The challenge is defend without judging.
What is there to defend if there is no judgement? If I cannot say, “There is a wrong and there is a right: this thing that you are doing is wrong,” then what do I have to defend?
Maybe we speak of different sorts of judgement.
There is council—one of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, which is knowing right from wrong, or right judgement. There is also fortitude, which is the strength to act on right council. That judgement which is council—this is the judgement that allows a person to use their free will to live a holy life, which takes fortitude (or courage).
On the other hand, there is what judgement means to people today, which is sort of a condemnation of actions or of people. For some reason it has been severed from objective reality and is blamed entirely on subjective beliefs. This is a distortion or a deception about the way things really are.
There are things that are wrong whether you know they are wrong, want them to be wrong, think they are wrong, like that they are wrong, or not. They are wrong completely independent of what people think.
That is the realm of right judgement. It does not matter what I think about what you are doing. It matters that what you are doing is either objectively wrong, or objectively right.
This kind of judgement is the basis of the conscience. It doesn’t matter what you think or feel. It is based on what is. It doesn’t require someone to make a judgement, it already is wrong or right.