Does "tough love" work?

[wynnejj]

I have an amusing example of tough love that didn’t work for me. My niece went to a state fair and came back with a rabbit. The “unwanted” rabbit secured a home because my niece had named the rabbit after my dad. To be expected, I became caretaker of the dumb rabbit. I would occasionally allow it in the house to roam around. One day it got up on a bed and pooped. Being the savvy animal trainer that I am, I recalled the idea of rubbing a dogs nose in his poop and applied my knowledge to the rabbit. The rabbit was furious. When I brought him back to his cage, he flipped bowls and anything he could get his teeth on. I went to calm him down by petting him and he jumped straight up and took a 1/4 inch square out of the middle of my palm. I learned a few things. Maybe the tough love only works on smarter animals like dogs. Maybe the dumb animal isn’t as dumb as I thought. It is the first time, after the pain, that the animal has somehow secured a place in my heart and not just my home.

 

[edward_george]

As with anything, but most especially in discourse on religious matters, it is necessary to identify certain “levels of engagement.” This is both in terms of philosophical levels (i.e. is the person we are engaging an atheist, a Baptist, an Orthodox Christian, or another Catholic even) and in personal characteristics (how old is the person, where and how were they educated, how sensitive to criticism are they, do they exhibit any stubbornness or pride in talking about things). Sometimes tough love is necessary. I’ve seen a blunt, seemingly uncharitable approach work on some people. Others don’t respond so well. It’s all a matter of looking at what you’re dealing with–sometimes you’re hunting buffalo, other times you’re scaring off crows. You don’t bring a BB gun to a buffalo hunt, and you certainly don’t need much more than loud noise to drive off crows (although slingshots are fun ) It’s a judgment call–size up whomever you are engaging and go from there.

-ACEGC

 

[Joe_5859]

I have an amusing example of tough love that didn’t work for me. My niece went to a state fair and came back with a rabbit. The “unwanted” rabbit secured a home because my niece had named the rabbit after my dad. To be expected, I became caretaker of the dumb rabbit. I would occasionally allow it in the house to roam around. One day it got up on a bed and pooped. Being the savvy animal trainer that I am, I recalled the idea of rubbing a dogs nose in his poop and applied my knowledge to the rabbit. The rabbit was furious. When I brought him back to his cage, he flipped bowls and anything he could get his teeth on. I went to calm him down by petting him and he jumped straight up and took a 1/4 inch square out of the middle of my palm. I learned a few things. Maybe the tough love only works on smarter animals like dogs. Maybe the dumb animal isn’t as dumb as I thought. It is the first time, after the pain, that the animal has somehow secured a place in my heart and not just my home.

I hope you meant that story to be funny, because that one really made me laugh!

 

[wynnejj]

I hope you meant that story to be funny, because that one really made me laugh!

Yes, and somehow instructive.

Back on topic, though, sometimes “tough love” is perceived correctly as declaring war on a party. So the question parallels the question as to whether there ever is a “just war”? More over, does it ever really solve anything? IMO, most wars are not just but maybe economic in origin. For example, our American Revolution was about whether we could secede from England. The Civil War was about whether a body of states could secede from the Union. They were wars about basically the same issue with unfair economic control as the origin, but did they solve anything really. Yet to most Americans / myself, it is difficult to label them as “unjust”. On the other hand, an example of a just war might be WW II. That was about stopping mass murder and forced evil ideology.

So is “tough love” ever OK. Yes, if it is a “just war”.

 

[wynnejj]

The more I think about it and hear responses on this thread and that other thread, the more I understand the role of tough love. I think what initially prompted me to be sympathetic to the OP in the other thread is that it irks me when people use Jesus with the money changers to justify being a general jerk. “Jesus wan’t nice all the time, so I don’t have to be nice either!” Of course, the more I read people’s responses, the more I realize that most people here aren’t doing that and they are not promoting that type of behavior.

The key to the understanding of Our Lord overturning the money-changer’s tables are the words Our Lord used at the time when he performed this symbolic demonstration signifying the unacceptability of the temple as a house of prayer and, indicting the priests for failure to instruct its laity in proper temple worship. (per footnotes of Mark 11, 15-19 in Saint Joseph Edition of New American Bible (1970))

“My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples?
<refer to Isaiah 56,7>
But you have made it a DEN OF THIEVES?
<refer to Jeremiah 7,11>”

Chapter 56 of Isaiah is all about how all are welcome in the house of the Lord, and names representative classes of people who were generally not accepted by polite society but SHOULD BE in God’s temple - for example, the foreigner and the eunuch.

