The Subjectivity Of Niceness

by Heidelblog on August 16, 2022 | 2 Comments

I fell into the trap that ensnares many souls today: believing that if a person has a pleasing personality, is affable, attentive, and “accepting” (whatever that means), then the person is good. Somewhere along the line, Catholics began making crucial judgments based on feelings rather than reason. We are lulled by a hearty laugh, a twinkling eye, a hug with a knowing smile. We get sucked in by a sense that someone loves us, even though we are being led down a garden path.

The friendly person who accepts us, the one who reaches out to “accompany” and affirm us—that person may not always have our best interests at heart. And sometimes a person who does want the best for us is harming us unknowingly despite his good intentions. We cannot know by outward appearances or our emotions whether or not the other is truly being Christ to us. The only standard we can use to measure another’s advice and guidance is whether or not that advice conforms to objective truth and goodness. Read More»
Leila Miller | “Don’t Be Fooled By ‘Nice'” | July 14, 2022

 

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2 comments

  1. Ah yes, Niceness.

    In Canada, we are famously nice, and famously a post-Christian wasteland with all the dreadful consequences that entails.

  2. Niceness, like Janus, has two faces. One is secular/subjective; the other is Christian/objective.

    Well over a decade ago my then-married brother told me that his (second) wife would be traveling with a rather “active” bisexual friend of theirs for a few weeks while he held down the fort at home. When I expressed some couched (ahem) concerns, he told me that if she chose to sleep with him, it was fine with him…”whatever made her happy”. What if she contracted AIDS and passed it on to him, I asked? He gave me a strange look and shrugged.

    Niceness obviously (often) resides in a world devoid of consequences…

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