Concentrating so long and so lovingly on the seven deadly ones has taken its toll on your mind. Pity. We all could really use good sound instruction (preferably with mouth watering examples taken from life). Heh-heh, the better to avoid them, of course, drool, slobber. How else can we get our minds (if any) off of the coming election and its temptation to vote for our baser instincts?

The columnist has presented the profound truth that offends so many whereever Christianity is accurately preached. There is one Lord, He is owed EVERYTHING.

If this is easily and willingly accepted, then grace and the cross and forgiveness - they are all good news. Someone has forgiven us something immense, infinite, and we can - rather than getting on with our lives - repurpose them to avoid giving further offense, indeed, to show our gratitude.

But if it isn't accepted... If, like Christopher Hitchens, one believes utterly and completely that each man is his own and owes nobody anything - then the forgiveness is an offensive sham. It is as if someone walked in your front door with a gun and said "You deserve to die for invading my home, but I forgive you, come have dinner with me in the kitchen."

How offensive that is! And, if you refuse? He immediately executes judgment via eternal torture. Even medium term torture seems rude under the circumstances. In short, if God is Lord of nothing - then the good news is an undeserved slap in the face backed up with threats. If God doesn't exist - it is a liars version of the same thing, backed up by hollow threats.

Christians have largely backed off on this claim of God's authority, instead preferring to discuss 'eternal bliss' as a payoff and ignore the seemingly unjustified potential for damnation or the current claims of Lordship. But this is hollow and is easily undermined. No Lordship, no Lord, no good news.

And - if a person does something to willfully rebel against an actual and legitimate and omnipotent Lord - well, that person, not that action alone, is worthy of wrath and judgment and damnation. The Sinner not the Sin is a wimp's reading of the scriptures that doesn't take the Lordship of Christ seriously. God can wish to purify the person from his sins, but until that happens, the person is inextricably linked to those sins by his own sinful choice - and the spiral keeps going. The 'sin' is a warping of the person who was meant to be - but only the 'meant to be' person is good. The real person is warped, sinful, and evil - hateful and to be hated. We all know what trouble it leads to when you spend your time imagining people as they 'could be' instead of 'as they are.' Well, that's the problem you encounter with trying to 'hate the sin' and still love someone who is completely identified with that sin. Can't be done. It offends God. The very person offends God, until they confess, turn, and are washed.

He is Lord. We are damned. Only through His Son can we effectively repent. Those who don't - are unforgivable. End of Story - parousia.

I'm the first person in line for "de-wussifying" our faith, but you're way off the rails here:



Loving the sinner "can't be done?" It offends God? Jesus was all wrong about loving our enemies?

Wow. While I can sympathize to a degree with your feelings on the topic, I hope that God has more love for us sinners than you portray. While repentance is essential, Jesus called us - prostitutes, tax collectors, idolaters, etc... - as we are, before we had repented. He loves us. We need to turn to love Him. If we don't, you are correct, we have chosen our own lot - eternal damnation.

In that light, we must love each other in a similar fashion. We must constantly look for the good in each other and act to increase that good. Instruction to avoid the bad can be helpful in that.

Great article, John, though I would like to have seem more substance.

Is the complete separation of sin & sinner possible or even a goal to shoot for? Let's look at applying Aquinas' teaching about no rage being permissible against a person. If acting against another in self-defense is permissible, and it's impossible to so act without the instinctive anger rising within us to aid in our efforts, then how can anyone say that you can't wish harm upon your attacker?! That's precisely what you're doing in the heat of the moment. At the absolute least, it puts us at an unacceptable disadvantage vis-a-vis our unjust attacker. If you're so conditioned that you stop defending yourself because you recognize that you're starting to (gasp!) get angry at the person, then you cease any meaningful short-term defense, to say nothing of making long-term defense (by incapacitating your attacker or harming him badly enough that he won't try to hurt you again) impossible. I'm allowed to block his attacks but not hit back?

Christianity does not equal pacifism. But pacifism seems to be the only pratical option for those who follow Aquinas' teaching on this. When the rubber hits the road and we start parsing this: what exactly is wrath, when does anger become wrath, and what is really off-limits for the Christian?

The author needs to check his facts a bit closer. I personally know Mr. Friedman and he has NEVER BEEN CATHOLIC. He is Jewish!

I think perhaps some of you are taking as serious and sober assertions items which Zmirak intended to be understood as false, or wildly exaggerated, for humorous effect.

It's a vocational hazard for those who write without benefit of smiling or frowning emoticons. Without benefit of facial expressions, sarcasm or gross absurdity can be mistaken for straight-faced reporting.

I received two comments on my post; both took issue with the idea that you cannot 'love the sinner.' I should be clear. Christ loved people 'while yet in their sins.' This is something I would make distinct from 'loving sinners.' I cannot love sinners as sinners. I cannot love them while they are identified with sin. I am called to love people as the image of God, though distorted.

In so much as people revel in their sin, identify with their sin, they cannot be loved. This is the ultimate scandal of people who want unconditional love for everyone. God does not offer this love. His love is completely conditional on Christ's atonement being accepted and entered into; death to sin.