Chapter 7 of Jeremiah uses the term “den of thieves” and is all about when a temple of worship is not acceptable to the Lord and is liable to severe punishment (as at Shiloh). It is about the deceit of the faithful(?) who think that they will be saved because they put their faith in “This is a temple of the Lord! A temple of the Lord! A temple of the Lord!”, but their behavior as good as says “We are safe. We can do these abominations again.”.

Chapter 7 of Jeremiah goes on to cite some SPECIFIC ABUSES of temple worship, including:
(1) worship of Ishtar, goddess of fertility - a competing religion
(2) holocaust of their own sons and daughters by means of immolation by fire.

These abuses pertain to us today via:
(1) Secular humanism and our current sex obsessive society.
(2) Abortion - the immolation of our own sons and daughter.

My conclusions: Priests are required to show “tough love” against secular humanism and abortion, else the temple worship is unacceptable to the Lord.

 

[brigid12]

These abuses pertain to us today via:
(1) Secular humanism and our current sex obsessive society.
(2) Abortion - the immolation of our own sons and daughter.

My conclusions: Priests are required to show “tough love” against secular humanism and abortion, else the temple worship is unacceptable to the Lord.

Not only is a priest’s job that of making sure no sacrilege takes place re. the Eucharist, but it is also that of catechesis of those in his parish. He is responsible to God for any of his parishioners that partake in a mortal sin in which he has not provided sufficient catechesis. Unfortunately, very many won’t pay any attention to Christ’s teaching unless something seemingly severe takes place. Mother Teresa of Calcutta did not try to be PC even at a speech she was giving in front of the Clintons (re. abortion).
Secular humanism/convenience has gotten to be so extreme in our society that not only is it permissable to kill over 50,000 unborn babies, but a number of people in this country enthusiastically follow a person that even wants to kill babies that are already born! As if noone knows the history of the Nazis.

 

[wynnejj]

Secular humanism/convenience has gotten to be so extreme in our society that not only is it permissable to kill over 50,000 unborn babies, but a number of people in this country enthusiastically follow a person that even wants to kill babies that are already born! As if noone knows the history of the Nazis.

Actually, the magnitude is a thousand times greater - 50 million not 50 thousand. I remember the first time that I became aware of the problem. It was 10 to 15 years after Roe vs Wade. In that one year alone it was 1.5 million, three times 50,000. And up to that point, I had no knowledge of the existence of abortion and the abortion trade. Nothing from the pulpit. I was stunned and angry at the cover-up. The clergy sex abuse scandals paled in comparison to the gravity of this cover-up. I consider the abortion issue a matter of “just war” requiring “tough love” at the communion rails as a “declaration of war”.

 

[CradleCath]

Hi, again -

I believe that Priests have a responsibility, and that requires them, at times, to Judge.

I also believe, that not always is it effective to be gentle and meek in the face of evil

and

Now, granted - this is the Apostle Paul. However, He was performing the same function as a Priest, caring for his flock. Examples like this abound in Scripture, and for the same reasons - it was important to get across the message that certain behavior, certain beliefs, and certain practices WILL land you in hell.

Now - certainly, we (the flock) have no business doing or saying the things Paul, or a Priest can, and should sometimes do. But - the thread that started this thread was not about a lay person, or even a Deacon…but a Priest.

I simply fail to see how someone, who’s job it is to correct, teach, and shepherd his flock, can effectively do that without at times taking a stand and, yes, even thundering to his flock - this or that is EVIL and NOT acceptable behavior or thinking. That if you do this or that behavior or believe this or that to be true - you are NOT to take communion.

I’m not advocating that berating, belittling, or being continuously abrasive to people is a good or acceptable behavior. No. Especially not for a Priest and definitely not for lay people. I am saying that at times it is necessary and even effective to get people out of certain thinking patterns or behaviors.

As was said before here - occasionally ‘blowing up’ can have, and usually does have, the desired effect. If you constantly scream at your kids - they learn to live with it and it does no good. If you are mostly loving and gentle, then blast them for something - guaranteed they will remember that occasion.

Sometimes too - allowing someone to sit in their little pile of doody they made for themselves, and allow their conscience (or the Holy spirit) to go to work on them, is the best thing you can do for them. That is usually what ‘Tough Love’ is characterized as - letting them clean their own mess up, and suffer the consequences of their own actions.

Even if that means letting them run away from it - so they see that it isn’t the circumstances, or everyone else, but rather themselves that is the problem.

Just my perspective

Peace

John

Excellent post!! How one loves another (& remember, we are speaking of tough LOVE) depends a lot on one’s relationship with the person. In the case of a priest/parishioner relationship, saving the soul of the parishioner is partly the responsibility of the priest…at least, the priests of old used to think it was. There are times when, in order to do his job, the priest has to jar his parish out of their apathy. Very few priests today will take the chance & do so.