Hatred

It is possible for a debased human will to hate God. God is altogether lovable, but to the sinner who incurs the necessary penalties of sin, hatred of the divine justice, which imposes the penalties, is possible.

Hatred of God is manifestly the worst of sins. For the evil of sin consists in the fact that it turns the soul away from God. And there can be no more complete and dreadful turning from God than by hatred of God.

It is always a sin to hate one’s neighbor. For, as St. John says (I John 2:9): “He that hateth his brother is in darkness.” We are to hate sin in our brother, but we are to love our brother.

Our hatred of our neighbor is a sin less hurtful to him than other sins, such as theft, or murder, or adultery. Therefore,it is not true to say that hatred is the most grievous of sins against a neighbor.

Hatred is not listed with the capital sins. For, though other sins may arise from hatred as from their capital source,hatred itself is not promptly present to fallen nature, but comes as the result of the gradual deterioration and destruction oflove.

Hatred grows out of the capital sin of envy, which is sorrow over a neighbor’s good. Envy makes a neighbor’s goodhateful to the envious man, and thus, as St. Augustine says in his Rule: “Out of envy cometh hatred.”