I’ve spent my adult life learning how to love being hated. Jesus said we must love our enemies. He didn’t say we aren’t supposed to have any.

There are two decisions I’ve made in my life that generated the most hate. The first was choosing to argue publicly from religion and philosophy that sexual orientation ought not be added to the Maine Human Rights Act. Everyone thinks of that as “gay rights.”

The second was entering the Roman Catholic Church during Easter in 2020. You just don’t do that after serving for twenty years as the political spokesman for Evangelical Protestantism in Maine. It also doesn’t help any that America is the most Protestant nation on earth.

I’ve written a bit about entering the Catholic Church on my blog. I’m thinking about republishing most of those articles here on Primal. If you want to do a deeper dive into why I converted go to my website for now.

I maintain the power to love those who hate me through prayer and worship. Recently I’ve been attending the daily Mass in my local Parish. It helps that the aesthetic of the sanctuary at St. Augustine in Augusta, Maine is masculine, solid, high and holy. On Sunday mornings I join my fellow citizens of Augusta at St Marys, located just a mile or so from St. Augustine. It is feminine, solid, intimate and holy.

If I couldn’t love my enemies I’d be caught up in all the online drama that absorbs most people I know in their daily lives. This drama is now income for many through clicks and likes.

Some Protestants tell themselves that they don’t hate Catholics. But then with callous disregard for Catholic sensibilities and convictions about the Mother of God they proceed to attack the Rosary. Their arguments are often freighted with intense emotion and passion. Most Catholics I know simply hide their Rosary and choose to pray in private so as not to offend.

It’s really important to be able to confess your sins to a priest. I feel bad for Donald Trump. He doesn’t even appear to want to understand this human need. Perhaps this helps explain his ratcheting on Epstein. I don’t know. I know it makes me sad though. And the consequences may end in nuclear obliteration for humanity.

I can’t know the future. But I know the person who does. His name is Jesus Christ. And He is the second person of the Holy Trinity. I work hard not to worry. I pray. And I speak the truth publicly as best I can.

I don’t doubt that I’m headed for a long stay in purgatory. But I’ll continue to honor the idea of sainthood, and pursue it for myself.

Loving the hate is fundamental, I think.

Amen.