One with our enemies

“Never fight evil as if it were something
that arose totally outside of yourself.”
—Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430)

[Augustine] was reflecting Saint Paul’s “all have sinned and fallen short.” It is tempting, of course, to believe that some have sinned—for example, “that evil empire”—or that “most have sinned, but not us.” Paul’s insistence, however, that all have sinned makes an important point: if we are not one with our enemies in love, at least we are one with them in sin, which is no mean bond, for it precludes the possibility of separation through judgment. That is the meaning of the injunction “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”

—William Sloane Coffin (1924-2006)