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Exploring the word

25 Jul 2010 - Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

ASKING FOR HELP is a curiously difficult thing to do. Once we're no longer kids, we take a distinct pride in being self-sufficient. Back in college I remember signing a lease on a basement apartment for the summer. It was a bargain: only 12 dollars a week. But it came with a plumbing problem: Each time it rained, the water flooded up to my knees. Needless to say, the mold was acute. Mushrooms grew in the bathroom. But I would not complain to the absent landlords nor would I dream of asking my parents for a bailout. I was going to live with my choices, even if the consequences were insanely undesirable. We joke about being unable to ask for directions while hopelessly lost. We allow debt to grow over our heads but refuse to call the financial counselor. Our marriages chill to the point of freezing but we don’t seek the assistance of Retrouvaille. We're lonely but won't leave the house. We know we're drinking too much but won't visit AA. We're unwell but won't see a doctor. We sin and don't go to Confession. Pride keeps us from taking a single step out of the misery in which we find ourselves mired. So we can understand how the folks in Sodom and Gomorrah got in way over their heads and didn't have the sense to cry for mercy. Abraham, who didn't even live in those cities, was the only person willing to make the case for their pardon, for the sake of the innocent. He asked and asked, bargaining God down on the number, and God relented each time. Abraham, however, never asked for fewer than ten innocents. He relied on the goodness of others too much, and so two cities wound up in ruins. If only someone in Sodom had been asking, too! If only one person on each block would seek mercy for our modern cities, perhaps fewer of them would suffer social degradation and ruin. Maybe we should have designated Prayer Watch reps in each neighborhood to guarantee the safety of the populace. Ask, Jesus says, and you will receive. The problem lies in that too many of us refuse to ask. Pride won't allow us to admit there's a problem or that it's our problem and not someone else's. Pride won't take the risk of appearing weak, foolish, or wrong—yet mortality ensures that we're frail, lacking in knowledge, and error-prone. We deny our nature when we deny these things, and we put ourselves in jeopardy—and the people we care about most in jeopardy, too—when we refuse to ask for the help we need. Don't settle for a snake when what you really need is a fish. Related scripture links Actually, God will save eight: 2 Pet. 3:20 God doesn't sleep: Ps. 121:3-4 Thy will, not my will: Mark 14:35-36; Matt. 26:39-42; Luke 22:40-42 What's above, what's below: Col. 3:1-3; Phil. 4:8 Pray unceasingly: Eph. 6:18; Phil. 4:6; Col. 4:2; 1 Thess. 5:17 Catechism links Justice: CCC 1807; 2411-2412 Sin: CCC 1846-1869 Forgiveness: CCC 601-618; 654; 1441-1442; 1474-1477

