There have been millions of words written about sin. Every Sunday, priests and preachers deliver homilies on the evil of sin and how sin drives us away from God. The Catholic Church classifies sins as either mortal or venial. St. Thomas Aquinas even developed a hierarchy of sin, suggesting that sins against God such as blasphemy, apostasy, and hypocrisy were far more serious than sins like theft: One type of sin is directed against God, while the other is against another person. Thomas presented this understanding in his Summa Theologica, which is considered one of the most influential accounts of sin in Catholic theology.
In the Gospels, Jesus condemns the sin of hypocrisy more consistently and forcefully than any other. He frequently criticizes religious leaders who appear outwardly holy but lack sincerity and a hunger for justice within: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean” (Matt 23:27-28). The apostle Paul warns against hypocrisy in the second chapter of his Letter to the Romans (2:19-24) by highlighting the harm of condemning others while tolerating one’s own sins.
The word hypocrisy comes from the Greek hypokritēs, which was used to describe someone wearing a mask. Jesus often employed the term to reference people pretended to be righteous and moral while acting in ways that contradicted those qualities. Today, many of our political leaders who claim the banner of Christianity would fall into that category. One recent example came during the congressional hearings of Dr. Anthony Fauci, the immunologist and medical advisor to President Donald Trump during the Covid pandemic. In the hearing, Fauci was subjected to questions that challenged his credibility. He made the decision to refuse to answer and pleaded the fifth over one hundred times. (“Pleading the Fifth” simply means invoking the right granted by the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution to refuse to answer questions that could incriminate you in a criminal prosecution.
One can agree or disagree that Fauci is a hero who helped save us from the horrors of Covid or, as Senator Rand Paul has suggested, guilty of covering up significant information. But this does not change the fact that Fauci had every right to remain silent. Senator Paul threatened Fauci with contempt charges and possible arrest. Another member of the committee, Senator Josh Hawley, who was educated by the Jesuits and considers himself to be a devout Evangelical Christian, said that “no honest person pleads the fifth.” What both Paul and Hawley seem to have forgotten, however, is that in 2022 deposition in New York, President Trump took the fifth more than four hundred times. While it was well within his rights to do so, holding Fauci to a different standard was very hypocritical, a sin that Jesus vigorously and frequently condemned.
Other examples of hypocrisy abound in our political life. In 2017, Minnesota Senator Al Franken was accused of sexual misconduct. He initially denied the accusation. Almost immediately, leaders in the Democratic party urged him to resign, which he did within a few days. More recently, Ohio Representative Max Miller was accused by his ex-wife of multiple acts of domestic abuse. Yet Republican leaders continue to back his campaign, though senators including Bernie Moreno have urged him to step down.
After President Obama Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland to replace deceased Supreme Court Justice Anthony Scalia in 2016, the normal process would have been for the Senate to hold hearings and vote on the nomination. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell refused to hold hearings or consider the nomination. He argued that a Supreme Court vacancy should not be filled during a presidential election year. Yet when Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in September 2020, McConnell wasted no time in pushing through the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett, finalizing her confirmation in two weeks despite his earlier statement about not filling Supreme Court vacancies in presidential election years.
Hypocrisy is not limited to one political party. Former Democratic Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey campaigned heavily on a platform advocating for anti-corruption measures and government accountability. In 2024, he was convicted on federal bribery and corruption charges. Former Democratic President Bill Clinton often spoke about equality and respect for women and championed policies supporting women’s rights. He then was accused of sexual misconduct.
We are a nation, a people, in crisis. Instead of seeing Christ in each other, we see the other as the enemy, someone to be demeaned and attacked. We can respectfully disagree with each other over issues and policy. But we cannot claim we are one nation under God if we continue to ignore what Jesus called the greatest sin, the sin of hypocrisy, by our leaders. And there are examples of the sin of hypocrisy all across the spectrum—not just in the political arena, but in the religious sphere as well. Unless and until we join together as one people speaking out and challenging instances of hypocrisy like Jesus did, we will never uphold each other as “mirrors of Christ” and create the kingdom of heaven here on Earth. As Jesus admonishes in Matthew 7:3-5: “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” ♦
Patrick Carolan is a co-facilitator of the Tomorrow’s American Catholic podcast.