None of my business

"For Herod had seized John and bound him and put him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, because John had been saying to him, 'It is not lawful for you to have her'" (Matthew 14:3-4).

Imagine going up to a king or a congressman or your next-door neighbor and getting in his business about some immoral slump he's fallen into. Or did the Baptizer get a pass because he wore that weird hair shirt and ate locusts in the desert?

A few years ago my neighbors, whose only son was aged 20, took in a young girl, aged 16, who was on the outs with her parents. I thought it was a bad idea but said nothing. Now they have a 3-year-old grandson.

More recently, the people a few houses down started letting the boyfriend of their 16-year-old have sleepovers (downstairs on the sofa, to be sure), the better to get to know him and make him feel at home. I said nothing. Their daughter announced to them last Sunday that she was pregnant.

I suppose there are always folks who are only too eager to play the prophet Nathan (2 Samuel 12), but that is not most often the problem. We usually err on the side of silence. This, in spite of the fact that I myself have always benefited by the few courageous ones in my life who have gently (or not) told me that something I was doing was lunacy.

The cult of "mind your own business" is based more in lovelessness than politeness. We are called to be watchmen (Ezekiel 33), to warn of coming danger. We are commanded to "save others by snatching them out of the fire" (Jude 23). "Let a righteous man strike me---it is a kindness" (Psalm 141:5).

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