For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written.
Ver. 24. For the name of God, &c.] Heretics and hypocrites do still with Judas deliver up the Lord Christ to the scoffs and buffetings of his enemies. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, i. 52) complains of the ancient heretics, that in them many evil-minded men found matter of blaspheming the name of Christ because they also pretended to the Christian religion. Epiphanius addeth, that for the looseness of such men's lives, and the baseness of their tenets, many of the heathens shunned the company of Christians, and would not be drawn to hear their sermons. Origen before them both cries out, Nunc male audiunt, castiganturque vulgo Christiani, quod aliter quam sapientibus convenit vivant, et vitia sub obtentu nominis celent, &c. There is an ill report goes of Christians for their unchristian conversation, &c. Ammianus Marcellinus, a heathen historian, deeply taxeth the pride, luxury, contentions, covetousness of the bishops in his time, and the deadly hatreds of common Christians. Nullae infestae hominibus bestiae sunt, ut sibi ferales plerique Christiani, saith he. A sad thing that a heathen should see and detest such hellish miscarriages among Christians. Bellarmine telleth us of certain hereties anciently called Christianocategori, that is, accusers of Christians, because for their sakes Christians were accused as worshippers of idols. a Papists give the same offence to Jews, who call scandal Chillul Hesham, a profaning of God's name, which they hold the greatest of sins.
a De Eccles. Triumph. lib. ii. 11.