A real saint is not scandalized by evil

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

 

YES, if one is truly a good and saintly man, he would not be scandalized by any evil that can simply be around him or can even hound him. It’s not that he is not affected by evil. Like any man, he is. At least, he would be annoyed and can get angry. He can even try to seek justice and retribution to anyone who might have done him some wrong or some crime. But he does not respond evil with another evil.

That’s what being scandalized by evil means. It’s when evil, in any of its forms, leads one to commit another evil, another sin, like hatred, the disproportionate response of vengeance, despair and bitterness, etc. He may feel bad, he may get angry as an instinctive reaction to evil that befalls him, but he manages to stay away from committing sin itself.

Remember St. Paul saying, “‘Be angry, and do not sin’: do not let the sun go down on your wrath.” (Eph 4,26) Yes, anger is a legitimate instinctive reaction to anything evil that would come our way, but we have to be most careful with it, because the line between anger as an instinct and anger as sin is thin, subtle and tricky. It’s much better to a good grip on this particular emotion of ours.

Like Christ, a truly good and saintly man would know how to bear evil patiently. And more than that, like Christ he would be aroused to correct that evil with charity, and even to love those who cause evil even more. He would try to correct them and seek their conversion.

And even with those who have no more hope of conversion, like the evil spirits who already have made their definite choice to remain against God and everything that comes from God, like Christ a truly good and saintly man would refuse to fall into hatred or any form of evil. He may have to defend himself against them, as he should, but would not be baited to fall into lack of charity.

As Christ said, we have to love even our enemies. (cfr. Mt 5,44) So we have to be most careful when in our pursuit for goodness and holiness, we end up hating those who are not good and holy and who give us trouble.

That kind of goodness and holiness is not the goodness and holiness of God. They would be fake and are based simply on our own gratuitous and unjustified ideas of goodness and holiness. It would be the goodness and holiness of the prude persons, the puritans, the self-righteous and hypocrites, etc.

A truly good and holy person would be willing to suffer the evil that can unavoidably come his way. This he does in obedience to the teaching and example of Christ which he considers, as part of his core beliefs, to be the true expression of charity.

So, one way of determining the true colors of a person, to see whether he is truly a good and saintly person or not, is to test him with some forms of evil. Sad to say, we are seeing many people failing in this test. When some disasters come or when some forms of injustice take place, many react not only with annoyance and anger, but also with hatred, despair and even loss of faith. What a pity! Rather, let’s be like Job.

 

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com