As a Catholic am I supposed to judge others?

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Bill_7154

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I’ve been away from God and Jesus and the Catholic Church for a long time. I recently went to confession for the first time in 17 years. I pray for a couple of hours each day now and feel good about that. I have lived a sinful life for many years in my past. I was not a terrible person but have broken some of God’s Commandments in the past.

What is my proper role in relation to God, Jesus, and The Catholic Church when it comes to interacting with other people? Am I not supposed to love my neighbor as myself? Does this not include sinners? Am I supposed to judge others, actively preach to other people that they are doing wrong if they are sinning? Am I supposed to in my mind hold others in contempt if they commit sins? I have not read the bible in at least 5 years. I remember almost nothing from it, at least the actual wording of the scriptures. But it’s my understanding that I am supposed to leave the judging up to God and treat others with dignity and respect even if they are living a sinful life. Is this right or wrong? It’s my understanding that I am supposed to be mindful of my own behavior, any temptation towards sin I may experience, and work to strengthen myself through prayer, confession, attending Church, receiving Holy Communion, and basically focus on my own behavior to lead the best life I can according to God’s laws and the teachings of Jesus.

I’m thinking that it’s wrong for me to judge others. And that includes judging others for judging others in my mind. I know that I have a whole lot to learn about being a good Catholic as I was not very invested in doing so even as a child. I have only really become invested in being a good and true Catholic a couple of months ago. I have prayed over the years, not only in times of desperation, and not for selfish instant quick fixes to problems I created myself, but in efforts to have a good relationship with God.

But up until a couple of months ago I was never REALLY invested in being true to my faith and investing myself fully in my faith in God and Jesus. I don’t think that I am supposed to judge others, regardless of the nature of their sins. I think that I am supposed to treat all humans with dignity and respect, even those I disagree with or those who do me harm or those who do harm to one’s I love or any human being really.

Is my understanding of my proper role in how I am supposed to be conducting myself as stated above correct? I still need to learn a lot about my Religion but this is where I am at now and want to make sure that I have this correct. I find it hard to not be angry with someone who does me harm, such as someone who takes advantage of me at work by giving me extra work without extra pay, etc.

Feedback would be greatly appreciated as I think that I am supposed to try and separate the sinner from the sin and let God deal with the sin while I deal with the sinner in a polite and respectful manner. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to get to the point of ‘turning the other cheek’ and I’m experiencing anxiety all balled up in my stomach even as I type that and think about it.
 
You treat others with compassion, charity, and mercy.

You do not judge the state of a person; whether they are good or bad.

You MAY judge actions. It was wrong to do this, right to do this, etc. Do this along with charity, and always giving the benefit of the doubt.

As to correcting someone who is creating scandal/sinning, that takes prudence and charity. Is the situation is appropriate for you to correct them? What will be a charitable way of approaching them? etc
But it’s my understanding that I am supposed to leave the judging up to God and treat others with dignity and respect even if they are living a sinful life. Is this right or wrong?
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Absolutely. Even if someone looks destined for hell, we do not know their heart or what they are thinking as they die. Their life is for God alone to judge- Our God is both Just and Merciful. Take Hope in His Mercy.
 
Thanks so much for the replies. They were very helpful. I’m greatful I sought out and joined a Catholic forum. In the past I have belonged to sinful forums and basically neutral forums but never thought I would look forward to and seek out Catholics to interact with (never held the Church or religion or God in contempt, but was basically lost I guess is the way to put it) but am so glad that I have. I feel blessed to be in the state I am now and thanks to all of you for being here.
Peace
 
I get confused about this too. Moral outrage seems to be extremely popular among even Catholics these days. I almost feel guilty if I’m nice to people and not going around knocking their heads in for their sins. It’s getting to feel like a person is a liberal if they’re not up for getting angry at people all the time. Sometimes it’s hard for me to figure out just how “ecumenical” we’re supposed to be. I mean, I look at the part at the beginning in the book of Romans where Paul condemns certain people with certain labels and I get uncomfortable. When is that mode acceptable, and when is it not? Am I being too tolerant, or am I not tolerant enough.

