The charitable anathema

OnePeterFive argues for the practice of "charitable anathema". This reminds me of dear Jerusha at Rice University in the middle 1990s who "prayed with me". I was in fact being prayed AT.

Now: I deserved something like that at the time. I was flirting with the Gnosticism. I didn't know better since I had no grounding in the Apostolic Fathers at that time; I really only understood the Didache and 2 Clement, hadn't fully grappled with 1 Clement (which was long) and Ignatius (who was alien). But I'll never forget Jerusha's theatrically pitiful face. I am ashamed to admit, I was angered. No really, I am not now proud of my emotional reaction even if I did, I think, succeed in hiding it. One might even ponder if I had a demon in me.

In self-defence of my resistance, if not of how I felt at the time: I do not think Jerusha handled this well. I think a better interlocutrix could gently explain that the gnostic texts are all secondary, by contrast 1 Clement and (more relevant) Ignatius are less secondary. Unfortunately for both of us, Jerusha did not have these tools any more than I did. She just had... well, she had a pronoun. The appeal anyone of XX might have over an XY.

Here is what I can report on what does not work. Dumping New-Testament cant upon that guy: circular. Psychoanalysing him: his wife or his mom might be able, but you aren't either of them. Invoking prayer: are you so sure your god is the right one? simple statistics would show that you're both wrong. We might be seeing a pattern - a particularly XX pattern. Instead of entitlement wrapped in therapy speak I might have received epistemic-closure wrapped in cant.

One can dress up arrogance all one likes. One can tell the other person he is "spiritually dead" and in denial of Christ's Love or Not Having The Truth In Him or Making God A Liar or - whatever. But: you don't really know the other person. I mean, he could well be jackass wrong; I certainly was. But that is not the same as refusing the truth; he mightn't even know where to look.

And if you don't know, yourself; you are less likely to win him over than to make an atheist of him, even (G-d forbid) a hater.