\n\"How should a Christian deal with righteous anger?\"<\/em> E.A., Chicago\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \n\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nHow do we deal with righteous anger? With as much righteousness and as little anger as possible.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n \n\u00a0<\/span>\n<\/p>\n \nWe \n\u00a0<\/span>\n<\/p>\n \nBut <!\u2013 n<\/p>\n \n <\/span>\n<\/p>\n n<\/p>\n \nSo if you\u0092re going to allow yourself the pleasure of feeling angry, make your anger as righteous as possible. Make sure that you\u0092re angry on behalf of people who are really suffering, and not just angry at somebody you think has caused your problems. Use your anger as the starting point for serious action, and not just as a measuring stick to make yourself look better than somebody else. Righteous anger has the emotional power to engage you with real problems and build genuine moral commitments. But the problems almost always last longer than the emotion does, and that\u0092s a good thing. What comes after righteous anger is hard work. It\u0092s nice to imagine sweeping the bad guys away and setting things right with one blow, but in the real world the end result of righteous anger is almost always that you\u0092ve got to work with the people you were angry at to solve the problem.n For that, you\u0092ll need all the righteousness you can manage, and at least as much patience as you first had anger.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n n<\/p>\n \n<\/span>\n<\/p>\n n<\/p>\n \nRobin Lovin<\/span>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n n\u201d,0] \n\u00a0<\/span>\n<\/p>\n \nSo “How should a Christian deal with righteous anger?” E.A., Chicago<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1176,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c22-ask-a-theologian"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nall learned as children that we\u2019re not supposed to be angry when
\nsomebody does something to us, but there are times when anger is an
\nappropriate moral response. When the poor are exploited for the profit
\nof the rich, when people are put at risk by poor planning or corrupt
\nleaders, when politicians lie to cover up their own problems or mislead
\nthe public, anger is the emotion that stirs us to do something about
\nit. In those cases, it\u2019s apathy that is immoral, not anger.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n
\nif we\u2019re honest, what usually stirs us up are the things that happen to
\nus. We get angry when someone cuts us off in rush hour traffic. People
\nliving in FEMA trailers a year after the hurricane and soldiers sent
\nonto the Baghdad streets without adequate armor don\u2019t get our blood
\nboiling quite so quickly. Righteous anger requires genuine compassion.
\nIn order to feel righteous anger, we have to be outraged at what has
\nbeen done to others and put our own problems in perspective. Righteous
\nanger is the kind of anger Jesus expressed toward leaders who laid
\nheavy burdens on people and then wouldn\u2019t lift a finger to help carry
\nthem (Matthew 23). Righteous anger is the kind of anger the prophets
\nfelt toward rulers who added house to house and field to field, until
\nthe poor had no place to go (Isaiah 5:7-10). Ordinary anger makes us
\nfeel good for a minute by imagining that we\u2019re better than the person
\nwho made us angry. Righteous anger moves us to action, often risky
\naction on behalf of people whom we may not even know.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nD([\"mb\",\"\n<\/p>\n
\n);
\nD([\u201cce\u201d]);
\n\/\/\u2013>\n<\/p>\n
\nif you\u2019re going to allow yourself the pleasure of feeling angry, make
\nyour anger as righteous as possible. Make sure that you\u2019re angry on
\nbehalf of people who are really suffering, and not just angry at
\nsomebody you think has caused your problems. Use your anger as the
\nstarting point for serious action, and not just as a measuring stick to
\nmake yourself look better than somebody else. Righteous anger has the
\nemotional power to engage you with real problems and build genuine
\nmoral commitments. But the problems almost always last longer than the
\nemotion does, and that\u2019s a good thing. What comes after righteous anger
\nis hard work. It\u2019s nice to imagine sweeping the bad guys away and
\nsetting things right with one blow, but in the real world the end
\nresult of righteous anger is almost always that you\u2019ve got to work with
\nthe people you were angry at to solve the problem. For that, you\u2019ll
\nneed all the righteousness you can manage, and at least as much
\npatience as you first had anger.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"