Authors Alice Camille

ask for help sodom and gomorrah Mercy Pride Abraham

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Exploring the word

24 Jul 2022 - Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Crime-and-punishment has been a relatively simple equation throughout history. Break a law, and you receive the due consequences. Some cultures preferred to employ the death sentence for offenses we would consider mere infractions or moral lapses. Some punishments, too, seem outsized and disproportionate: wiping out a whole family or village in retribution for a single murder. Striving for a higher morality, some adopted a strict eye-for-an-eye code, aiming for an even-steven balance of justice. But few if any questioned the need for punishment outright. The wages of sin equal death. Letting people off the hook was not an option. Attempts to fathom the morality of God, the ultimate judge, were no doubt colored by the moral sensibility of each generation’s primitive theologians. Would God afflict a child for the sin of her parents, or extract revenge for an offense through multiple generations? Would an army face defeat because of the disobedience of one soldier? Would an entire nation suffer for the failures of its king? In the stories of scripture, particularly the Old Testament, we often see the wrath of an angry God in full display. Moses had his hands full keeping God from destroying the tribes of Israel altogether. The prophets delivered God’s warnings and threats as a full-time occupation. The story of Eden is a kind of apologetics for the sum total of misery in the world: We asked for it, and we deserve it. Cain and Abel, Noah’s ark, the tower of Babel, the entire protohistory of Genesis seeks to explain the reason for the world’s ills through the lens of moral failure. If God is angry with us, God has reasons. Sodom and Gomorrah No two towns have ever had quite the reputation of Sodom and Gomorrah. Of the two, Sodom evidently outstripped Gomorrah for the prize of most dissolute, because its name often stands alone in future references. Familiar to many of us as one of the “clobber passages” against homosexuality, many scholars today understand the overarching sin of Sodom to be the scandal of inhospitality to strangers. “Inhospitality” seems a weak term to describe gang rape, but this violent hostility toward outsiders is described in other passages about Sodom as the end result of a society based on greed, selfishness, and indifference to the needs of others. Sodom’s abuse of travelers stands in shocking contrast to Abraham’s welcome of these same strangers in last week’s reading. It would be hard to explain the horrendous behavior of the Sodomites with the modern understanding of the homosexual orientation. Of the nearly two dozen other references to the city in the Bible, the Letter of Jude alone hints at a sexual component to its criminality. However the guilt of these cities is interpreted, no doubt remains that their names become a byword for God’s absolute justice in response to the wicked. What Abraham seeks to do in his dickering with God is therefore astounding. He doesn’t simply appeal to God for eye-for-an-eye justice: kill the wicked, spare the innocent. Rather, Abraham attempts to use the innocent themselves as barter for a full pardon for all. Does the presence of 50 guiltless citizens mitigate the sinfulness of hundreds or thousands? Abraham suggests that it does, and that amnesty for all is how the “judge of all the world” shows justice. In this debate, Abraham appears at first glance to be more moral than God. The flood story of old revealed God’s impatience with sinners and the desire to wipe them out and spare only the eight good people of Noah’s family. Abraham argues for more than that. For the sake of 10 righteous people, he asks God to forego judgment altogether. Christian implications The rabbis point out that Abraham’s argument planted a new idea in the traditional understanding of sin and judgment. Later, Jeremiah carried it further in asserting that Jerusalem would be spared if one good person could be found. Unhappily he, like Abraham, could not meet the specified quota, and destruction followed in both cases. Rabbinic literature contains the notion that 36 righteous people are responsible for the preservation of the world in each generation. Should we fail to make our quota, the Earth will not endure. Christians believe that the salvation of humanity is achieved in the sacrifice of one man, whose innocent blood takes away the sin of the world. For the sake of the one, sin is remitted and the sting of death is overthrown. Abraham started something in his ancient debate. He began a bartering process that created a new way of thinking about crime and punishment. The Christian brand of amnesty goes by the name forgiveness, which means “to cover.” Our debt of sin is covered by our participation in forgiveness—as we give, so shall we receive. Jesus argues for the superior morality of God when he points out that the rest of us do the right thing even when we don’t want to, if sufficiently bothered or inconvenienced by the alternative. If the wicked can be good to their children, surely God can be good to humanity—even when we don’t deserve it—for the sake of the relationship. Applying the word Nailed to the cross Saint Paul refers to sin as the bond against us—the debt that holds our very freedom in the balance. The legal case against us is grim and unlikely, but we have nothing to fear. Jesus Christ snatches up the accounting that damns us and nails it to the cross that is our rescue. In the sacrifice of his innocent life, our debt is canceled. He pays the bond so that we don’t have to. We demonstrate our gratitude by setting free those whom are bound by their debt to us. When considering even the best of the ancient alternatives, like eye-for-an-eye justice, Christian forgiveness is a remarkable moral advancement, not to mention the best deal we sinners are likely to get. Forgiveness of sin is what Abraham, in a theologically primitive sense, may have been bargaining for that day near the Dead Sea. He didn’t have that word in his vocabulary, but that old patriarch knew instinctively that God could do far better than crime and punishment. Related scripture links The wages of sin: Rom. 6:23 Eye for an eye: Exod. 21:23-25; Lev. 24:19-20; but see also Isa. 43:24-25 Punishments for generations: Exod. 20:5-6; 34:6-7; Num. 14:18; Deut. 5:9-10; Jer. 31:29-30; 32:18 Moses saves the nation from God’s wrath: Exod. 32:7-14; Num. 14:10-23 Protohistory: Gen 1-11:9 “Clobber passages”: Lev. 18:22; 20:13; Rom. 1:26-27; 1 Cor. 6:9-10; 1 Tim. 1:10 References to Sodom and/or Gomorrah: Deut. 29:22; 32:32; Wisd. 10:6-7; Isa. 1:9-10; Jer. 23:14; 49:18; 50:40; Lam. 4:6; Ezek. 16:46-58; Amos 4:11; Zeph. 2:9; Matt. 10:11-15; 11:23; Luke 10:10-12; 17:28-29; 2 Pet. 2:6; Jude 7; Rev. 11:8 Righteous save the unrighteous: Isa. 53:1-12; Jer 5:1; but see also Ezek. 14:12-23 Catechism links Justice: CCC 1807; 2411-2412 Sin: CCC 1846-1869 Forgiveness: CCC 601-618; 654; 1441-1442; 1474-1477

