“Deliberately Diverse” represents the opinions of Taylor friends who never completely agree about anything but enjoy diverse discussions.
I have not infrequently heard people say, “Hate the sin but love the sinner” or interchangeably, “Love the sinner but hate the sin.” These days, we often hear such phrasing when referencing the LGBTQ community, but it came to be used frequently in the 20thcentury evangelical Christian culture in reference to moral issues.
• Hate the adultery but love the adulterer
• Hate the thievery but love the thief
• Hate the murder but love the murderer
• Hate the abuse of children but love the abuser The expression gets translated to the LGBTQ community as “Love the person, but hate the sin,” which we aren’t sure how to talk about since “the sin” often looks like a loving marriage or a life partnership.
“The sin” looks like a thousand acts that happen between people we don’t label as LGBTQ: holding hands, a warm embrace, words of care and endearment. As far as I can tell, “the sin” is primarily focused on what we imagine other people are doing in private spaces, which is oddly quite similar to what people we don’t label as LBGTQ do in their private spaces.
Jonathan Merritt, a gay man who writes extensively about faith and culture, wrote about this expression: “Many who use this phrase don’t intend to harm others but wish to express love for another at some level. But the scriptural reasoning behind this phrase is unclear. Jesus never asked us to ‘Love the sinner, hate the sin’ and neither did any other biblical writer. ….
“I think Jesus knew that if he commanded his disciples to ‘love the sinner,’ they would begin looking at other people more as sinners than neighbors. And that, inevitably, would lead to judgment. If I love you more as a sinner than as my neighbor, then I am bound to focus more on your sin. I will start looking for all the things that are wrong with you. And perhaps, without intending it, I will begin thinking about our relationship like this: ‘You are a sinner, but I graciously choose to love you anyway.’ If that sounds a little puffed up, selfrighteous and even prideful to you, then you have perceived accurately.”
Jesus also did not say “Thou shalt not judge.” He did say, “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For the judgment you give will be the judgment you get, and the measure you give will be the measure you get” Matthew 7:1-2 NRSVue.
Jesus teaches that we should judge righteously using an appropriate standard of judgment and that our judgment begins with ourselves, not with others.
Two important commandments for our times: “Love your neighbor” and “Do not judge so that you may not be judged.”
Pierce is the vicar of St. James’ Episcopal Church in Taylor and can be reached by email at ministry@ stjamestaylor.org.
