Hypocrisy - a Parenthetical Observation

This is an overly-long parenthetical break in one of my sentences from the last post, so I thought I would isolate it as a separate post:

An interesting side note on what occasions hypocrisy, which I think I am reporting accurately, though it has been a long time since I read it: C. S. Lewis says somewhere that he will not speak in judgment upon those sins to which he is somewhat impervious – he will only speak to those sins which he finds himself tempted by and sometimes acting out. Some would regard this as hypocrisy – how dare he judge those who do what he has done? But his rationale is that he cannot account for what motivates those who commit sins that do not tempt him. He can only understand the weaknesses that he himself possesses. He can speak to the sinfulness of those actions because he knows it at first hand. I guess he avoids hypocrisy by being honest about his own shortcomings. My college girlfriend refused to identify anything as sinful which she did herself. She thought it was hypocrisy to do so. I thought it was a kind of solipsism that turns objective categories into subjective ones, that defines the world by one’s own personality.

There are some other interesting observations by Robert Miller and Richard John Neuhaus, over at First Things's blog. The substance of Miller's entry is best summed up by this line from his entry: "A man is not a hypocrite because he violates a moral norm in which he sincerely believes." Neuhaus moves off into the wider implications of the situation of Ted Haggard.