Politics, Art, Religion : Page 285

How to be intolerant of error yet tolerant and kindly and sympathetic toward those whom we believe in error is the problem and the achievement of the gracious Christian conversationalist, according to St. Paul's ideal. If anyone cannot embody this ideal reasonably well, then he ought to avoid religious discussion. In all but religious disputes, as Sir Thomas Browne says, "so much as there is of passion, so much there is of nothing to the purpose" (op. cit., Part II, Sec. 3). I think you can most easily acquire the faculty of kindliness in religious discussion if you recognize clearly that if everybody had the full truth or saw all its implications, then talk would be superfluous. Therefore, instead of being irritated by people's errors, you should be glad of the opportunity of being apprized of them, for only so can you try to correct them. Perhaps one should feel about error as a young American felt when he witnessed the first bullfight. He said, "Lord, I do not want any bullfighter to get hurt, but if it be Thy will that one is to get hurt, let it happen while I am here to see it!" If no one were ever in error, how could we perform the blessed work mentioned by St. James (5:20), namely, that of bringing a sinner back