Authors Alice Camille

sodom and gomorrah Forgiveness eye-for-an-eye justice

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Featured Exploring the Word

27 Jul 2025 - Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Asking for help is a curiously difficult thing to do. Once we're no longer kids, we take a distinct pride in being self-sufficient. Back in college I remember signing a lease on a basement apartment for the summer. It was a bargain: only $12 a week. But it came with a plumbing problem: Each time it rained, the water flooded up to my knees. Needless to say, the mold was acute. Mushrooms grew in the bathroom. But I would not complain to the absent landlords nor would I dream of asking my parents for a bailout. I was going to live with my choices, even if the consequences were insanely undesirable. We joke about being unable to ask for directions while hopelessly lost. We allow debt to grow over our heads but refuse to call the financial counselor. Our marriages chill to the point of freezing, but we don’t seek the assistance of couples counselors. We're lonely but won't leave the house. We know we're drinking too much but won't visit AA. We're unwell but won't see a doctor. We sin and don't go to Confession. Pride keeps us from taking a single step out of the misery in which we find ourselves mired. So we can understand how the folks in Sodom and Gomorrah got in way over their heads and didn't have the sense to cry for mercy. Abraham, who didn't even live in those cities, was the only person willing to make the case for their pardon, for the sake of the innocent. He asked and asked, bargaining God down on the number, and God relented each time. Abraham, however, never asked for fewer than 10 innocents. He relied on the goodness of others too much, and so two cities wound up in ruins. If only someone in Sodom had been asking, too! If only one person on each block would seek mercy for our modern cities, perhaps fewer of them would suffer social degradation and ruin. Maybe we should have designated Prayer Watch reps in each neighborhood to guarantee the safety of the populace. Ask, Jesus says, and you will receive. The problem lies in that too many of us refuse to ask. Pride won't allow us to admit there's a problem or that it's our problem and not someone else's. Pride won't take the risk of appearing weak, foolish, or wrong—yet mortality ensures that we're frail, lacking in knowledge, and error-prone. We deny our nature when we deny these things, and we put ourselves in jeopardy—and the people we care about most in jeopardy, too—when we refuse to ask for the help we need. Don't settle for a snake when what you really need is a fish. Related scripture links Actually, God will save eight: 2 Pet. 3:20 God doesn't sleep: Ps. 121:3-4 Thy will, not my will: Mark 14:35-36; Matt. 26:39-42; Luke 22:40-42 What's above, what's below: Col. 3:1-3; Phil. 4:8 Pray unceasingly: Eph. 6:18; Phil. 4:6; Col. 4:2; 1 Thess. 5:17 Catechism links Justice: CCC 1807; 2411-2412 Sin: CCC 1846-1869 Forgiveness: CCC 601-618; 654; 1441-1442; 1474-1477 Adapted from a previously published Exploring the word.

Authors Alice Camille

self-sufficiency ask for help sodom and gomorrah ask and you will receive Pride

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