Whether Active Scandal Can Be Found in the Perfect?
Objection 1: It would seem that active scandal can be found in the
perfect. For passion is the effect of action. Now some are
scandalized passively by the words or deeds of the perfect, according
to Matt. 15:12: "Dost thou know that the Pharisees, when they heard
this word, were scandalized?" Therefore active scandal can be found
in the perfect.
Obj. 2: Further, Peter, after receiving the Holy Ghost, was in the
state of the perfect. Yet afterwards he scandalized the gentiles: for
it is written (Gal. 2:14): "When I saw that they walked not uprightly
unto the truth of the Gospel, I said to Cephas," i.e. Peter, "before
them all: If thou being a Jew, livest after the manner of the
gentiles, and not as the Jews do, how dost thou compel the gentiles
to live as do the Jews?" Therefore active scandal can be in the
perfect.
Obj. 3: Further, active scandal is sometimes a venial sin. But venial
sins may be in perfect men. Therefore active scandal may be in
perfect men.
_On the contrary,_ Active scandal is more opposed to perfection, than
passive scandal. But passive scandal cannot be in the perfect. Much
less, therefore, can active scandal be in them.
_I answer that,_ Active scandal, properly so called, occurs when a
man says or does a thing which in itself is of a nature to occasion
another's spiritual downfall, and that is only when what he says or
does is inordinate. Now it belongs to the perfect to direct all their
actions according to the rule of reason, as stated in 1 Cor. 14:40:
"Let all things be done decently and according to order"; and they
are careful to do this in those matters chiefly wherein not only
would they do wrong, but would also be to others an occasion of
wrongdoing. And if indeed they fail in this moderation in such words
or deeds as come to the knowledge of others, this has its origin in
human weakness wherein they fall short of perfection. Yet they do not
fall short so far as to stray far from the order of reason, but only
a little and in some slight matter: and this is not so grave that
anyone can reasonably take therefrom an occasion for committing sin.
Reply Obj. 1: Passive scandal is always due to some active scandal;
yet this active scandal is not always in another, but in the very
person who is scandalized, because, to wit, he scandalizes himself.
Reply Obj. 2: In the opinion of Augustine (Ep. xxviii, xl, lxxxii)
and of Paul also, Peter sinned and was to be blamed, in withdrawing
from the gentiles in order to avoid the scandal of the Jews, because
he did this somewhat imprudently, so that the gentiles who had been
converted to the faith were scandalized. Nevertheless Peter's action
was not so grave a sin as to give others sufficient ground for
scandal. Hence they were guilty of passive scandal, while there was
no active scandal in Peter.
Reply Obj. 3: The venial sins of the perfect consist chiefly in
sudden movements, which being hidden cannot give scandal. If,
however, they commit any venial sins even in their external words or
deeds, these are so slight as to be insufficient in themselves to
give scandal.
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