Who's Your Lazarus?

12-years-old, 13 at the most. 

Just last week, a New York middle school student was arrested for sending child porn to other students and using these images to force his victims – the same age as he was -- to send nude photos in return. Once he received them, he used what was sent to extort money from them: “Send me cash or I will make known to the world who you are.”

New York police and the FBI say that there could be hundreds of possible victims. Hundreds.

Let that sink-in for a moment: a child using pornography to entice other children to engage in lude, illegal and sinful acts. A child using other children – his own peers -- for sex and money.

We should weep at that thought.

And we should be asking the really hard questions: how did we as a society allow this to happen? Has modern technology become a dangerous weapon in the hands of so many who are too young to use it properly? Have we become so desensitized that we unknowingly turn others around us into objects to suit our own selfish needs and desires?

At the heart of Luke’s Gospel story concerning the rich man’s treatment of Lazarus, there is an important focus on the power of wealth and comfort to oftentimes blind us to the needs of the poor, many of whom sit outside our businesses and along our city sidewalks asking for money, food or a method for finding harmful substances to feed an addiction and dull their pain. The Lord will continue to challenge us as a Church and as individual disciples to find ways to respond compassionately to the Lazaruses who come into our lives, often at inconvenient times. Most of the saints have found from their own experiences that these women and men who shake us out of our comfort zones are Christ in disguise, dressed in rags, smelling stale, and quite irksome in their demeanor.

But there’s another important lesson not to be overlooked here in the interaction of the Rich Man and Lazarus: notice what happens once death comes for the wealthy homeowner. Instead of feeling remorse or crying-out to God for mercy, instead he tells Father Abraham to send Lazarus with a cool, moist finger to quench the flames that tormented him in the hereafter.

Even in death, the rich man only saw Lazarus as one to be used. Even then – when all is made known to us -- the once-materially-poor man (now blessed beyond measure in heaven) was treated as nothing more than an object, a nothing.

Which begs the question of all of us: in what ways are we using others as objects? In what ways are we treating them as nothings?

There are countless ways we do it. We gossip about another. Slander another via social media or among friends. We sometimes get so caught-up in our own lives that those around us aren’t even seen. They become bit players in our spotlighted drama called “Me, Myself and I.”

I can’t tell you the number of times at Wawa (of course) in which I watch a customer – usually on a phone – snub or ignore the cashier who is politely attempting to engage them in the niceties expected of service workers. They become the Lazaruses at our door.

Using others cheapens them and turns us into what Amos identifies as the complacent ones. Woe to us for the ways in which we do so.

Which brings me back to that broken, lost middle-school student who used his peers for sex-extortion. Look what pornography has done to this young man. Look what it has done to his victims. Look what it is doing to all of us.

There is no doubt we are drowning in porn as a society. And I spend enough time in the Confessional to know that it is destroying lives, stealing purity, ruining marriages (and relationships) and objectifying others in a way that only Satan could have designed.

What God has made beautiful and to be a gift – that of our sexuality and intercourse within marriage -- the power of evil has twisted it to become selfish, harmful and destructive to souls. Sex and the human person has become nothing but the new Lazarus at the door of our rich, empty hearts.

And we can no longer be complacent. As 1Timothy states: “But you, [child] of God, pursue righteousness, devotion, faith, love, patience and gentleness. Keep the commandment without stain and reproach.” In other words, fight back.

Gentlemen, to you I speak in a special way: so many of you were exposed to pornography long before you could process what you were seeing. Studies show that most young men of your generation were 7 or 8 years old when you first saw the improper misuse of sex and the human person. That breaks my heart. It should be breaking all of ours.

The world will tell us there is no harm in watching or using it to satisfy our urges. Tune them out. Shut them down. They are lying. Pornography changes how you see women and view yourself. Porn is selfish and addictive. A life of porn is the wide road that leads to hell, both in this life and in the life to come.

Ladies, I know that your relationship to pornography is somewhat different, although I am hearing that even this is changing for you, as well. In the age of women’s empowerment and equal rights (all of which is good), I simply ask this question: how are the men in your life turning you into Lazarus at the door? How might you be an object to be used in all the ways that selfish boys use women? (I employ the word ‘boy’ intentionally here – authentic men stand-up for you and your purity and treat you as coheirs to the Kingdom of God. Real men strive to make you saints as they themselves strive for holiness in their own lives.)

Take Amos’ challenge to heart: don’t become complacent in the world of porn in which the world seems to be drowning. Fight the urge to turn others into a naked Lazarus object used for your own selfishness.

If you are struggling with the addiction, start with Confession. You may have to go more than once – some wounds take a long time to heal. Pray to Our Lady, St. Joseph and/or a favorite saint of yours: they are here to battle on our behalf and intercede for us in our desire for new beginnings and sanctity. Also, if necessary: keep the phone away from you when you are tired, angry, hurting or lonely. Know your triggers. 



And whatever you do: don’t give up the battle for your soul’s purity. Complacency is one of Satan’s greatest weapons to use against us. May we fight for ourselves as I wish someone had fought for a very lost and broken New York boy who got lost in the evil selfishness of pornography. Fight back!