Ah, The Tangled Skein Of Our Guilt!

‘To be slapped for no reason gives you a halo; but to be slapped for a reason leaves a hollow spot in your pride’ said I to Monk Anselmo who said he had abjured pride completely.
Master Crapper’s son later in the evening teased the Monk so pitilessly and he took it all with resignation. When Master Crapper came late in the evening he asked the monk if he felt at home. In reply Monk Anselmo gave a mighty whack to Master Crapper and then went to bed.
Master Crapper was most incensed and then perplexed. “ I feel my pride shall never be the same. So humiliated I feel.”
I told him to overlook his guest’s action. “Cuthbert, your son will explain it all, one day. I suppose.”
How we explain our innocence or Christian virtue of being afflicted for no reason or delivered by the power of His Name etc., has to be understood in our relation to others. Our deliverance comes at the expense of some other. In the equation someone gets punished as Master Crapper was. By the way the host could not be said he was completely innocent. Could he?
benny