Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Hate the sin, love the sinner

It was Gandhi who said this, in his 1929 autobiography.  It's not actually in the Bible, believe it or not.  But a famous Christian (St Augustine, in 424 a.d.) did say something like it : cum dilectione hominum et odio vitiorum, which means, roughly, with affection/fondness of men and hatred of vice.

In practice, many, many people struggle to love the person and hate the sin.  Because we cannot help ourselves judging.  Sad, isn't it?  The worst is when people hypocritically do horrible things to others while saying that they are doing it with love.  People like the gay haters, who consistently simply can't see how their view of us is entirely devoid of love, that it on the contrary reeks of profound and vicious hatred.  They pay lip service to God is Love, and Judge not Lest ye be Judged, but in reality are quite unable to see that their own position is profoundly unChristian.

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