Hypocrites and Parasites...

"The hardest saying of Jesus and perhaps the most controversial in our post-Sept. 11 world must be: 'Love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you.' ...

Christ commands us to not only see the splinter in our adversary's eye but also the beams in our own, which often obstruct our vision. To name the face of evil in the brutality of terrorist attacks is good theology, but to say they are evil and we are good is bad theology that can lead to dangerous foreign policy. Christ instructs us to love our enemies, which does not mean a submission to their hostile agendas or domination, but does mean treating them as human beings also created in the image of God and respecting their human rights as adversaries and even as prisoners. The words of Jesus are either authoritative for Christians, or they are not. And they are not set aside by the very real threats of terrorism."

What Jesus wouldn't do - an excerpt from Jim Wallis' new book, God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It (Harper San Francisco).