Unfortunately, this is not always the way it's applied. Vicious actions, demeaning rules, exclusion, separation and discrimination are all justified under the guise of "hating the sin". In those cases, it has had the opposite of the intended effect. The person - that human - has become nothing but the sin. The effects "fighting" that sin has on real people become unimportant; we love them, after all. It's just the sin we're against.

It saddens me that this beautiful, unifying phrase is turned so often into ugliness. Yet, perhaps, it still holds promise. Not alone, but, like the Christian god, as a triumvate interrelated so closely that they are all one, yet separate. Instead of just "love the sinner, hate the sin", we'd see it flanked by two equally important phrases: "Judge not lest ye be judged" and "Let he without sin cast the first stone."

I'm in no hurry to pick up a rock. How about you?