Anger is evil.

Host: The sky was the color of bruised iron, the kind that threatens rain but never delivers it. The city below pulsed with light and noise, but inside the small, forgotten church, the world held its breath. The candles burned low, their flames trembling like fragile faith.

Host: Jack stood near the old piano, its keys yellowed, his hands in his pockets, his jaw tight. Jeeny knelt near the altar, her face illuminated by the faint glow of candlelight. Between them hung the ghost of the quote — “Anger is evil.” It lingered in the air, sharp and uncertain, like a question neither wanted to answer.

Jeeny: (quietly) “Jesse Lee Peterson said, ‘Anger is evil.’”

Jack: (snorts softly) “That’s a convenient thing to say — if you’ve never been wronged.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s exactly when you need to hear it most.”

Jack: “No. That’s when anger’s the only thing that reminds you you’re still alive.”

Jeeny: (rising, brushing dust from her knees) “Alive doesn’t mean righteous. Anger burns — it doesn’t build.”

Jack: “It builds if you know how to use it. The civil rights movement, revolutions, art — they were all born from rage. Martin Luther King said he was ‘deeply angry at injustice.’ Anger woke the world.”

Jeeny: “And yet he preached love, not wrath. His anger was transformed — purified. He didn’t feed it.”

Jack: (leaning on the piano) “But he needed it. Without it, love would’ve been naïve. Anger is the first honest response to evil.”

Jeeny: (steps closer) “And the last step before becoming what you hate.”

Host: The church seemed to tighten around them — the air thick, the shadows lengthening. The flame nearest Jack flickered wildly, reflecting in his eyes like a storm looking for a direction.

Jack: “You sound like you’ve never been angry.”

Jeeny: “I have. And it almost destroyed me. Anger is a parasite — it feeds on your wound until there’s nothing left but the wound itself.”

Jack: “You make it sound like forgiveness is some kind of exorcism.”

Jeeny: “Isn’t it?”

Host: The rain began to fall outside — slow, deliberate drops against the stained glass. Each one refracted light into colors that danced across Jeeny’s face.

Jack: “You think anger is evil. I think apathy is worse. Evil thrives not because people get angry — but because they stop caring.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. They start caring only about themselves. That’s what anger does — it blinds you with your own reflection. Evil begins when you believe your pain justifies cruelty.”

Jack: “So what — we’re supposed to swallow it? Smile through injustice?”

Jeeny: “No. But we can’t fight darkness with fire and expect to see clearly. Anger wants destruction. Justice wants transformation.”

Jack: “You talk like the two are separate.”

Jeeny: “They are. One’s a storm. The other’s a sunrise.”

Host: The wind rattled the stained glass, casting fragments of color across the pews. Jack turned away from her, his shoulders rigid. His voice came low, like confession dressed in defiance.

Jack: “When my father died, I didn’t cry. I was too angry. Angry at him for leaving, angry at myself for not being enough. And I carried that for years — that fire. It kept me sharp. Focused.”

Jeeny: (softly) “And lonely.”

Jack: (pauses) “Maybe.”

Jeeny: “That’s what anger does. It promises strength, but all it gives you is armor you can’t take off.”

Host: She approached him slowly, her hand brushing the piano, her voice steady, a kind of calm that could only come from scars.

Jeeny: “You remember Gandhi’s words? ‘An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.’ That’s not pacifism, Jack. That’s physics. Every blow needs balance, every hate breeds its twin.”

Jack: “And yet without anger, no one resists. Without the sting, no one wakes up.”

Jeeny: “The sting wakes you, yes. But you don’t live in the sting. You heal because you leave it behind.”

Host: The rain thickened, turning into a steady downpour. The candles hissed faintly, their flames wavering. The piano keys glowed white like teeth in the dark — silent, waiting.

Jack: “You know what’s evil, Jeeny? Not anger. Indifference. The people who watch the world burn and call it peace.”

Jeeny: “Indifference is death. Anger is decay. Neither gives life.”

Jack: “You really believe calm fixes everything?”

Jeeny: “Not calm. Compassion. They’re not the same.”

Jack: “Compassion’s useless in the face of cruelty.”

Jeeny: “No. It’s the only thing that outlasts it.”

Host: Her words landed softly — but they stayed, like smoke refusing to fade. Jack ran a hand through his hair, pacing slowly. His boots echoed against the wooden floor, the sound hollow, rhythmic, defiant.

Jack: “So what do you do when someone destroys your life? When they lie, steal, ruin? You just… forgive?”

Jeeny: “I forgive to keep them from destroying me twice.”

Jack: (after a pause) “And if forgiveness feels impossible?”

Jeeny: “Then start by wanting to want it.”

Host: The candles flickered lower. Only one still burned bright — between them, trembling like a witness. Jack looked at it for a long time before speaking.

Jack: “You think anger is evil. But maybe it’s just the body’s way of mourning fairness.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But mourning isn’t meant to be permanent.”

Jack: “Then tell me — how do you bury anger?”

Jeeny: “You don’t. You transform it. Into action. Into art. Into change. Into something that doesn’t poison what’s left of you.”

Host: The rain eased, tapering into silence. The church felt lighter somehow, as though the storm had washed something clean that wasn’t visible before.

Jack: “You think I could ever do that?”

Jeeny: “You already are — by admitting you’re angry. Evil hides. Truth confesses.”

Host: Jack smiled faintly, not out of joy, but recognition — the small, reluctant surrender of someone who’d been carrying too much for too long.

Jack: “You always make things sound simpler than they are.”

Jeeny: “No. I just believe healing’s not complicated — only painful.”

Jack: (softly) “So anger isn’t evil?”

Jeeny: “It is, when it becomes your language. But even evil can teach — if you stop letting it speak for you.”

Host: The last candle flickered once, then steadied, its flame tall and unwavering. Outside, the sky began to clear — faint light seeping through the stained glass, painting the floor in shades of renewal.

Host: Jack and Jeeny stood in silence, their reflections merging in the sheen of the piano lid — two shapes, two souls, no longer arguing but understanding.

Host: The camera would have pulled back slowly — through the arched doorway, past the rain-soaked steps, out into the waiting dawn.

Host: And as the first ray of sunlight touched the cross at the church’s peak, Jesse Lee Peterson’s words echoed not as condemnation, but revelation:

Host: “Anger is evil — not because it exists, but because it demands to rule. And only when the heart learns to forgive does it remember its true design: not to burn, but to light.”