Ize confoosed.
 
I mean, if I’m in a conversation and someone brings up their support of gay marriage, am I supposed to feel guilty if I don’t argue with them. I don’t mean saying that I disagree, I mean actively trying to convince them how wrong they are.
 
“Hate the sin, love the sinner” is how the old adage goes. There’s a lot of truth to that.

First, I would say “Welcome home.” It’s great that you have made your way back to the faith and the grace that is available to us in the Sacrament of Confession. It’s great that you’re spending time in prayer, too. Jesus said he is the vine and we are the branches. We don’t do much good if we’re not connected to him. Prayer is how we stay connected to the vine.

I would encourage you to make Scripture reading part of your daily prayer. St. Jerome (the guy who single-handedly translated the whole Bible into Latin) said that “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” If you want to get to know Jesus, the Bible is a great place to go. Start with the Gospels. The Gospel of Mark is the shortest and most fast-paced.

As far as your question, I think it’s a good one. As Jesus said, we need to worry about the plank in our own eye before we can worry about the speck in our brother’s eye. But then, we as Christians cannot simply adopt a “live and let live” attitude. We need to stand up for what is true and good and right. How this works out in the real world can be a bit of a balancing act at times.

For me, the best approach I’ve found is to really focus on proposing the Gospel truth rather than imposing. The truth has it’s own beauty and power to convert. We don’t always need to point fingers and scowl at those who sin. After all, we are all sinners. The most effective thing we can do is to live our faith boldly and to really announce it as the good news that it is. Look at the example of people like Mother Teresa. She didn’t pull any punches about what is right and wrong. But she devoted her life to caring for the most needy and vulnerable. She wasn’t going on the lecture circuit shaming people into becoming Catholic.

God bless. I will keep you in my prayers. Please pray for me, too.
 
Just always remember: the reason why we are correcting people & judging actions is to help save their souls not to win an argument or feel elated. Basically, if your evangelization efforts are directed towards God and not yourself, then you probably will be on the right track as far as the question of charity goes.

Also, please do not confuse prudence and charity with cowardice. It is not OK to allow a person that we know to be in sin to continue that way just because we were afraid of being unpopular. At the end of the day, saving this person’s soul is much more important then whatever feelings they may have toward us in the short term.

And last but not least, Welcome Home! 🙂
 
Satan has a secret. It is the secret about his three primary strategies to destroy us.
If Satan can convince our culture to adopt the philosophy precipitated by these
secret strategies he can brainwash our children, disrupt our families, manipulate
our culture, and bring apostasy within the Church.
All the problems that we see today in society and in our church can be traced to
these three fundamental strategies. It is the basis of the politically correct
movement and of the heresy of individualism. These strategies are the fuel that
powers feminism, the engine that drives liberalism, and the vehicle of the postmodern
worldview that dominates our world today and that contaminates the Church.
These three secret strategies are:
• All opinions are equal
• Never judge anyone
• Never step on toes
Click to expand...
*emphasis added * saint-mike.org/warfare/library/wp-content/docs/secret.pdf
 
Thanks again for all the great replies. They are all very helpful. As indicated in my post, I’m just starting out as a Catholic ‘for real’ as my own choice as an adult. I was raised Catholic but not invested. As a young adult, until now, I rarely doubted God’s existance, and off and on, sometimes for months and months at a time would regularly pray, but it was not in the context of considering myself an actual Catholic as I was not attending Church or obeying the rules and regulations, the practices of the Catholic Church. I was doing so as someone who believed in God and Jesus Christ but didn’t feel the connection that I now feel.

The first time I went to Church recently was following a time I went when one of my nephew’s was being baptized. At that time I felt sort of irritated by what felt like rigidity of the way the Mass is conducted. The rituals of sitting, standing, and the singing. I also felt annoyed by the Priest’s disposition/personality.

