Today’s OT reading was about Abraham “bargaining” with God about saving the city of Sodom from destruction via fire and brimstone. There are a number of themes one could take from this story, including the importance of intercessory prayer. My priest chose the notion of guilt by association. He had a heavy accent so I wasn’t able to take in everything he said, missing a few key words and sentences.

My thoughts bounced from the destruction of Sodom as being a metaphor for hell, to wondering why the innocent had to die from ‘guilt by association’, since I assumed not everyone there was sodomizing. Then it hit me. If we live in a society where sodomy has been normalized, and prenatal murder legalized – and we say and do nothing about it – we are not innocent. We are guilty by association, and our souls die by our passive cooperation with evil in the choice to remain silent. It makes perfect sense.

Cowardice and silence to avoid offending people are not valid excuses. As the great Archbishop Fulton Sheen once said, “The refusal to take sides on great moral issues is itself a decision. It is a silent acquiescence to evil.”  This is true regardless of how popular the moral evil has become.