When trying to live a holy life, it can be really hard to balance how much to care about our reputations. Caring too much about how other people think of us is vanity, a form of pride, which takes our focus away from loving God, but caring too little about other people’s opinions without prudence can cause scandal, which inhibits evangelization as well. So where is the balancing line?

First of all, it is good to try to maintain a good reputation, which is defined as “the beliefs or opinions that are generally held about someone” (Oxford Language Dictionary). Some people might argue that we shouldn’t care about our reputations at all, but St. Peter writes that we should “maintain good conduct among the Gentiles, so that in case they speak against you as wrongdoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Peter 2:12). The truth is, we are constantly witnessing to the people around us, whether we want to or not. They see how we talk, how we act, and how we dress, and that can have a strong influence on how they think about the Church. Most people do not live in a Catholic, or even Christian, society. They may only know one or two people who are actively pursuing their faith, so to them we essentially become the face of the Church, and the face of Christ. If the people who look up to us see us pursuing goodness and faithfulness, they are often encouraged to pursue those things as well, but if they see us falling into sin, or even hear about it from elsewhere, then they start to believe that it’s ok to be lax in practicing the faith. Having the wrong reputation can also harm direct evangelizing efforts because we don’t practice what we preach, and that makes people much less likely to believe that what we say is true.

On the other hand, it is possible to care too much about one’s reputation as well. A good example of this can be seen in the Pharisees in the New Testament. This group of Jews were the leaders of Israel, both religiously and socially. They placed great emphasis on obeying the laws and being good people, from an external point of view. Yet, they were so focused on being seen as good that they held themselves above sinners, the poor, and the suffering, and were unwilling to mix with them for fear of staining their reputation. In contrast, Jesus talked and ate with sinners and social outcasts regularly, choosing to love them first and caring little about the social aftermath, yet never compromising his own morals. Caring too much about reputation means making it a goal rather than an effect. Having a good reputation as a side effect from doing good works can be helpful for evangelization, as mentioned above, but the moment concern for our reputation stops us from doing good works, we need to seriously reexamine our priorities. . Like the Pharisees, if we make having a good reputation our primary goal, we can start caring so much about how other people think of us that we start chasing their approval, causing us to lose sight of God in the process. 

One important fact to remember is that even if we are living a holy life, not everyone will think well of us all the time. Even Jesus was mocked and reviled, and He never sinned at all. A sad fact about modern society is that if people don’t agree with us, they are typically inclined to think badly of us, even if we have done nothing to deserve their disdain. Even so, we must ensure that we live our lives in such a way that even if people do become offended, it is the truth that offends them, and not the way we present it. We still must strive to keep our souls as clean as possible, even if our reputations suffer. Like Jesus, our reputations may be stained by false accusations, but our job is to ensure that they are not tarnished by our own misconduct or negligence. 

Having a good reputation is helpful for evangelization, but ultimately, there is only one person whose opinion of us really matters, and that is God. If you are ever facing a choice between maintaining a good reputation and being a good person, choose to be a good person, because your worldly reputation will not matter in Heaven.