After going to confession and then back to Church and receiving Communion it was a completely different experience. I learned to attach myself to the positive things that were going on, enjoyed hearing the word of God, and enjoyed the singing…feeling meaning in the words being sung. I felt at peace during and after the service. And the priest who received my confession was wonderful. I felt a strong presence coming from him that affected me greatly. I was weeping as I confessed, and think I have done so each time since even though my last couple of confessions were much fewer sins and of smaller nature like feeling angry with other people on occasions or being a little snippy with my wife on a few occasions.

I’m learning to recognize and accept that we all have flaws, even priests, and it is selfish and unfair of me to expect they fit some criteria of personality to please me. I’m learning to see the good in people and leg to of focusing on the negative in them. I’ve been praying for people I have been angry with and have found that to be quite helpful. Mostly I have found inner peace which is a great blessing as I have been diagnosed with PTSD from my childhood as well as in the past social phobia (which for the most part went away years back). However I have been impacted basically every moment of every day with remnants of PTSD in that I have been constantly in fear, nervous, afraid, with physical pain in my stomach region that is a manifestation of anxiety. It has been with me constantly for years and years, sometimes worse than other times, but basically always there.

When I started praying for help with that in various ways I have found that the stomach anxiety is mostly gone from me which is truely remarkable. Immagine someone reaching into your guts and squeezing your intestines and twisting them and just holding on. That was how I walked around every moment of every day, along with fears of the most simplest of situations. This was how I was and have been for many years. That has mostly been lifted from me where now I experience fear but can pray on it for help and receive help. It comes and goes. And the physical manifestation of the anxiety is mostly gone as well which was a remarkable experience to not just have it lessen a little bit, or to not be preoccupied by it, but to have it not there for most of the day most every day.

I don’t feel ready to speak to everyone I encounter about my faith but I am enjoying speaking with my father and wife about it, I speak to my 9 month old baby boy about it, and have spoken to my mother about it and it feels very good to do so. I work with mentally ill adults who are disabled and have done so for many years. I’m quite good at my job since I suffered in childhood and managed to overcome very significant trauma. Hense, that experience gives me the ability to understand the pain and suffering of others from a unique perspective, as well as my personal journey of transformation from being a basket case as a child and teenanger and young adult to being a gainfully employed adult who is married and has a child.

Now with the addition of my faith I think that i will be able to help others at my job all that much more. I"m also considering looking for a new job to work for a faith based charity. If I were to work for a Christian or Catholic charity I think I would be able to actively speak about my faith as I work with disinfranchized populations and more of my co-workers would share my faith, putting me in a better enviornment at work.

Aside from the task of growing as a Catholic and follower or the teachings of Jesus I also have decided to take on the task of working towards increasing my income. It is necessary I do this since I now have a child and I am motivated to do so now that I have been blessed in that I have discovered and work towards expanding my faith. I pray for improved self-esteem and similar things which I hope is the correct way for me to begin to formulate a plan or plans on how to go about increasing my income. I don’t have a college degree but may go to school to get an AA degree esentially in one of the programs where the pay is the greatest for graduates. I’m considering other things as well and praying for help in formulating and following through with plans to help me increase my income. I used to play poker for money on the internet part time and there will be casino’s in my state in a few years where I could earn an OK to decent second income doing that (is that a sin?) Poker is a skill game but money is made from those who have the gambling affliction or are simply playing for fun but do not recognize there is a lot of skill involved, or care.

Mostly I pray to be a better husband and better father. My baby boy just started saying “Da Da” a few days ago! My wife is jealous as he’s saying this a lot and not saying Ma Ma yet. Ideally I would be a stay at home dad, spending 24/7 with my son and giving him all the love and attention that I craved from my father but did not yet. This is not a realistic option however.

And I will be praying for all of you and thanking God again that I have found a way to interact with other Catholics on the internet as he answered my prayers around finding ways to meet and interact with other Catholics.
 
