For example, in trying to reconcile a couple, you might say, “Come, let us talk to your wife.” If the husband replies, “No! She offended me, so she must come to me” —that is a worldly response. But the Bible says clearly that you should go first to the person who sinned against you.
—H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, Inner Healing
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In Ephesians 4:25, Saint Paul says, “Therefore, putting away lying, let each one of you speak truth with his neighbor.” If I come to ask if you are upset with me, and you answer, “No, nothing is wrong,” but in your heart you are upset, then you are lying. If I ask you if something is wrong, you could answer, “Yes, actually something is bothering me.” The verse continues, “For we are members of one another. Be angry, and do not sin.”
—H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, Inner Healing
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Some people use trickery. If they are at odds with someone standing in the first row in church, they stand five rows back, so that when the deacon says to greet one another, they are too far to greet one another. However, you can deceive yourself and your father of confession, but it is impossible to deceive our Lord. When the deacon says “greet one another” that includes not only those in your same bench in church, but every person in your life, whether they are present at church or not; you should be able to greet that person with a holy kiss.
—H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, Inner Healing -
Many people say, “I do not like to confront because confrontation causes problems,” but when our life is Bible-based, we realize that it is impossible for our Lord Jesus Christ to give us a commandment that would cause problems. If confrontation causes problems, then we must examine if the fault is in not knowing how to confront.
—H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, Inner Healing -
Do not condemn. Not even if your very eyes are seeing something, for they may be deceived. If we desire to find something to condemn, we will find it, whether or not it justly deserves criticism. But, it is important to realize, such an attitude comes not out of love, not out of a desire to truly make things better, but rather, to make ourselves look better than everyone else.
—St. John Climacus -
“Sometimes the thing we’re struggling with personally is the thing that we’re so violently loud about.” e.g. they should not be doing this
—Fr. Antony Paul -
You must remember that you are a sinner. Always have that knowledge when you evaluate anyone else. I’m a sinner, they’re a sinner. Who am I to say my sin is better than theirs?
—Fr. Seraphim Holland -
If you’re struggling to forgive someone, God will help you and you will eventually achieve that goal.
If you’re not struggling to forgive them – or even worse, you’re justifying – then you’re in a bad place. A dangerous place.
—Fr. Seraphim Holland -
Such persons must labor, each one in his degree, for his own correction, and you must labor to bear with their weaknesses. You know from experience the bitterness of the work of correction; strive then to find means to make it less bitter to others. You have not an eager zeal to correct, but a sensitiveness that easily shuts up your heart.
François Fénelon, Spiritual Progress
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Long-suffering and readiness to forgive curb anger; love and compassion wither it.
—St. Thalassios the Libyan, On Love, Self-control and Life
in Accordance with the Intellect
