“Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” In the New Testament, there are few moments as prolific as the Lord’s defense of the adulteress woman. Yet, after dispelling the Pharisees with those wise and striking words, God does not simply leave the woman alone. “Neither do I condemn you” He says, alluding to the salvation that He would win in glory on the cross. “Go and sin no more.”
It is this call and command of the Lord that is most conspicuously absent from Mr. Patrick Feagin’s critique of my article, the “World Turned Upside Down”.His article, titled “An Epistle to the Wren Journal,” while primarily aimed at my piece, also attempted to denounce The Wren Journal organization as a whole. While I initially was expecting some kind of maligned defense of modernity, I was delighted to see that Mr. Feagin chose to defer to the eternal word of God instead. I am always happy to discuss it. Unfortunately, I was met with juvenile insults, strawman arguments, and biblical exegesis so poor that it would make any Sunday school teacher weep.
To start, he misunderstands the central idea of my article. As he states, “The article explores the consequences of societal secularization, criticizing women in particular for ‘immodest dress.'” However, my article was not merely a discussion of the consequences of secularization with a critique of women’s dressing habits thrown in the mix. It sought to express how the values and customs of modern secular society are a complete inversion of the practices and virtues championed by the Christian faith.
How one dresses is just one of many examples I used to illustrate this point. I also contrast pride with humility, instant gratification with patience, fleeting pleasure with everlasting joy, suffering in vain with suffering in Christ, and entitlement with gratefulness.
I might further add that he makes the baseless accusation that I am somehow misogynistic. The piece I have written stands firmly against all those who would dare defile the boundless dignity of woman; I suppose the only misogyny present here is Mr. Feagin’s lackluster defense for their continual degradation.
What I oppose is not women, but the erosion of virtue. To rebuke immodesty and inappropriate apparel is to defend the dignity of mankind. This is not misogyny but love rightly ordered. The issue with Mr. Feagin is that he confuses my praise of modesty with a condemnation of lust. As far as lust goes, we completely agree; “that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Mt 5:28). That said, to dress immodestly is to hurt yourself. While on the other hand, to dress modestly is to declare that you see value and dignity in your own soul; that you are more than an object to be degraded physically. To dress modestly is to say not to the world, but to yourself, that God loves you infinitely.
Furthermore, Mr. Feagin makes the argument for a Christianity that preaches passivity. This is a common pitfall many succumb to upon reading Matthew 5:39, which he cites in his article: “But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also.” The interpretation of this passage as a call for passivity is understandable, but it is far removed from the truth Christ wishes to convey.
In Jesus’ time, the left hand was considered unclean, and so it was never used when striking another. Therefore, if someone were to strike you on the right cheek, it would have been with the back of their hand. It was a gesture of contempt, the way one would treat a slave or inferior. In light of this, to “turn the other cheek” is not to say that we should flee or acquiesce, nor does it mean we should meet transgression with transgression. Instead, it is a call to stand our ground and remain firm in our moral resolve. You are, in effect, refusing to cooperate with the worldly system that seeks to degrade you. In this humorous, provocative way, you are mirroring back to the person their transgression, hoping thereby to lure them into a different moral and spiritual space—one that invites reconciliation and transformation. This is turning the other cheek.
With this context in mind, it is ironic that Mr. Feagin quotes Saint Paul, and in effect presents himself as the great Apostle by styling his piece as an Epistle. The last thing that Saint Paul, the Apostle of the Nations, could be called is passive. Risking life and limb to spread the Christian faith, he was relentless in condemning sin everywhere he saw it. Take Romans 1, where Saint Paul condemns the sin of sexual immorality: “Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.” (Rom 1:26-27).
In contrast to Saint Paul, Mr. Feagin claims that “The LGBTQ+ community is not an adversary to Christianity.” This assertion ignores the reality that sodomy and transgender ideology, taken as a whole, stand in direct contradiction to the Christian faith. Those who advocate for or defend the desecration of marriage and the marital act, whether through homosexual acts, polygamy, or any other distortion of God’s design, set themselves in opposition to Christ.
Saint Paul tells us to “imitate [him] as [he] imitates Christ.” (1 Cor 11:1). Mr. Feagin is right in saying that Christians “forget their place,” but only because they don’t shout from the rooftops loud enough. As the Lord says to his apostles, “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.” (Mt 5:13).
Mr. Feagin continues, “To imply that the celebration of the LGBTQ+ community is inherently anti-Christian is to imply that LGBTQ+ people are not worthy of the gospel or God’s love.” To identify sinful acts as sinful is not to claim that sinners are beyond God’s love. On the contrary, it is a work of charity to fraternally correct our neighbor, calling them not to remain in sin, but to repentance, virtue, and a fuller relationship with God. In other words, sin itself should be condemned as much as the people themselves are loved. When Jesus Christ spared the adulteress woman from being stoned, it was not an affirmation of her sin. It was a merciful invitation to live a life no longer of sin, but of a life in Him. As our Lord states, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again” (Jn 8:11).
Thus, we ought not to remain acquiescent in the face of evil, as Patrick would have you believe. This does nothing but embolden the evildoer, confirming them in their sin and tyranny. Too often, this silence is born not of virtue but of a desire to avoid the discomfort and difficulty that come with standing for the truth.
Instead, we must “turn the other cheek.” We must not choose the path of indifference or tolerance toward sin. We are to take up our crosses daily and resist evil in the name of Jesus Christ. Yes, it is difficult. Yes, it is uncomfortable. But we were not made for ease and comfort. We were made for greatness. We were made to glorify God.
Mr. Feagin himself concludes, “Pride and self-righteousness are insidious sins.” I would urge him to heed his own words, for he now finds himself defending the very vices he decries. But, like so many in our modern age, the Christian virtues he seeks to preserve have, in the words of Chesterton, “gone mad.” Patrick attempts to uphold mercy and charity, but does so by severing them from justice—an impossible task, for all virtue is grounded in charity. As Christ warned, “Every city or house divided against itself shall not stand” (Mt 12:25). Justice cannot oppose charity without ceasing to be itself. To separate one virtue from the others is to disfigure them all, and in so doing, lead virtue itself astray. Patrick has my sympathies, as he seems to come from a good place. But, as the old adage reminds us, the road to hell is often paved with good intentions.
