ПОРИЦАНИЕ

Let us avoid blame. There is no sin heavier and at the same time lighter than this sin. Why? Because it occurs faster than any lawlessness and soon captivates an inattentive person. Other sins require time, costs, waiting, and helpers, and are often stopped by the length of time. For example, whether someone decides to kill, whether he decides to kidnap or turn someone else’s property into his own favor, he has a lot of trouble ahead of him, and from slowness he often loses his anger, abandons a vicious desire, abandons a disastrous thought, and does not add the deed itself to his desire. But with reproach it is not so, but if we are not very vigilant, we easily get carried away. We don’t need any time, no waiting, no costs and no hassle to say something bad, but it’s enough just to make up your mind, and the desire immediately turns into action - because here only language is required. Therefore, if this evil is quick, if this sin is easily attacked, if the punishment and torment for it is severe, and there is no benefit, neither great nor small, then we will avoid this disease with great care, we will cover up the vices of others, and not disclose them, we will admonish those who sin, as the Lord says: “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone” (Matt. 18:15). The secrecy of denunciations will make healing easier. Let us not torment, let us not corrode the wounds of others; Let us not imitate flies, but let us compete with bees. Flies land on wounds and eat them away, and bees fly around flowers. Therefore the latter make honeycombs, and the former cause pain to the bodies on which they sit; these are disgusting, but those are desirable and worthy. Let us, therefore, force our soul to fly through the meadow of the virtues of the saints and constantly spread the fragrance of their exploits, and let us not corrode the wounds of our neighbor. But if we see people doing this, we will stop their mouths, restraining them with fear of punishment and reminding them of their kinship with their brethren. When they do not listen to anything like that, then we will call them flies, so that although the humiliation of this name will keep them from doing something bad, so that, leaving this bad activity, they will spend all their leisure time looking at their own vices. Thus, the fallen will rise, remembering their undisclosed sins, and, constantly thinking about their own vices, will easily lag behind them, through the memory of previous sins, becoming slower to commit others, and those constantly representing the virtue of the saints will receive the greatest zeal to imitate them. And when through all this the whole body of our Church is corrected, then we will be able to enter the Kingdom of Heaven in its entirety (4). You might be interested in: