In the book "Louis XIV," Richard Wilkinson describes a scene where King Louis XIV of France questions his courtier, the Prince of Conde;

Concerts, ballets and plays culminated with Moliere's "Tartuffe" - a brilliant satire on religious hypocrisy, which infuriated the "devots" headed by the queen-mother. To his credit Louis - who found the play hilarious - defended Moliere. "Why do people get upset by Tartuffe and not by blasphemous plays like Scarmouche?" Louis asked Conde. "Because nobody minds God being attacked, whereas in Tartuffe they themselves are ridiculed," was the reply.

- Louis XIV, Richard Wilkinson, 2nd edition, page 97. Note; I don't agree that the play was all that righteous; my main focus is on religious hypocrisy that these lines reveal. Also, I de-Italicized some of the words because they did some weird stuff with the text.

I think that this short section of a secular book tells us the problem with many people who believe, whether pastors or not; they are often slow to criticize attacks on God, while being all too willing to defend themselves from whatever criticism is thrown their way. I admit, I ought to be more diligent in getting my ideas from my brain to a blog. I say this as a show that I'm not immune to this issue, either. I read stories that get me riled up, feeling hostile, such as the Negotiations-verse. I read stories that... go too far against what I believe, such as Unshaken and Rekindled Embers. My main excuse to myself (and I suppose I try to pass off to God) is that curiosity has it's hold on me and I want to see how these end.

What do we do about this and things like it?

Well, first we need to examine ourselves; is this thing or action good? Does it produce good? Does it causes others to want to do good? Are we trying to hide something from others because we know that it goes against what we believe or what we preach? Are we putting on a mask to pretend to comply with our beliefs while inwardly, secretly, and privately breaking them?

Second, we have to admit we have a problem; that we're not practicing what we preach, and that that's wrong, and confess these sins to God (in other words, agree truly with God that those things we've been doing are wrong).

Third, prayer. We need to pray for forgiveness and for strength and courage to resist these things, and for others who are going through these same sins and temptations. We need to pray for God to reveal these things within us, and to guide us to reject and move away from them out of love for God and the realization that He knows better than us (que the song from que the song from Joseph; King of Dreams).

Fourth, we need to take steps to try to fix the problem. Man having a sin nature since the Fall, these fixes will not be perfect in what we come up with, nor in the execution of said fixes. But at least it's trying, which is in itself progress from what we were doing before.

We do need to recognize hypocrisy, most of all within ourselves; it's all too easy to point a finger at someone else's flaws without examining our own (Matthew 7:3-5). In the light of the Ravi Zacharias scandal, and given our own realizations of what we do and what we ourselves do hypocritically, we need to recognize and deal with the problems within each of us. Thanks be to God that we have a graceful, just, and forgiving Master who paid the price for our sins that those who believe in Him shall be saved in eternity, though perhaps not from temporal consequences of our sins; can't slap a parent or policeman in the face without consequences, after all.

May God indeed expose our flaws, that we may repent of them, and seek His guidance, all to His glory. To Him be all praise, honor, and glory, now and forever. Amen.

It's very telling that your post got a dislike before it got any likes: dare I call it ironic, given the subject matter? It would seem as though the Prince of Conde really knew what he was talking about.