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current holiday.
In his 1964 book "Gandhi on Non-Violence," Thomas Merton writes, "It is no accident that Hitler believed firmly in the unforgivableness of sin.This is indeed fundamental to the whole mentality of Nazism, and its avidity for final solutions and its concern that all uncertainties be eliminated. Hitler's world was built on the central dogma of the irreversibility of evil ...." (page 12)
Merton continues with an examination of St. Thomas Aquinas's views on evil. He viewed evil as real, and recognized that it was necessary to confront it. But he knew it could be overcome, even healed, and built upon. Aquinas noted that there were characteristics common to those who could not forgive, which make them remarkably similar to the sinners they hate. In "Summa Theologica," he notes "the mood of Nemesis" that "rejoices in the belief that others justly suffer and grieves when good comes to the unworthy."
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