m thinking it has to do with those you surround yourself with. Those you trust, those you seek advice from.

I went out last night with a great bunch of guys and one thing that struck home with me, as we chatted about politics, is aligning yourself with those that believe and act the way you WANT to. In my life the people I look up to, whether it is a ficitonal character or a real one, oftentimes are the people that act and do what I WANT or would like to do. So, you see why they have a great family. Why they are financially secure, Why they do what they do and see how they apply the principles you hold dear to their own lives.

So what am I saying…this rambling, this weirdness. Primarily that my foibles that I look down upon in others will only be rectified when I apply the principles I’ve learned (love the sinner hate the sin, especially in relation to myself) and guard myself with the defense that comes from relationships with those that are applying the same principles in their own life.

Day by day…

2 comments.