Is it possible to love the sinner but hate the sin?

[smac97]

9 hours ago, Calm said:

I find it hard to believe anyone would have a problem with hating the sin of abuse, thieving, drug dealing, or drunk driving and still loving the people unable or not willing to control themselves to not sin in this way.

Very well stated.  

9 hours ago, Calm said:

I think the sins they are talking about are actually a small subset of sin (where behaviours are viewed as sin by some, but not by others and these behaviours are often attached to identity),

Also very well stated.  I would only add to it by postulating that "these behaviors" that these circumstances (where differentiated notions about what is and is not "sin" arise) often pertain to the Law of Chastity and/or the Word of Wisdom.  

9 hours ago, Calm said:

but the phrase has been used so much, it gets automatically attached to this set when said rather than sin in general, so more likely to lead to conflict rather than understanding. 

Also very well stated.  If and when the "sin" (the behavior) becomes conflated with "identity," then the differentiation comes across (to the person engaging in the sin and adopting the identity) as a pretext, a falsehood.

Many years ago I went to visit an elderly neighbor.  She let me in, but was quite visibly upset.  She explained that her grandson had just left her house a few minutes earlier on bad terms.  He was fairly estranged from his parents and siblings, but had retained a relationship with her.  However, during this visit he was in an obviously impaired state, smelling strongly of alcohol and marijuana, and behaving strangely.  She had asked him to go home, take a shower, sleep it off, and then come back and visit her when he was sober.  He had asked her why, and she explained that he was drunk/stoned, and that she would like to visit with him when he was sober.  He had become upset, telling her that drinking and using MJ is part of who he is, and that she needed to accept him for who he is.  She had responded by telling him that she loved him, but that she does not require her to agree with all his decisions and behaviors.  He then became angry and stormed out, leaving her upset.

9 hours ago, Calm said:

I also have a problem with using “sinner” this way as if committing the sin was the most important aspect about them.

I sometimes feel this way, but there are also times of liberating candor with myself when I find the descriptor apt.  Not because it defines who I am or what is objectively "most important" about me, but because it defines what I am doing and what I am subjectively making "most important" (indulging in wrongful conduct rather than obeying God).

9 hours ago, Calm said:

If we truly think of someone else as sinning and that is our focus, I do think it will be harder to truly love them as we have created a partial image, a caricature of the person.  

I think "sinner" as used in the scriptures is mostly descriptive of a state or condition wrought through conscious choices and behaviors, or self self-applied (in 1 Timothy 1:15, Paul states that "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief," Luke 18:13 has the publican "God be merciful to me a sinner").

9 hours ago, Calm said:

But technically we are all sinners in some way or another, doing something we shouldn’t or leaving undone something we should. If we are just using “sinner” to mean individual, that isn’t a problem, but the word itself creates a different, less healthy focus Imo.

Yes, it can create some real problems when used as an expression of judgment of another, since such use is likely to be either hypocritical (as you rightly note, "we are all sinners in some way or another," and in the wonderful words of the hymn Lord, I Would Follow Thee, "“Who am I to judge another When I walk imperfectly?"), or lacking in stewardship.

Thanks,

-Smac

[bluebell]

12 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

This is just trendy shorthand for 'I don't like Christianity', in my opinion. The need to be personally validated in all things is inherently incompatible with a Saviour whose central desire is to thoroughly transform us.

I agree about the whole validating thing.  Validation is often a very helpful thing, but requiring that agreement be a part of validation just becomes intolerance.

[bluebell]

11 hours ago, blackstrap said:

A person who has never been addicted to anything , likely has a hard time truly having empathy  for an addict and also is not likely to be trusted by an addict as a therapist because ,  " they don't know what it is like " . It is very possible to be sympathetic to another person's situation in life , however.

Agreed.  We may not always be able to empathize but we can almost always sympathize.

[bluebell]

11 hours ago, Calm said:

I find it hard to believe anyone would have a problem with hating the sin of abuse, thieving, drug dealing, or drunk driving and still loving the people unable or not willing to control themselves to not sin in this way. I think the sins they are talking about are actually a small subset of sin (where behaviours are viewed as sin by some, but not by others and these behaviours are often attached to identity), but the phrase has been used so much, it gets automatically attached to this set when said rather than sin in general, so more likely to lead to conflict rather than understanding. 

I also have a problem with using “sinner” this way as if committing the sin was the most important aspect about them. If we truly think of someone else as sinning and that is our focus, I do think it will be harder to truly love them as we have created a partial image, a caricature of the person.  

