How do I love people who do evil things?

How do I show love for people who do evil things? I don’t know.

How do I show love for evil people? Likewise, I don’t know.

Those are two different questions, even though they sound the same. They are difficult questions too. Should someone who is evil be shown love? How about people who do evil things?

And let me be clear, I’m asking the question of what I should do, not governments, communities, churches, or any grouping of people. I’m not even asking what other individuals should do – you have to figure that out for yourself. I’m struggling with the question of what I should do.

Maybe we should start with some definitions.

What is evil? I guess it depends on how you define it. I think evil goes beyond just being morally bankrupt or doing something bad. I think it goes much deeper to a level in which someone is purposefully causing pain and suffering to another or a group of people with the intent of causing harm. Evil and cruelty would be related in that sense.

What is love? Love is more than just a feeling, or attraction to someone. Love isn’t just some sappy thing. Love moves a person to take action risking their own safety. Love moves a person beyond just doing something morally good to a deeper level in which someone purposefully relieves pain and suffering, is empathetic, moves towards healing and wholeness.

St. Paul wrote about what love is in 1 Corinthians 13:

“Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”

I think this is a pretty good description of what love is.

And it brings us back to the main question – how do we love someone who does evil?

If we take St. Paul’s words and apply them to the question, we end up with some advice. It’s certainly not easy by any stretch of the imagination. For some people, it may be out of reach – evil can have a lasting effect on people and victims of it have to figure out how and if they will deal with those that caused pain to them.

If we look at St. Paul’s writing, it seems that we are to be patient with those who act with evil intent. What does that mean though? Maybe it means leaving the door open for the possibility of change of heart – and that could take a long time. Maybe it means slowing down rather than reaction. Maybe it means offering something that someone with evil intent never offers – time. Maybe it means something else.

St. Paul suggests that love is kind. How do we show kindness to someone who does evil things? I don’t think it means that we look the other way from evil actions, pain, suffering, and cruelty. I think kindness is not treating people in the same way they have treated others (if they have shown cruelty). It’s not about being soft or weak with people. Kindness isn’t about being a pushover. It is about setting people free from what is holding them in bondage – in the case of someone doing evil, that evil is holding the person in bondage. What is more kind than setting someone free from that evil?

St. Paul says that love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. How does this relate to an evil person? I think means that we start with the assumption that we don’t know the answers, and in reality, we don’t really know the person we are dealing with and what drove them to the point of embracing evil. These four things that St. Paul writes about seem to be talking about being able to see the image of God in the other person. That is certainly loving – especially if that person can’t see the image of God in themselves or others.

St. Paul says that love doesn’t insist on its own way. In other words, love is invitational. It offers a different way to be and act. What is more loving that to offer someone who is acting with evil intent an alternative to set them free? If we respond to evil with violence, cruelty, and just mirror what the evil person does, then how are we offering an alternative? Aren’t we just becoming the very thing we hate? Love moves us in a different direction.

St. Paul says that love is not irritable or resentful and that it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but in the truth. And remember, the truth sets us free. This also relates to not becoming the very thing we are opposed to. Love doesn’t rejoice in the causing of pain and suffering or death of someone who is evil. Love also doesn’t rejoice in false peace where injustice is allowed to persist.

St. Paul finishes the section by writing: “It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.” Love is not just invitational, but also hopeful, persistent, and always the best option. Love isn’t something that we do when it’s easy and requires no effort. Love isn’t the option just for people we like. It was made as a way for us to relate to those we hate, our enemies, and those that seek out our destruction. That’s not easy – none of this is easy.

How do we love someone who is evil and/or acts with evil intent? We love them. We don’t love what they do. We don’t love their intent. We offer them something they don’t deserve. We invite them to a different way. We offer them a way that will set them free. We insist on seeing the image of God in them. We give them what they seem incapable of offering. Not because they deserve it. Not because we want to.

We do it because responding with violence, cruelty, and evil never ends well for anyone. It has never worked. It has certainly been tried for essentially all of human history. The way of love is rarely, if never tried. We are all too quick to give up on it. How quickly humanity tries violence, cruelty, and evil though. But these ways always disappoint. They always come up short. They never last. If we were to take St. Paul’s writing about love, but talk about evil, it might sound something like this:

Evil is impatient; evil is cruel; evil is envious, boastful, arrogant, rude. It insists on its own way; it is irritable and resentful; it rejoices in wrongdoing and rejects the truth, twisting it for its own purposes. It makes all things disposable, lives by the ends justify the means, leads to despair, and consumes all things. Evil demands full compliance.

If I know anything about evil, it is this – it is not to be trusted. Never make a deal with evil. It will lie straight up to your face because what it cares most about is getting what it wants. And because it believes that the ends justify the means, it will promise all sorts of things it has no intention of fulfilling. And once it gets what it wants, it will discard you. Because everyone is discardable for evil – even the one carrying out evil. Never make a deal with evil.

And when one person says “no” to evil, it means that evil has lost. Evil will resort to violence to get its way. And even if evil kills, all it does is makes the rejection of evil permanent for all eternity. Evil loses. It always does. But in losing, it cause much damage.

One of the biggest things to keep in mind with evil is that we cannot change another person. We can only invite them to a different way of being.

How do we love someone who is evil? We love them, with all our might. We see their humanity. We offer them a different way to live and be. We seek justice, which restores right relationship. We reject the ways of evil. We follow the way of peace – real peace. We seek shalom. We do not become the evil we oppose. We become the antithesis of it. We see what evil does and we do the opposite of it. We love. We build up. We offer healing. We see humanity. We do what seems impossible. And we keep at it.