Questions about faith, judgement, and community division

**This is NOT a troll post**

I’m here to try to gain a better understanding and perspective of the Catholic faith. I am not Catholic, but have been around Catholicism my entire life. I’ve attended mass with friends and family and am minimally knowledgeable of how the Church is organized.

That being said, I’m having a hard time seeing things from the Catholic perspective and am here trying to better my understanding if you all wouldn’t mind helping.

Background

Recently in our community, we’ve had a local county commissioner who is very outspoken about liberals and whatnot. That is NOT the point of this post, but it is necessary to point out that he is a community leader. This man is deeply religious, incredibly involved with his local congregation, and devoted to his faith. I’m truly happy that he’s found that in his life; it’s a good thing.

Most recently, however, he has been using language that targets constituents, labeling community members as evil, witches, Satan’s Spawn, demonically possessed, and so on. It’s crossed the line from just talk to concerning behavior. I understand that there are bureaucratic avenues to approach this within our community and I believe others are pursuing that, but this post is an attempt to understand the religious and theological roots of such language and beliefs.

After learning about his comments, I voiced my concern about him continuing to serve in the community. He did not respond, but many of his supporters did, referring to me as a Satan worshipper, a baby murderer, child mutilator, witch. I’m not here for sympathy and I don’t care about the name-calling (although name-calling from a community leader is quite different, but that’s for a separate discussion). But I did notice something interesting: the comments were coming from people (at least 20) who identified themselves with an organization called SSPX, which was the same congregation as the commissioner. I did some research and only found that they may or may not be accepted by Rome, but the most recent guidance from our local diocese is that SSPX is not in accordance with the Church.

My concern with all of this is two-fold: that an elected official genuinely believes that members of his community are Satan-worshippers and demonically possessed evil doers that need to be destroyed (his words) and that the congregation overwhelmingly believes the same.

I am approaching this from a psychological, human, and theological standpoint. Please leave politics out; I do not care. When attempting to engage with some of these parishioners, the replies are much the same in regard to evil, Satan, etc. which is why I’m here asking for guidance or clarification.

1.      Is there a faction of Catholicism that teaches this way? That it is their duty to call out evil and destroy it by any means? If so, what would that entail?

2.      I was taught that judging others is not a core part of the faith and that ultimate judgment belongs to God. Am I misunderstanding this? What is the boundary between calling out evil and passing judgment?

3.      What is the best way to approach parishioners who communicate in this way, in order to have a meaningful conversation? If there are any of you here in the group who share this perspective, I would appreciate your input.

I’m struggling to understand how members of my own community, neighbors, teachers, hairdressers, families we see at the park, could come to believe that the destruction of others is the way for objective good to prevail. The language being used is alarming and when anyone attempts to engage, they are met with insults and accusations.

For me, the ability to have a respectful conversation is more important now than ever. I just don’t know how to start that conversation of meet them on their side in a way that doesn’t provoke immediate hostility.

Thank you very much for any input you all may have.