But technically we are all sinners in some way or another, doing something we shouldn’t or leaving undone something we should. If we are just using “sinner” to mean individual, that isn’t a problem, but the word itself creates a different, less healthy focus Imo. 
 

The example of ‘love Mormons, hate Mormonism’ when I hear it makes me wonder if they have put in the effort and really gotten to know either well enough to judge or if they are depending on the cliche because of lack of actual caring (if they truly cared, they would likely put effort into developing better understanding).

That's a good point about actions vs. identity.  

[bluebell]

11 hours ago, Tacenda said:

I can do that unless it's someone that is evil through and through. 

I'm probably right there with you on that.  

[bluebell]

3 hours ago, JLHPROF said:

There are many sins that society considers so awful that we mostly lack the ability to truly love the person who committed them, even after repentance.  We want them to repent but never truly feel any positive feelings once we learn of their sins. The exception being someone we can't help love like our own children.

Perhaps that's why Christ is more capable than we are.  He views us as we would view our children.

Agreed.  We are not as capable of this kind of love as the Savior is, probably because we so often fall short of the second greatest commandment and do not have the charity that we have been commanded to have.  Thank goodness for repentance or we would all be lost, as Hamba said earlier.  

[bluebell]

2 hours ago, pogi said:

The solution is easy - the only way to truly love a person (since we are all sinners) therefore, is to love the sin!!

I think that is the undertone in this sentiment, right? 

I think that there are a lot of people that see it that way, or rather, they believe that to truly love everyone, you have to stop believing in the existence of sin.  Only when you believe that no one is sinning, is loving everyone possible.

[bluebell]

2 hours ago, bsjkki said:

A different take. My sister in law doesn’t believe in the ‘just love them’ advice most of us get to as our children leave the church. She is Catholic and draws different lines than I do. She believes you must be vocal and oppose your children’s bad or wrong choices. 
 

I choose to maintain relationships. My kids know what I believe. It’s not a secret. She chooses to be vocal and has alienated many family members. The irony is the choices I get sad about…i.e drinking alcohol, is not a sin in her mind. So, her son under age drinking is no big deal for her where if my daughter started drinking, I would be devastated. 
 

I would attend a gay wedding, she would not. I believe some exceptions for abortion should exist, she does not. What is a ‘sin?’ It depends on your beliefs.

I'm with you on that.  Christ doesn't sever our relationship with Him when we rebel.  Why would we do that with others in His name?

[pogi]

1 hour ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

Do you celebrate with them when they celebrate? If your gay brother got married are you happy with them? Do you proudly include a picture of your lesbian daughter and her wife next to the pictures of your other married children? Do you talk about them to your friends? 
 

For at least three current apostles the answer is an emphatic no. Elder Gong requested that his gay son not post a picture of Elder Gong out for dinner with his son and partner. Elder Oaks tells us that we shouldn’t go out and be seen with our gay children. Elder Holland called out “rainbows”, and a practicing Latter-day Saint who mentioned that he was a gay son of God. The love is so thick it’s toxic. 

I edited my post before your response because you are right, it may be inevitable that we treat some people different in certain ways when we don't approve of their behavior.  But that doesn't mean that we don't love them.  Do you approve of all of your children's behavior?  Do you celebrate when they choose to drink and do harmful drugs in adolescence, even if they claim it makes them happy?  Would you celebrate unprotected sex because it makes them happy?  Would you love them any less even when you don't celebrate/approve of all of their life choices?  Is it really impossible to accept/love someone without approving of their choices?  I sure hope not, or we are all in trouble!   

In terms of gay marriage, personally, I would treat them no differently from my other married children.  The conscience of others may vary.  But I don't question their love for their children.  Their children might question it, but I think compassion/tolerance/understanding needs to be a two-way-street for relationships to work.  If they can't understand how their parents could still love them without approving of their lifestyle, then they have some maturing to do.  

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

I love my Latter-day Saint relatives, but find their beliefs and the way they live their lives to be abominations. While I welcome them for brief visits in my home, I make them leave their family members behind. I don’t want to be seen with them in public. And I certainly don’t want their lifestyle to influence my children. I feel for those that struggle with this particularly harmful religion, but I love love love them. 

I honestly can't tell if this is just sarcasm or if you are sincerely attempting to use an analogy.  But either way I think you've made a good point in that while it might be possible to love the sinner and hate the sin, that doesn't mean plenty of people don't fail at it.

