Stop judging, that you may not be judged.

Monday, 6/22/15

Jesus tells us, “Stop judging, that you may not be judged.”

    

Wasn’t he going too far there? When people are in the wrong, haven’t we the duty of pointing out their error?

Maybe not.

At the Second Vatican Council the Church told us that if an individual, following his or her conscience, comes to believe what we see to be untrue, we should not judge them wrong. Here is what the Church said about that in paragraph two of its “Declaration on Religious Freedom.”

“The Vatican Council declares that he human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individual or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his beliefs.”

Another way of putting it is to say, we should “Give everyone the benefit of the doubt.”

Since all our judgments’ are based on the facts as we see them, we are free to lay the true facts before others. We should be grateful to those who politely laid the facts before us when we were persistently very wrong.