Sins of Omission

Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator

The final episode of the popular sitcom "Seinfeld" finds the foursome witnessing a mugging. They simply stand and watch the tragic event, making a few comments but never lifting a finger to help the innocent victim. Shortly after they are all arrested and jailed for their "negligence." Not a few commentators on the program and many of the critics bemoaned the fact that the final episode didn't measure up to the usual standard. They had been expecting more.

I don't have any reason to believe that the various writers of this episode know the story from St. Luke's Gospel which we read at today's Eucharist. The story is peculiar to St. Luke's Gospel, appearing in none of the other accounts. It tells of Lazarus, a poor man who goes unnoticed by the unnamed rich man even though he sits at the door of the rich man's home. (For the sake of telling the story, commentators have given the rich man the name "Dives," the Latin word for "riches.") The tragedy of the story is that the rich man is condemned to the flames of torment for the same reason that Jerry Seinfeld and his compatriots are imprisoned; he and they didn't do anything. In the various moral text books, this is called a sin of omission.

Lent discipline usually focuses our attention of our sins of commission, on the sinful acts which we commit. However, the Scriptures today focus our attention on our seeming indifference to the plight of the poor. Our fasting is done in part to remind us of those who are hungry; our almsgiving is supposed to remind us of those who lack the basic necessities of life. While our politicians frequently cite the problems encountered by the middle class, they and society in general would rather divert our attention from those who lie on our doorsteps, who would search through our garbage receptacles looking for food, who sit on our street corners shaking plastic cups begging for spare change. If we continue to ignore them, we do so at our own peril.