Being Charitable and the Catholic Contingency

Today I went to Chipotle with 2/3 of the Catholic Contingency, and inevitably, we discussed religion, and I posed some hypothetical moral dilemmas to these two experts in piety. As Jack attacked his (double wrapped!!!) burrito with a joyful glee, he wistfully said, "There are no bad Catholics anymore. Everyone can get communion these days." Although I am not exactly sure who would be excluded from Communion (besides non-members), I smiled and nodded sagely as if knew why this was a travesty (Wikipedia has not yielded any answers to Jack's esoteric comment).

"Well," I said with great authority, "Islam definitely has categories for good and bad Muslims." Both Patrick and Jack found this to be truly wonderful because these days, there are all kinds of Christians - the strict Christians who go to Bible study and attend church with a regularity that even God finds amazing, and the masses, who love parties, booze, and Spring Break. There was no "good" or "bad" because within American society, "everything goes" these days, and it's currently chic to avoid labeling.

In contrast, in Islam, there are good, practitioners of the faith and then the bad seeds, who are like the grave diggers in Hamlet - they only come out at night but provide some of the profoundest moments in the entire play. The bad seeds add the spice and drama to the soap opera of our lives - they are the secret villains, who hide their unIslamic deeds by the dark cloak of night. Lady Macbeth eloquently soliloquizes night and its unseemly benefits as she musters the courage to murder:

Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry "Hold, hold!"

And so, just like Shakespeare's (arguably) most famous character, some Muslims hide their moments of weakness and temptation by the "blanket of the dark," engaging in a deception because this dichotomy of "good" and "bad" Muslim still exists. Islam, being a relatively new religion, has not yet reached the point sociologically where sins like zina can be openly committed with gusto.

Now while I posed this dilemma to the Catholic Contingency, they found that engaging in deception was better than openly and brazenly disregarding the moral imperative of religion. In hiding their sins, one was at least repentant, Jack reasoned; they hid for they knew it was wrong. However, the crucial question remains - is that why these 'bad' Muslims hide? Or do they realize that the social consequences of their wrongdoings are so dire that deception is the only means by which they can entertain the society of other Muslims? Is repentance really a part of this cloak and dagger theatrical routine?

In the end, the Catholic Contingency came up on the side of "hate the sin, not the sinner" and "judge not lest ye be judged." One should pray for these people who have fallen prone to sin, but to judge them and hate them for their moral failing of deception? A difficult task to avoid, but essential in maintaining one's own moral character. For example, a sample Quranic verse: "Let the one who believes in Allah and the Hereafter utter good words, or let him be silent."

And so, the conclusion I came to is that the Catholic Contingency is much more charitable than me, and in one ride to eat a veggie burrito, I learned a valuable life lesson from an unlikely source - people not of my own faith, but ironically from individuals who believe that contraception is a "mortal sin" and the resurrection of Christ. And as a result of said Life Lesson, I did not write a revengeful blog about bullies at Carlisle School; and instead, I pray for them in namaz. Thanks Catholic Contingency!

--By Mariam, who hopes that this blog has not alienated the readers who like funny, quirky blogs by getting all, like, deep.