There are a variety of ways to approach the Gospel and the Ten Commandments. One approach views the Christian life through the lens of following rules.
This approach sees everything in Christianity as rules, and anyone who does not follow the rules is outside the Church and subject to God's wrath.
It is a bleak view of Christianity, as it tends to disregard any "wiggle room" in the faith, believing that one has to be absolutely perfect in everything in order to "deserve" to go to Heaven.
Mercy
St. Francis de Sales explains in his Introduction to the Devout Life that even some saints were misled by this approach and were too strict in their practice of Christianity:
In his early days, St. Bernard was very severe and harsh towards those whom he directed, telling them, to begin with, that they must put aside the body, and come to him with their minds only. In confession, he treated all faults, however small, with extreme severity, and his poor apprentices in the study of perfection were so urged onwards, that by dint of pressing he kept them back, for they lost heart and breath when they found themselves thus driven up so steep and high an ascent.
When justice is without mercy, it becomes cruel and difficult. It certainly is praiseworthy to strive after perfection, but not without chairty.
St. Francis de Sales then explains how God softened St. Bernard's heart:
[A]lthough it was his ardent zeal for the most perfect purity which led that great Saint so to act, and although such zeal is a great virtue, still it was a virtue which required checking. And so God Himself checked it in a vision, by which He filled St. Bernard with so gentle, tender, and loving a spirit, that he was altogether changed, blaming himself heavily for having been so strict and so severe, and becoming so kindly and indulgent, that he made himself all things to all men in order to win all.
We need to remember that God does not want simple “rule followers,” but sons and daughters who love him and others.
Mercy and charity must always remain the chief virtue we practice, dealing with ourselves and others in a way that reflects God’s own love for us.
