Modern Coptic icon of Christ with the Samaritan woman.
My dear, let it be the code and rule of our lives the saying of the Lord: «Do not judge».
Apparently a light commandment. Light, because if we examine it with some attention, we shall see that it is easy to avoid judging, to protect our soul and mouth from it. Besides judging is not something priorly rooted from birth and kneaded with our soul. It is something external, especially when judging is not born out of animosity or hatred but from superficiality and negligence and from the usual tendency to always talk about the others.
In fact, judging is not only a light but also a heavy sin, unfortunately extensively spread. We meet it everywhere. It consists of a much polluted atmosphere which we continually breathe. It is a common phenomenon that one can say it has become the norm for man. «Nothing is more pleasant to man, than to judge the actions of others» says Gregory the Theologian. Exactly because of this extensive spread of judging, makes this sin hard to fight and makes the divine commandment «do not judge» heavy.
No one can dispute this sad condition but also no right thinking person can seriously claim that he is justified in judging, since others judge. Woe to us if we used as criterion and rule of our ethical life the disorderly life of others. Our conscience herself, no matter how much she has been overshadowed by the prevailing confused and disordered condition of our society, will protest and condemn the judging. She will scream that the rule of our life must be not the voice and habits of the world but her voice, which in the final analysis is the voice of God. That is why every person finds the commandment of God «do not judge», correct and just, even if he is swept away in «judging».
Απόψεις για τη Μονή Βατοπαιδίου (και όχι μόνο) 