How do you LOVE an evil person?

“Often the one who delights in evil is an ordinary, unassuming person who hides behind a facade of normalcy. Few people who are evil ever appear evil, even after the evidence of their deceit, destructiveness, and hardness is exposed.”

“Evil is present when there is a profound absence of empathy, shame, and goodness. Empathy involves a connectedness to the heart of another and a respect for their personal boundaries. An evil person is unmoved by the inner world of the other and has no respect for boundaries. Shame involves an ability to be exposed and disturbed about actual or perceived violation of relationships. An evil person is unaffected by exposure, so to see someone or something grow in strength, freedom, and beauty. An evil person seems to delight in stripping away purpose, individuality, and vitality.”

“Evil is (for the most part) unfeeling. It lacks sorrow when someone suffers and joy when there is happiness. But an evil person is more than emotionally detached; he simply will not allow himself to enter the heart of his victim as a person. The victim is an object – an entity to be controlled or destroyed- and not a living, breathing being who feels hurt, fear, sorrow, and shame. In that regard, evil sees the other as nothing more than a service to itself.”

“An evil person, regularly and masterfully, portrays his motives and behavior as innocent. Others just do not understand. He is deceitfully gifted in making the victim of his abuse feel like the perpetrator of the harm.”

“The coldness of evil is a passionless hatred toward any who resist or fail to succumb to the evil person’s desires.”

“A second attribute of evil is shamelessness…Shamelessnes

s thrives on the ability to avoid exposure. The experience of shame always involves an exposure of one’s inner world by another and is usually a potent deterrent to proceeding in a shameless direction…But a person can avoid the experience of shame if he can put the eyes out that see inside him. When his accuser is blind, he can escape the gaze that penetrates his soul. For that reason, evil almost always works to shame the other. Shame works to blind the eyes that expose.”

“Evil is bad. That is, it is persistently destructive. But it is also deceitfully subtle. Consequently, evil rarely shows itself as bad. In fact, it often portrays itself as helpful, open, kind, generous, long-suffering.”

“Evil misuses power and then claims innocence. If that is questioned, then evil uses shame or mockery to bludgeon the victim into accepting the shame.”

“One of the greatest gifts one can give a person inclined towards evil is the strength to frustrate their attempts to dominate.”

“Evil uses false contrition to lull its victim to sleep so that it can regroup and try a different tactic.”

“Evil will not be conquered as long as our hearts live to obtain immediate relief or escape profound loss. Only when we have little or nothing to lose will we be willing to love.”

These are all excerpted from Chapter 10 of the wonderful book by Dan Allender called Bold Love.