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, tagriffy said:

Sinister used in a way that equates it with evil. When you use sinister to mean evil, you are perpetuating the dexter supremacism.

Isn't that the basic dictionary definition?

Edited October 21, 2022 by bluebell

[SeekingUnderstanding]

3 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I honestly can't tell if this is just sarcasm or if you are sincerely attempting to use an analogy.  But either way I think you've made a good point in that while it might be possible to love the sinner and hate the sin, that doesn't mean plenty of people don't fail at it.

Well it’s probably both! I’m sincerely reflecting the “love” that prophet seers and revelators have told members to express to their LGBTQ family members. It’s sarcasm, because I don’t feel the way I expressed, and I would be hard pressed to say love is possible in the scenario I expressed. So if someone believes that my identity is a threat to civilization, that expressing my identity is an abomination, and that my family is counterfeit and then says they “love” me, I won’t believe them. 

[Rain]

31 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I agree about the whole validating thing.  Validation is often a very helpful thing, but requiring that agreement be a part of validation just becomes intolerance.

There is a difference in validating feelings and in validating actions  

[BlueDreams]

7 minutes ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

Well it’s probably both! I’m sincerely reflecting the “love” that prophet seers and revelators have told members to express to their LGBTQ family members. It’s sarcasm, because I don’t feel the way I expressed, and I would be hard pressed to say love is possible in the scenario I expressed. So if someone believes that my identity is a threat to civilization, that expressing my identity is an abomination, and that my family is counterfeit and then says they “love” me, I won’t believe them. 

This represents a complication for me a little. What happens when it's something we strong believe in but others don't. 

For example, I'm strongly oriented to environmentalism and actively working to reduce our communal impact, including making personal decisions that are more sustainable. This isn't a hypothetical belief. I've dropped serious cash on this belief, seek ways to live my beliefs better, talk about it directly or indirectly to a ton of people, read books on it, etc. I believe that not doing so is a threat to civilization, that those who refuse to change or downplay this are ideologically abominable (though I've never used that word specifically my reaction still probably fits), and that the current method of unsustainable growth culture that we're steeped in is a "counterfeit" or at least a potent fantasy. But I do genuinely hold love for many of the people I fundamentally oppose on this. Can that really be a thing? Should they believe me? Should I believe them if they hold the  opposite position as me just as strongly and find my views and practices obnoxious/abhorrent? 

I don't know if I have a solid answer. I'm just curious what's the balance between loving another/believing people about said love and the need for acceptance/agreement with the beliefs/identity/practices. 

 

With luv,

BD

 

[bluebell]

12 minutes ago, Rain said:

There is a difference in validating feelings and in validating actions  

Yes!  And so many people will refuse to validate feelings because they don't like someone's actions, or they believe that someone must validate their actions in order to validate their feelings as well.

[Rain]

I think it's possible to love the sinner and hate the sin, but incredibly difficult and probable no human has been able to do it in cases when the sinner is incredibly evil and hurtful.

Gregory Boyle in Tattoos on the Heart shows this amazing part of himself where he can love gang members where they are, but even he talks about the difficulties he sometimes has doing it.

One of the things he talks about it how sometimes people are just not ready to make a change yet.  The way he talked about it made me think of math (though why I don't know).  My thoughts were sometimes a student is learning addition, but isn't ready for multiplication yet.  But it's not so much a ready so much a keep building up levels (addition, multiplication, algebra, trig, calculus), but that every sin has a step of being ready to leave it behind.  It was more of a simple math readiness thing. And yet so complicated at the same time.

BlueDreams talks about loving people who were unsafe for her family.  After reading part of the book (I'm taking it slowly) I thought "ok, I want to be like that.  I want to love people where they are."  I was filled with this strong desire to do so.  But then I saw them and it was like my heart slammed shut. I sat there and talked to myself about this desire to love like the Savior and I could not get my heart open. 

So I think the concept is very simple and doable, but all too often it is incredibly difficult and it requires us to work with God to get us there.

[Meadowchik]

If it is technically possible, perhaps the phrase is still too toxic because of the many ways people themselves have been defined as sin, not just sinful.

Edited October 21, 2022 by Meadowchik

[SeekingUnderstanding]

13 minutes ago, BlueDreams said:

This represents a complication for me a little. What happens when it's something we strong believe in but others don't. 