It might be more accurate when Catholics judge actions if they said we *believe *if you are unrepentant for actions XY or Z you will go to hell. Instead of you will go.
 
CMatt25 said:
It might be more accurate when Catholics judge actions if they said we *believe *if you are unrepentant for actions XY or Z you will go to hell. Instead of you will go.
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Negatively judging the state of a person’s soul is wrong, whether you do it or a Catholic does it. You might have missed this post:
Aggies08 said:
You treat others with compassion, charity, and mercy.
You do not judge the state of a person; whether they are good or bad.
**You MAY judge actions. **It was wrong to do this, right to do this, etc. Do this along with charity, and always giving the benefit of the doubt.
Click to expand...
 
Only Christ is the judge. We do not judge anything.

Also at the end of ages, the 12 Apostles will sit on 12 thrones and will judge the 12 tribes of Israel as promised to them by Christ.
 
And I was always taught good judgment was a virtue.

Tolerance: The virtue of a man with no moral convictions.
 
Bill_7154 said:
I’ve been away from God and Jesus and the Catholic Church for a long time. I recently went to confession for the first time in 17 years. I pray for a couple of hours each day now and feel good about that. I have lived a sinful life for many years in my past. I was not a terrible person but have broken some of God’s Commandments in the past.

What is my proper role in relation to God, Jesus, and The Catholic Church when it comes to interacting with other people? Am I not supposed to love my neighbor as myself? Does this not include sinners? Am I supposed to judge others, actively preach to other people that they are doing wrong if they are sinning? Am I supposed to in my mind hold others in contempt if they commit sins? I have not read the bible in at least 5 years. I remember almost nothing from it, at least the actual wording of the scriptures. But it’s my understanding that I am supposed to leave the judging up to God and treat others with dignity and respect even if they are living a sinful life. Is this right or wrong? It’s my understanding that I am supposed to be mindful of my own behavior, any temptation towards sin I may experience, and work to strengthen myself through prayer, confession, attending Church, receiving Holy Communion, and basically focus on my own behavior to lead the best life I can according to God’s laws and the teachings of Jesus.

I’m thinking that it’s wrong for me to judge others. And that includes judging others for judging others in my mind. I know that I have a whole lot to learn about being a good Catholic as I was not very invested in doing so even as a child. I have only really become invested in being a good and true Catholic a couple of months ago. I have prayed over the years, not only in times of desperation, and not for selfish instant quick fixes to problems I created myself, but in efforts to have a good relationship with God.

But up until a couple of months ago I was never REALLY invested in being true to my faith and investing myself fully in my faith in God and Jesus. I don’t think that I am supposed to judge others, regardless of the nature of their sins. I think that I am supposed to treat all humans with dignity and respect, even those I disagree with or those who do me harm or those who do harm to one’s I love or any human being really.

Is my understanding of my proper role in how I am supposed to be conducting myself as stated above correct? I still need to learn a lot about my Religion but this is where I am at now and want to make sure that I have this correct. I find it hard to not be angry with someone who does me harm, such as someone who takes advantage of me at work by giving me extra work without extra pay, etc.

Feedback would be greatly appreciated as I think that I am supposed to try and separate the sinner from the sin and let God deal with the sin while I deal with the sinner in a polite and respectful manner. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to get to the point of ‘turning the other cheek’ and I’m experiencing anxiety all balled up in my stomach even as I type that and think about it.
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You certainly have the correct mindset, and welcome back. We all make judgments regarding the actions of others, but we are never to look at anyone and think “I’m better” or wish them harm (which can be hard sometimes). However, most of us experience a life, today, where being a Catholic can be difficult. I’ll give you a few examples based on my experiences and thoughts. An old friend once asked if I’d go to the bar with him and get wasted. I said I didn’t want to do that, and he was OK with it and didn’t ask me again.

