SO GOOD QUOTES

Another Father of the Holy Church, Saint John Chrysostom takes a different view, very human and ecclesiastically sound: that of the expression of love for those in sin and for the Lord Jesus. He says that indifference on our part towards those who are sinning demonstrates that we don’t love them and also that we don’t love the body of the Church, of which the sinners are members. He calls upon us to show an interest in our brothers and sisters who have sinned and to rebuke them, but calmly and with good sense, not in a spirit of anger.

We shouldn’t say that we’re not interested in what others are doing, nor say that each of us will bear the burden of our own sins. (Gal. 6, 5). We’re also guilty if we see others going astray and don’t bring them back onto the right path. In fact, if, according to Mosaic law, we shouldn’t be indifferent even towards an animal belonging to our enemy, how will we be forgiven by God if we’re indifferent not towards an animal, nor even towards the soul of an enemy who is lost, but towards the soul of a friend (and our brother or sister in Christ)?

We can’t, therefore, use Cain’s excuse, when he said to God: ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ and so say that we’re not interested in people who are sinning. Chrysostom considers this attitude not merely unacceptable but inhuman and in conflict with that of the Church. He stresses that all wickedness arises from the fact that we consider as foreign something that belongs to our own body. He goes on to say: ‘So don’t be inhuman, uncaring or indifferent. Because the words you speak are words of great harshness and indifference, as is shown by the following: if a part of your body is suffering from an illness, why don’t you say that you’re not interested? Why don’t you ask how we know that we’ll get well if we look after ourselves and show an interest? In fact you everything you can so that, even if you don’t get better you can’t berate yourself for not doing something you should have. If we take such good care of the members of our body, is it right to ignore the members of Christ?

Indifference to those who are sinning is itself a sin
Christos Karadimos