In terms of enemies, the context is not sinless loving sinful. The context is 'belonger' and 'outsider' or 'member of one club' and 'member of another club' between which there is historical emnity. We are all called to become brothers and sisters in Christ, and to accept persecution in His name knowing that we are serving His purpose - either the persecution will cease and the persecutor will repent in tears, or the persecutor will face final judgment in tears and we will receive rewards and justice, both.

We hate the person who embodies the sin, who is the sin, who is the sinner. We wish for them to die - and a new person to be born of the ashes, washed and redeemed.

Yeah, Lynne. I was kidding. My regards to the Kinkster, however--who I think would appreciate the joke. Tell him I supported him for governor, and that my girlfriend and I want him to play at our wedding.

That is not the same as your original statement:



So which is it? Can you love people because they are the (distorted) image of God, or does the sin warp the person, making him "hateful and to be hated?" It sounds like, by loving the image of God in a person, you are getting into your self-described "trouble" of "imagining people as they could be."

For the record, be careful what you describe as "offending God." It's quite presumptuous that the love of any individual, however sinful that individual might be, would offend God. I'd like to see some backup on that.

I'm not a scholar of Thomas, but I did mean to point to the problem in the sin/sinner distinction. Perhaps we can work through it by saying that we can HATE the sin, but not the sinner, but be ANGRY at both, in different ways. How do we define hate? Ultimately, by wishing their damnation. That is pure hate. Second to that, wishing them death or suffering MORE than is necessary to attain the good--the good including not JUST the defeat of the immediate attack, but deterrence or prevention of future attacks. Otherwise, it would be wrong for us to make prisons unpleasant; if they were simply facilities to preserve people from committing more crimes until we can rehabilitate them, they should be appointed like high-end mental hospitals. No, they are meant to PUNISH, to express society's legitimate ANGER at the PEOPLE who do evil. The role of the State as executor of God's justice--and our own surrogates in defending our own just claims to life, liberty, and property--has been too much ignored in recent writings on Church and State. This claim, which the Church recognized in relation to the death penalty up through the first edition of the current Catechism, is fundamental. We cannot let sentimentalism or therapeutic liberalism wish it away.

Fair enough. Perhaps BenK and I simply have different views on the definition of hate. I would agree that you can certainly be angry at both. We're probably just talking past each other.

So, there exists a tension between seeing a person as they are and as they should be/could be. It is a deep violence to a person to not respect their choices and intention in them being who they actually are; but with a perverted will and a crooked being, they have made themselves hateful. God Himself will not disrespect their choice to reverse it, but instead presents them with the inevitable products of their own rejection of His legitimate majesty and authority - their destruction in just and proportional. They offend Him and in doing so further the perversion of creation.

As agents of God, servants of His most perfect will, we are called to act in accord - to hate the sinner in the office of sinner.

But God also offers salvation to those who express the desire to accept the efficacious means offered from resigning from that all-consuming position of sinner. We are bound to make physical His offer in all its mercy; that no matter what the sin, a person who is willing to turn away will be washed clean in God's eyes, and He will offer no more judgment for that sin. We cannot exclude people from His grace. Nor can we choose to extend the effects of His grace to people who reject it. And we must love all his Children who have accepted His grace - sometimes by chastising them when they fall into old ways.

But we cannot be yoked to sinners, share their goals, provide them with charity, or advance their sinful intentions.

This action, of the church, is somewhat independent of the actions of the state, which only punishes temporally and offers an imperfect image of God's justice, with only short term effects. The state can't necessarily always waive acts of justice in event of apparent confession and contrition. Instead, like the Law, the state and its laws are a tutor to society to teach us the basics of God's justice, and raise the issue of the need for mercy, as well as other things.

I thought Kinky Friedman was Jewish?

John Zmirak writes some of the most foppishly Catholic articles on the Internet - and that's "dandy" by me.

Every time I read one of these, I find myself feeling around my neck for a silk ascot and wondering who I can invite over for an afternoon tipple.

Zmirak's articles are sometimes good but he's too much of a neoconservative for me. He's always assaulting everyone too his Right especially those proud of their European heritage.

With sincere respect, Howard, if you think John Zmirak is a neocon, you need to revise your definition.

John is a paleoconservative, the mortal enemy (along with the libertarian) of the neocon.

Brian: Zmirak is too much of a universalist to be a paleo. He may call himself a paleoconservative but in reality he's an anti-war neocon.

Apparently it's not enough to have been a Pat Buchanan delegate, to have opposed mass immigration and the Iraq War (against which I warned in 2002), to have been in on the organizational meeting of Pat Buchanan's magazine and written for over a year for Taki's Top Drawer, to be a "paleocon." I'm too much of a "universalist." Let's translate that into English: I'm not a white racialist, because I am a Catholic. So I'm the sinister tool of the yadda-yadda-yadda....

I was lured in here by the title and was expecting a serious treatment of the topic. (I was bushwhacked by Zmirack.)

Doesn't Massive, Disproportionate Retaliation occur any time a parent raises ones voice to scold an infant or toddler?

So what you are saying here is that John is writing nonsense for our amusement? well isn't that dangerous for I don't find the seven deadly sins amusing...and I worry that a person who is actually looking for guidance will look at this sarcastic piece of prose and believe that the seven deadly sins are something to laugh at.
Again this writer takes real and interesting topics and lets hi dog chew on them for a while, taking the remains and publishing...