Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling
over disputable matters (Romans 14:1).
St. Augustine is usually credited with the statement: “In
essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”
Paul tells us there definitely are such things as
non-essentials. He says we are to accept those who disagree with us on these
gray areas without feeling the need to set them straight even though we think
they’re wrong.
Disputable matters are those about which God has not seen
fit to give us detailed instruction. But even though God did not set down in
black and white what we are to do or believe in regard to these things, he left
nothing to the imagination about how he expects us to treat those with whom we
disagree.
Too often in today’s polemical atmosphere, we have taken
what are rightfully matters of opinion and elevated them to dogma. If not
quarreling (feeling the need to prove someone wrong) is how Paul describes
acceptance, then quarreling must be a synonym for rejection, and we will never
win someone over to our way of thinking while at the same time rejecting them.
If God, rather than giving us a paint-by-numbers
Christianity, chose to leave some issues to our discretion, then perhaps even
more important than defining answers to these disputed matters is how we treat
one another.
TODAY’S MEDITATION
Can you accept those who
think differently than you, without feeling the need to set them straight? If
it was really such a crucial matter couldn’t the Holy Spirit confront them?
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