For example, I'm strongly oriented to environmentalism and actively working to reduce our communal impact, including making personal decisions that are more sustainable. This isn't a hypothetical belief. I've dropped serious cash on this belief, seek ways to live my beliefs better, talk about it directly or indirectly to a ton of people, read books on it, etc. I believe that not doing so is a threat to civilization, that those who refuse to change or downplay this are ideologically abominable (though I've never used that word specifically my reaction still probably fits), and that the current method of unsustainable growth culture that we're steeped in is a "counterfeit" or at least a potent fantasy. But I do genuinely hold love for many of the people I fundamentally oppose on this. Can that really be a thing? Should they believe me? Should I believe them if they hold the  opposite position as me just as strongly and find my views and practices obnoxious/abhorrent? 

I don't know if I have a solid answer. I'm just curious what's the balance between loving another/believing people about said love and the need for acceptance/agreement with the beliefs/identity/practices. 

 

With luv,

BD

 

Love this. Much truer and better response than appeals to criminal behavior. And I don’t know. I do know that if you refuse to let them around your children, and don’t want to be seen with them in public (lest your friends think you approve of thier lifestyle), then the answer is likely no. If you hide them from your social circle the answer is likely no. (I’m not sure what the equivalent would be to say not put up wedding photos of your gay daughter, next to the wedding photos of all your other children). 

[Rain]

35 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Yes!  And so many people will refuse to validate feelings because they don't like someone's actions, or they believe that someone must validate their actions in order to validate their feelings as well.

I used to feel (not believe though) this way with my children.  It wasn't till I read 7 Habits of Highly Effective People that I got you aren't validating actions when you understand feelings. I had thought of reading that book for a couple of decades before I did and just for the relationship with my children I wish I had done when I first felt impressed to do it.

Edited October 21, 2022 by Rain

[Rain]

5 minutes ago, Meadowchik said:

If it is technically possible, perhaps the phrase is still too toxic because of the many ways people themselves have been defined as soon, not just sinful.

Yes, sometimes we need to let certain sayings go because the relationship of the words to the actions is tainted by people spouting the saying while doing the opposite of the saying.  

[MustardSeed]

Admittedly still need to read all replies, but my initial reaction is to twist the original question to say, is it possible to feel loved when someone important to us hates what we do? 
I imagine much of the answer depends on how that hate for behavior is communicated, directly or passively .  IMO

[tagriffy]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

Isn't that the basic dictionary definition?

It is now. Originally, sinister merely meant left or left-handed. But the more "right" became associated with the good, the correct, the proper, the more "left" and "sinister" became associated with the evil, the wrong, the indecent. This is why left-handed people were accused and executed for witchcraft and even as recently as a generation or two ago, left-handers were literally having the left-handedness beaten out of them in the United States (and, BTW, it still happens in places like China). Even today, the left is still associated with evil. Look at Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing, Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing, or the Russo brothers' Avengers films. Look at the way they dexter washed Apollo in the new Battlestar Galactica. They'll probably do the same with Data eventually.

[tagriffy]

2 hours ago, pogi said:

In terms of gay marriage, personally, I would treat them no differently from my other married children.  The conscience of others may vary.  But I don't question their love for their children.  Their children might question it, but I think compassion/tolerance/understanding needs to be a two-way-street for relationships to work.  If they can't understand how their parents could still love them without approving of their lifestyle, then they have some maturing to do.  

I don't really agree here, at least in the specific example given. Being gay is not a lifestyle; being gay is what a person is. Granted, there is a often lifestyle associated with being what one is. For example, I am an intellectual, and my lifestyle involves a lot of reading and writing that is particularly bent toward scholarly pursuits. I suppose it is theoretically conceivable that my family could love me without approving of my scholarly pursuits, but I would question whether it is me they really love in such cases as opposed to some artifical construct that really isn't me.

[JLHPROF]

4 hours ago, tagriffy said:

I'm not so sure that the concept of loving the sinner but hating the sin has anything to do with feeling positive feelings.

Can you love someone without being able to think of them positively or feel about them positively?

[JLHPROF]

3 hours ago, bluebell said:

Agreed.  We are not as capable of this kind of love as the Savior is, probably because we so often fall short of the second greatest commandment and do not have the charity that we have been commanded to have.  Thank goodness for repentance or we would all be lost, as Hamba said earlier.  

For sure.
But is this something we're supposed to be able to do?  Joseph Smith taught that as we progress our ability to love and our desire to help sinners continues to grow.
If we are really becoming like Christ eventually we need to figure out HOW to love someone who has done something we consider reprehensible.
We can usually accept that they can repent.  But that's a long way from loving the sinner despite their previous sins.