I wouldn’t want to hang with people whose primary hobby was smoking dope, because once you get involved with people like that you’re encouraged to participate. The same for anyone who liked to go to strip clubs, or invited me to his place to watch porn. I’d just say no. But they are to be regarded with full respect and treated with dignity. We are all tempted by different things and it’s always best to stay away from situations that might increase our level of temptation.

People know me as “that religious guy” at work. There’s a Bible on my office bookshelf. Aside from teasing me about “he’s born again but gone tomorrow,” I catch very little flak. I think it’s very true that actions speak louder than words. I mean, you can say you’re religious, but if people know you are not doing what you should, that cuts down the credibility of your witness.

And always pray and have hope. The other thing that would help is to make friends with other Catholics if you don’t really know any. That way, since you see eye to eye on most issues, you can encourage each other and help each other grow closer to God.

Nobody is perfect. We’re all sinners. And we all fall short in some area: controlling our tongue, controlling our flesh and refraining from certain activities that we know will help make us more vulnerable to sin.

What we need is discernment. All that means is, this is right to do and this is wrong. We are told to love our neighbor as ourself and Jesus tells us to love our enemies:

bible.cc/matthew/5-44.htm

Hard to do, but at the very least, we can and should pray for them. Who knows? They may be inspired by someone and come to seek the truth.

Regarding tolerance:

catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0014.html

A little warning if I may. Beware of words, especially “new” words. Examples:

Diversity: We accept and encourage homosexual (LGBT) behavior.
Inclusive: We accept and encourage homosexual (LGBT) behavior.

We are never to tease or bully anyone who is gay. I’ve worked with gays and it was no big deal. We got along. We treated each other respectfully.

If you are asked about why the Church says this or that is wrong, and you don’t have a reply ready, the internet is your friend. Just google Catholic teaching same-sex marriage or Catholic teaching abortion or Catholic teaching artificial birth control or Catholic teaching cohabitation.

I’ve found that most of the problems non-Catholics and some Catholics have about life revolve around using sex not in marriage, as God intended, but in other ways that the Church teaches are wrong, like watching porn, live strippers, and magazines that feature nude and semi-nude women and/or graphic porn. And masturbation is a big issue here.

If you have any questions, please write back.

Peace,
Ed

Hope this helps,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
And always pray and have hope. The other thing that would help is to make friends with other Catholics if you don’t really know any. That way, since you see eye to eye on most issues, you can encourage each other and help each other grow closer to God.

If you have any questions, please write back.

Peace,
Ed

Hope this helps,
Ed
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Hi Ed,
Thanks very much, your post was helpful. I have questions about the part of your post I quoted above. I have only recently been going to Church for a couple of months. In my prayers I ask that I may find ways to meet and make friend with other Catholics, I pray for guidance and the ability to recognize opportunities to do so, etc. I posted an ad on craigslist looking for a Catholic mentor. I have joined this forum in order to interact with other Catholics. I pray about whether or not I should seek out and join a bible study group in order to befrend other Catholics. Most of my friends are Christian, but not Catholic. I’m not sure about how to go about meeting other Catholics. I’m married to a woman who is Christian but not Catholic.

I also have lingering things from my past that make it difficult in general for me to interact socially. I have PTSD from a very bad childhood and have spent most of my life in fear of people. I know that might sound crazy, but sadly it’s true. I pray about that and my prayer’s are being answered but I also understand that things take time. Socializing is difficult for me, reaching out, being proactively friendly, etc is beyond my capabilities still at this point.

Any suggestions you have about meeting and making friends with other Catholics would be GREATLY appreciated. It’s one of my primary goals and one of the things that is regularly in my prayers. I feel sooo greatful that I am now able to speak with my father about my faith and that he is a primary support person for me. Both he and my mother are Catholic and very involved with their church. They are changed people now and I forgave them for the wrongs they did me when I was young years ago so we get along well now. But I feel the desire to make friends who are Catholic so I can speak freely about God and Jesus and my personal experiences as I seek to learn and grow as a Catholic. Any suggestions you or anyone else may have in this regard would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks again,
Bill
 
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