Sin is one of those things that can be so satisfying in so many ways. I am supposed to watch out for it, so I get to watch out for people sinning. I am supposed to test the spirits, so I get to critically evaluate the happenings around me and identify the bits that are sin. I am sup­posed to be discerning, so I get to evaluate that sin, to pick it over, to examine its roots and branches, and declare it discerned before I chuck it, and its carrier, on the brush pile for burning. This is all very fulfilling. Though I don't like sin, especially yours, there are things about sin that give me self-righteous pleasure.

I find that I am actually pretty efficient at identifying sin. It is a skill I have honed.

The media is a fine source of pleasure and by that I mean it is a great place to find sin. It doesn't take an ex­pert to identify the obviously sinful content of television. Anyone with the rudiments of long-term memory can realize that what was absolutely forbidden on television twenty years ago is now common to the point of banality. I can find it there, and I don't even have to leave home.

I don't even have to see movies to know that most of them are completely wrong, or disrespectful, or blasphe­mous, or pornographic. All I have to do is read the re­views. I can be fairly certain that the ones that are not completely packed with sin are at least tainted with sin, or have moments of sin or have actors who have sinned. Movies are almost too easy to be satisfying for any self respecting sin hunter.

Newspapers are a bit more challenging. There are cer­tainly glaring failures and momentous sins with all of their attendant consequences to be read, but there are those stories that could simply be discussing stupidity, or neglect, or ignorance. I can mark them all as sins of omis­sion, but that is not as fun. It seems a bit hollow.

My neighbour is more fun; and by my neighbour, I mean you. I can walk through a mall, or down a street, or into a school or a church and identify all of the sin I see there. This person obviously has this sin problem and that person has a great deal of difficulty controlling their predisposition toward that sin. I can see them all. There are times when I wish I had a little book dedicated to the cataloguing of these obvious sins. I am sure I could fill it with things I do not like.

Sometimes... sometimes a nagging question rises in my mind. Sometimes I become convinced that I am not sup­posed to dislike sin. In a very Proverbs sort of way, I start to think that I am supposed to hate sin. I am pretty sure, except for the perverse joy it can bring in the hunting, I don't like sin, but do I really hate it?

Hate is a strong word. Hate is so strong a word with so negative a reputation that many of us have been trained to avoid even the idea of hate, no matter the object of that hatred. If we listen too long, though not carefully, to admonitions against hating, we can come to the firm conviction that we should not hate at all. It is not long before this seeps into our understanding of sin. I suspect that this is only part of the problem.

Even if I can say that I love the sinner, but hate the sin, I am not always sure that I do either of these. If I really hated the sin and loved the sinner, I would be required to do something about it besides keeping careful records on a scorecard of evil. I might have to show love by hating sin. That is too hard to be much fun at all.

If I am honest, which I often try to be, I begin to suspect that my own lack of hatred for your sin comes from my uncanny ability to ignore my own. If I step out on a limb, if I take a step toward you, if I stretch out my hand in real love to flick away the speck that is in your eye because I hate that it is there, I must immediately acknowledge that I have more on my hands than your specky sin. I will have to deal with a log, and I am not sure I am ready for that kind of work. Sometimes, I am not sure I want to get rid of that log, or any of the others I carry around.

I have come to a realization, and I wrote this down on my own list: Until I learn to hate my sin, I will never learn to love my neighbour.