It may seem strange for a politician so liberal that he’s been called a communist by his political adversaries to quote a talk radio show host’s article in the National Review, but these aren’t normal times and perhaps I’m not your typical politician.

Dennis Prager wrote Gratuitous Hatred Is Destroying Republicans — Just as It Did the Ancient Israelites. There is plenty I can find to disagree with in Prager’s article, but his concern about gratuitous hatred is an important point, and it’s not just destroying Republicans, it is destroying all of us.

One example of this is the tendency to come up with names to disrespect our previous and current president, as well as one of the current candidates. As you can see by the title of this post, Republicans and Democrats alike do this. It is part of a larger problem, the vilification of those that are different from ourselves, that are ‘other’.

This is happening, not only in national politics, but in church politics as well. Today, I read a post by a senior Anglican bishop, which included, “Western liberal activists are not the least bit gracious. Actually, forgive me. That was judgmental. I have never met a Western liberal activist who was gracious”

Apparently these days even senior Bishops think it is acceptable to speak disrespectfully of those they disagree with, if the post ‘forgive me’.

The bigger problem is that hate now appears to be socially acceptable. We talk about ‘haters’ and shrug them off saying, ‘haters gonna hate’.

This isn’t new, and if we go back to great literature and to scripture, we find two important quotes. The first is from the Prince in the final scene of Romeo and Juliet

See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love.
And I for winking at your discords too
Have lost a brace of kinsmen: all are punish'd.

It illustrates the passage from 1 John 3:15

Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer; and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.

and again in 1 John 4:20

If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.

I know that it can be enjoyable to poke fun at people we disagree with. At times it can be humorous, but too often it is just plain hateful. To my God fearing friends, I call on you to not only say, “forgive me” but to actually repent, to turn around and seek to love those you disagree with, those that are different from yourselves. To my secular friends, I’ll just refer back to the Prince’s speech at the end of Romeo and Juliet. We will all be punished, one way or another, if we don’t end this gratuitous hatred.